Community Reading With Southern Utah University

It was a darkish and stormy night when community members met at the Cedar City library. I know that the first sentence makes this sound like the start of an Agatha Christie novel but don’t worry no murders occurred, at least as far as I know. 

Southern Utah University teamed up with the Utah Shakespeare Festival for a discussion of A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry. 

The discussion of A Raisin in the Sun was led by the Utah Shakespeare Festival’s interim artistic director Derek Charles Livingston and cast member Monique Gaffney who plays Mama.  

The discussion opened by talking about the time in which the play was written, 1959. Derek Livingston talked about the hurdles African Americans would have faced during that time. Hurdles such as redlining, job discrimination, inherited wealth, and higher education access. 

The rest of the discussion centered around attendees’ favorite parts of the play and how they saw themselves in the play. 

Some attendees talked about their struggles as women, Native Americans, and downwinders as well as how multigenerational housing is common in several cultures around the world. 

If you would like to attend the next Southern Utah University community education community reads event, I’ll leave a link here.  

The next book being covered is The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros which will be hosted by Dr. Illiana Portaro associate professor of Spanish.