Books

Léa Roback (1903-2000) was well-known for her seven decades of activist work in Quebec, especially her union and women’s rights activism. This biography provides readers with an opportunity to read about Roback’s activist life and work from the perspective of one of her great-nieces, who is an activist herself. At a time when the geo-political moment has produced polarized views and a lack of dialogue, Roback’s ability to cross-borders – linguistic, religious, cultural, and class borders – to work towards social justice needs to be documented and shared. The biography will be of interest to educators and social justice activists around the world.

Our Children are Your Students reports on the various tactics that LGBTQ families use to work with schools that don’t anticipate the arrival of their families and children. The book features a verbatim theatre script called Out at School, which is based on interviews conducted with 37 LGBTQ families about their experiences in school. The play contains 22 scenes of verbatim monologues and dialogues. A set of images created by visual artist benjamin lee hicks accompanies each scene. The play also contains three original songs composed by musician Kael Reid, who draws on a number of the themes embedded in the scenes. Links to performances of the songs and to the artwork are available on taragoldstein.com

Over the four seasons of Women Writing Letters, a literary performance series curated by Gailey Road Productions (2011-2015) sixty-one women identifying writers and artists wrote and performed a variety of letters on a variety of topics sharing experiences of everyday life. The series featured both established and up-and-coming writers reviving the art of letter writing.

Edited with my colleague David Selby at the beginning of a new century, Weaving Connections is a call to action by progressive educators to teach and live in respect and balance.