FLAGSTAFF — “The Border: Words and Music by Peg Bowden and Natalia Serna” will be presented at 7 p.m. Monday, April 20 in Liberal Arts 136, Building 19 at Northern Arizona University. The event is free and open to the public.
The event features a reading from Bowden’s latest book, A Land of Hard Edges (Peer Publishing 2014). The reading will be interspersed with music by Colombian singer-songwriter Natalia Serna, who sings to deported people at a soup kitchen in Nogales, Sonora. Serna will sing these songs and others about her experiences at el comedor.
Bowden is a retired nurse who volunteers at a migrant shelter el comedor in Nogales, Sonora. She currently writes a blog called “La Frontera: The Border” based on her experiences with people she meets at the shelter. As a resident on the borderlands (her home is only 12 miles from the U.S. Mexico Border), Bowden was thrust into the immigration crisis and the complex situations of migrants. Her new book, A Land of Hard Edges, focuses on her experiences with the pilgrims crossing our borders seeking a better life. Investigating why thousands of people are willing to risk their lives crossing into the Sonoran desert, Bowden begins to understand the complexities of human migration, and the power of love and family.
Serna is a singer/songwriter living in Nogales, Sonora. She grew up in Colombia on her father’s coffee plantation. The people she meets who are traveling north and across the border inspire her songs and lyrics. Natalia volunteers at el comedor, a migrant aid station operated by Jesuits. Her songs add a powerful healing element to the difficult journeys that the migrants face.
The event will be in English; Serna’s songs are in Spanish.
This Immigration Awareness Series is sponsored by College of Arts and Letters, the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences, Comparative Cultural Studies, Global Languages and Cultures, Honors College, Latin American Studies, NAU No More Deaths, and the Student Activities Council.
Send an email to latinamericanstudies@nau.edu or call 928-523-0064 for more information.