The JDEAS Chapter hosted an online reading on November 16th in cooperation with Tint Journal entitled Traversing tongues: how writing in a foreign language brings us home. This event was the Chapter’s first event with another organisation and it gave three talented writers the opportunity to read from their work: Heike Auer, Filippo Bagnasco, and Viktoriia Grivina. Heike and Filippo are both JDEAS graduates while Viktoriia is a doctoral student at St Andrews University. The writers were presented by Lisa Schantl, the founder and editor-in-chief of Tint Journal.
The texts featured in this event were varied and fascinating. Heike read a wonderful extract from a novel in progress which made the listener want to hear more while Filippo shared with us his experience of landing in a new culture with a new language. Finally, Viktoriia read contrasting texts: an extract from work in progress about civilians caught up in war followed by a sunnier text about her summer experiences in Ukraine when she was younger.
This online event was a new departure for the JDEAS Chapter and the cooperation with Tint Journal proved to be exciting and fruitful. It was a privilege to showcase the work of such talented writers, who, as with all contributors to Tint Journal, write in English as their second or non-native language. For more information, go to https://www.tintjournal.com. The Editorial Board are pleased to consider original pieces for publication.
I would like to extend my thanks to Tint Journal and to Alumni Graz for its generous support.
Nancy Campbell (Chapter JDEAS)