Decades in the making, our series, Let's Talk About It, Oklahoma!, remains one of our most popular events. Every semester, a new theme is selected for this Oklahoma Humanities-sponsored book club series. Books are free to borrow from the program and anyone may participate. Join us for illuminating presentations and community-building through group discussions. Delve into topics from civil rights, to history, to mystery 鈥� and beyond!
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Current Season of at 大象传媒
Free loaner copies of books available at Dulaney-Browne Library! Availability is on a first-come, first-serve basis.
This season's theme:
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"Myths Made Modern"
Even the oldest myths never grow old, enjoying rediscoveries and retellings in almost every generation. Myths remain popular because they simultaneously entertain and make us think. They connect us to other peoples, eras, and cultures through imaginative storytelling, the artistry of language, and the resonant power of metaphor. As a form of 鈥渟acred history,鈥� they represent belief systems of past or 鈥減rimitive鈥� cultures that use fantastical tales to speak to real, lived experiences and ways of attempting to make sense of the world. Myths blend adventure, endurance, and magic to help us connect to timeless human experiences.
The Jeanne Hoffman Smith Center for Film & Literature will be hosting two sessions, reading the first two books in the theme "Myths Made Modern," which focuses on contemporary retellings of ancient myths. In our sessions, we'll read reimagined stories from The Iliad and The Odyssey.
Please note that, due to recent federal funding cuts to all state humanities councils, this fall Oklahoma Humanities is offering an "Abridged" edition of Let's Talk About it, with single-book sessions in August and September only.
To learn more about the books and theme, click for a copy of the full series essay. Printed copies of the theme essay will also be available with book check-out. If the program's copies of the books run out, community members are also welcome to join with their own copies!
The first session will be held August 26th and books are available now!
All sessions will take place at 6:30 p.m. Tuesdays, at 大象传媒
Petree College of Arts & Sciences Walker Center, Room 151
NW 26th and N. Florida
Each session features a short lecture, followed by small-group discussion of the book.
| DATE | BOOK TITLE | PRESENTER |
|---|---|---|
| AUG. 26 | Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller (2011) | Jason Stephenson, Scholar |
| SEPT. 16 | The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood (2005) | Dr. Harbour Winn, Center Director Emeritus |
Free parking is available in the lots surrounding the building.
Thanks to our partnership with Oklahoma Humanities, we've been given the ability to go back in time! Take a trip down memory lane and scroll through an extensive list of every Let's Talk About It theme from the past.
| YEAR | THEME |
|---|---|
| SPRING 2025 | Most American: A United We Stand Theme |
| FALL 2024 | Of Shadows and Light: Stories of African American Resilience |
| SPRING 2024 | Where We Come Together |
| FALL 2023 | Native American Identity: From Past to Present |
| SPRING 2023 | Immigration Stories in Contemporary Fiction: Suspended Between Borders |
| FALL 2022 | Speculative Women, Future Bodies |
| SPRING 2022 | Memories, Memorials, & Painful Pasts: A More Perfect Union Theme |
| FALL 2021 | Travel, New Ways of Seeing |
| SPRING 2020 | Working to Survive, Surviving to Work |
| FALL 2019 | Coming and Going in Oklahoma Indian Country |
| SPRING 2019 | Wade in the Water |
| FALL 2018 | Living with Limits |
| SPRING 2018 | War, Not War, and Peace: A Pulitzer Prize Centennial Series |
| FALL 2017 | The American Frontier: A Pulitzer Prize Centennial Series |
| SPRING 2017 | Young Adult Crossover Fiction: Crumbling Borders between Adolescents and Adults |
| FALL 2016 | Civil Rights and Equality: A Pulitzer Prize Centennial Series |
| SPRING 2016 | Play Ball |
| FALL 2015 | Hope Amidst Hardships |
| SPRING 2015 | The Dynamics of Dysfunction: To Laugh or Cry or Both |
| FALL 2014 | Oklahoma Private Investigations |
| SPRING 2014 | Muslim Journeys: American Stories |
| FALL 2013 | Making Sense of the American Civil War |
| SPRING 2013 | Myth and Literature |
| FALL 2012 | Native American Writers of the Plains |
| SPRING 2012 | The Oklahoman Experience: From Wilderness to Metropolis |
| FALL 2011 | Much Depends on Dinner: What We Eat and What It Says About Us |
| SPRING 2011 | What America Reads: Myth Making in Popular Fiction |
| FALL 2010 | Rebirth of a Nation: Nationalism and the Civil War |
| SPRING 2010 | Journey Stories |
| FALL 2009 | The Worst Hard Time Revisited: Oklahoma in the Dust Bowl Years |
| SPRING 2009 | Do You See What I See: Growing Up in the Wide World? Contemporary World Literature |
| FALL 2008 | American Icons: The American President |
| SPRING 2008 | Mysterious Fears and Ghastly Longings |
| FALL 2007 | Crime and Comedy: The Lighter Side of Crime and Misdemeanor |
| SPRING 2007 | The Oklahoma Experience: The Thirties |
| FALL 2006 | Invisibility and Identity: The Search for Self in African American Fiction |
| SPRING 2006 | The Journey Inward: Women's Autobiography |
| FALL 2005 | Piercing the Quilt, Stirring the Stew: Ethnic American Women's Voices |
| SPRING 2005 | The Oklahoma Experience: Re-Vision - Reading and Discussing |
| FALL 2004 | Vietnam |
| SPRING 2004 | Crime and Punishment |
| FALL 2003 | The American Renaissance |
| SPRING 2003 | Friendship in Literature: Reading and Discussing |
| FALL 2002 | The Gilded Age: The Emergence of Modern America |
| SPRING 2002 | Private Investigations: Hard-Boiled and Soft-Hearted Heroes |
| FALL 2001 | Liberty and Violence: The Heritage of the French Revolution |
| SPRING 2001 | Many Trails, Many Tribes: Images of American Indians in Contemporary Fiction |
| FALL 2000 | Individual Rights and Community in America |
| SPRING 2000 | Making a Living, Making a Life: Work and its Rewards in a Changing America |
| FALL 1999 | The Unknown Americans: Contemporary Latin American Literature |
| SPRING 1999 | Generation to Generation: Contemporary Young Adult Fiction |
| FALL 1998 | Being Ethnic, Becoming American: Struggles, Successes, Symbols |
| SPRING 1998 | Writing Worlds: The Art of Seeing in Anthropology, Fiction, and Autobiography |
For more information, check out the
