On your mark! Get set…AATIA is gearing up for the September election of the 2009 Board of Directors. The six positions include: President, Director of Communications, Director of Finance, Director of Membership, Director of Professional Development, and Secretary.

Carlota Grimes will chair the Nominating Committee, which also includes Marco Hansen and Carolina Modesto. If you are interested in volunteering to serve on the Board next year or would like to nominate someone else, please contact a member of the  Nominating Committee by August 2, 2008.

The final issue of The AATIA Letter is now online. This (July 2008) issue provides advance details about September’s Translation Tools workshop, led by Jost Zetzsche, and AATIA’s July 12 member meeting, which will spotlight Austin’s Sister Cities.

It also contains farewells from regular columnist and cartoonist Tony Beckwith and editor Michael Conner, plus a recap of entries posted on the blog in the period since the previous issue of the newsletter.

Marianne Martinez of the Austin Sister Cities program will be one of the featured speakers at AATIA’s next member meeting at 1 p.m. on Saturday, July 12. The broad goals of the program are to foster friendly relations and promote understanding between the people of Austin and the citizens of our sister cities around the world.

This program is designed to contribute to the educational, cultural, social, and economic presence of the City of Austin in the international community of nations. You may have noticed the related displays at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport.

The meeting, to be held at the Austin History Center (9th & Guadalupe), will have the usual high-quality networking, top-notch refreshments, and other meeting segments, which will be announced here as the details surface.

Citing an increased work load in his freelance translation business, Al Favela has announced that he is stepping down from his position as AATIA Director of Finance, effective immediately. The Board is grateful to Al for his years of service to the Association in this capacity.

Members interested in volunteering for the role of Director of Finance are asked to contact Secretary Julie Nordskog.

Left to itself, every literature will exhaust its vitality if it is not refreshed by the interest and contributions of a foreign one.
— Goethe, 1827.

This belief that international literature plays a vital role in book culture is one that is shared by all the publishers and booksellers involved in Reading the World, a celebration of literature in translation to be held at BookPeople on Friday, June 6.

Noted Russian translator Marian Schwartz will moderate the hour-long program, which begins at 7 p.m. and will consist of three parts:

1. Liliana Valenzuela reading from her translation from English into Spanish: Cristina Garcia, A Handbook to Luck/Las Caras de la Suerte

2. Cristina Ferreira-Pinto Bailey reading from her translation from Portuguese: Teeth Under the Sun by Ignácio de Loyola Brandão (Dalkey Archive P, 2007).

3. Michele McKay Aynesworth presenting Beacons, the literary journal of the American Translators Association, with readings by the following: Liliana Valenzuela, Tony Beckwith, and Rob Cogswell and his translator, Horacio Peña.

This event is hosted by the Austin Area Translators and Interpreters Association. 

Nora Comstock will speak at the next SpanSIG meeting. She is the Executive Director of Las Comadres, an informal internet-based group that meets monthly in many US cities to build connections and community with other Latinas.

The meeting will be held at the Austin History Center, 9th & Guadalupe, 10:15-12 noon, on Saturday, May 10. Don’t forget the member meeting at 1:00 p.m. the same day, same place.

The May 2008 issue of The AATIA Letter is now online. This issue, the next-to-last, examines AATIA’s future without our venerable newsletter, a review of the last two month’s entries posted on its replacement, the weblog you are reading now, and an announcement of the May 10 member meeting.

The March issue of The AATIA Letter, now online as a pdf, features Frank Dietz’s article "Getting Your Files from There to Here"(posted here earlier) and Tony Beckwith’s mini-memoir "The Caledonian Ball," plus the news about AATIA’s HQ office in the heart of downtown Austin and the new blog (you’re reading it!).