The Oklahoma Experience: Looking for Home
Let’s Talk About It, Oklahoma (LTAIO) offers more than your average book club for adults. With the added benefit of a humanities scholar to inform and broaden discussions, participants are able to explore the human experience through literature in meaningful and thought-provoking ways.
A series consists of 4-5 sessions, each featuring a book from the chosen discussion theme. A humanities scholar opens each session telling about the author’s life, giving historical context to the book, sharing its contemporary relevance, and explaining how the book ties into the overarching theme. Participants then discuss their own thoughts about the book.
In April, we are offering the series “The Oklahoma Experience: Looking for Home.” The books in this series all reflect the search for home by different people at different times. Sign up at the front desk and get a copy of the first book. All discussion will take place at 6:30 p.m. in the upstairs meeting room.
The White Man’s Road by Benjamin Capps Monday, April 3
Capps begins his novel after the Comanche have been on the Fort Sill Reservation for about a generation. The book depicts the change in Comanche life from an extended, communal society to one centered on the nuclear family. Dr. John Coward of TU will lead the discussion.
Sundown by John Joseph Mathews on Monday, April 10
Mathew’s semi-autobiographical novel depicts the dilemma of the mixed blood Indian—the frequent result of the Osages’ encounter with the “white man’s road.” Dr. Bill Corbett will lead the discussion.
Walking on Borrowed Land by William Owens on Monday, April 17
Texas writer William A. Owens used his extensive study of black folklore to create the story of a fictional black community in Oklahoma in the 1930s. Dr. Kurt Lively of TCC will lead the discussion.
Bound for Glory by Woody Guthrie on Monday, May 1
Publication of Woody Guthrie’s Bound for Glory brought critical acclaim to the Oklahoman who fancied himself the poet of the people—and here indeed, as the critcs said, was a new voice in the land, telling the story of the dispossessed. Dr. Andrew Vassar of NSU will lead the discussion.
Books, theme materials, and services for this series are provided by “Let’s Talk About It, Oklahoma,” a project of the Oklahoma Humanities Council, with funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities. Funding for this series is provided by grants from the Inasmuch Foundation and the Kirkpatrick Family Fund.
