January 29
Opening Reception for Mother Tongues

New York City is home to over 700 languages, and many of these are in danger of being lost. Mother Tongues is a call to action to preserve NYC’s linguistic diversity ranging from endangered languages to the NYC accent!

Please join us for the opening reception to hear, experience, and interact with these languages!

Performances include:

An opening blessing performed by José Juarez, an indigenous Totonac shaman from Puebla, Mexico.

A recitation by Papa Susso, one of Africa’s great griots. A griot is the keeper of oral traditions in West African cultures, performing musical poems.

6 – 9pm at City Lore Gallery. 


February 12
Screening of If These Knishes Could Talk Followed by NYC Accent Slam

A two part evening celebrating the NYC Accent!

First a screening of Heather Quinlan’s most recent documentary, If These Knishes Could Talk: The Story of the New York Accent.

Then, City Lore will suss out the best NYC accent in the NYC Accent Slam! This will be a good-natured competition that pits one New Yorker from each borough against the others to vie for the best New York accent.

Doors open at 6:30pm. Screening begins at 7pm.

Admission is $15. Buy tickets here. 


February 18

Screening of “Language Matters”

Followed by a Q&A with Endangered Language Alliance co-founders, Bob Holman and Daniel Kaufman.

Film Screening of sister project, the PBS documentary, Language Matters, featuring the world’s endangered languages. The screening will be followed by a Q&A with Bob Holman and Daniel Kaufman, co-founders of the Endangered Language Alliance.

By the end of this century, half the world’s languages will have vanished. The death of a language robs humanity of ideas, belief systems, and knowledge of the natural world. Language Matters asks: What do we lose when a language dies? What does it take to save a language?

For more information go to http://www.languagemattersfilm.com/

Doors open at 6:30pm. Screening begins at 7pm.

Admission is $10. Buy tickets here.


March 12
Documenting Traditional Garifuna Song in NYC and Belize

Featuring performances by Libaña Maraza and a discussion with Daniel Kaufman and James Lovell.

The Garifuna are one of the indigenous peoples of St. Vincent in the Caribbean and now reside in NYC in large numbers. Their music is a unique combination of Arawak, Carib and African influences.

This event will showcase a traditional type of Garifuna song, the arumahani, which is now endangered and rarely performed for the public. The group Libaña Maraza will perform several arumahani songs followed by a discussion with Daniel Kaufman and James Lovell about their on-going documentation project funded by the Endangered Language Documentation Programme.

Doors open at 6:30pm. 

Admission is $10. Buy tickets here.


March 18
Yiddish Songfest

An evening led by Ethel Raim of the Center for Traditional Music and Dance.

A celebration of Yiddish culture in New York featuring a cappella songs, a sharing of Yiddish objects and words, and discussion about Yiddish culture and language in New York.

Doors open at 6:30pm. 

Admission is $15. Buy tickets here.