Immigrant Heritage Week

Saturday, April 18, 2009 the St. George Library on Staten Island joined in the 6th annual Immigrant Heritage Week Celebration (April 17- 23), featuring tap and African dance to African drumming and percussion. The duo of Irene Koloseus and Andy Algire entertained, educated and engaged a lively audience of adults and children about the art of American tap dance and traditional West African music.

Irene Koloseus and Andy Algire played the Balafon, a xylophone type of instrument closely associated with Guinea and with Senegal and The Gambia. Ms. Koloseus challenged Mr. Algire in a competition to follow the beat of her tap dance steps by him playing the Balafon. The audience enthusiastically clapped to the beat of tap and Balafon.  read more »

From Friday, April 17th to Thursday, April 23rd, 2009, New York City will celebrate Immigrant Heritage Week. Declared an official, annual celebration by Mayor Bloomberg, Immigrant Heritage Week is a unique celebration of the vibrant immigrant cultures, history, and communities found in every corner of the City.

In the past years, the celebration began on Monday but this year it starts on Friday, April 17th. Why April 17, you might ask?

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Week 2 of National Poetry Month: Seeing Things

The Reader’s Den is the NYPL’s online book discussion forum, but during the month of April we’re all about poetry. This week’s poem, City Visions, was chosen with a view to celebrating Immigrant Heritage Week, which starts April 17. It was written by the same poet whose words grace the Statue of Liberty (“Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses…”).

CITY VISIONS by Emma Lazarus

I.

As the blind Milton's memory of light,
The deaf Beethoven's phantasy of tone,
Wrought joys for them surpassing all things known
In our restricted sphere of sound and sight,—
So while the glaring streets of brick and stone
Vex with heat, noise, and dust from morn till night,
I will give rein to Fancy, taking flight
From dismal now and here, and dwell alone
With new-enfranchised senses. All day long,
Think ye 't is I, who sit 'twixt darkened walls,
While ye chase beauty over land and sea?
Uplift on wings of some rare poet's song,
Where the wide billow laughs and leaps and falls,
I soar cloud-high, free as the the winds are free.  read more »