Encounter Culture New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs

For many people who live in New Mexico the nearest library might be three hundred miles away. Luckily, the New Mexico State Library runs two excellent rural library services: Books by Mail and three bookmobiles that serve different regions of the state.
If you live 20 minutes outside of the city limits of any city in New Mexico, or if you live within city limits but are homebound, or if you can only read large-print books, you can sign up for Books by Mail. The Books by Mail collection contains more than 30,000 titles, including books in Spanish, audiobooks, eBooks, and more.
For schools and small communities who want to browse the shelves or access the internet from the bookmobile’s portable satellite terminal, check out the New Mexico State Library website to find out when and where a bookmobile will be stopping near you. And don’t forget to chat with the bookmobile librarian to find out what reading events and projects are offered during stops in your community!
“I care about people first. I care about what's going on in their lives,” says Berdina Nieto, the New Mexico State Library Books by Mail librarian and rural services outreach specialist. “Patrons will call just to get their book order and then tell me what's going on in their world, and then I'll do the same.
MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE
Books by Mail
Bookmobiles
New Mexico State Library
Cimarron City Library
Santo Domingo Pueblo
RECOMMENDED EPISODES
EC0602: Adventure Begins at Your Library: Explore New Mexico Tribal Libraries and Youth Programming
EC0601: From Goatheads to Grand Canyons: A Love Letter to the Landscape with New Mexico State Poet Laureate, Lauren Camp
EC0306: Healthy Escapism: The State Library for the Blind and Print Disabled with Tim Donahue and Berdina Nieto
We’d love to hear from you! Send feedback to elpalacio@dca.nm.gov. You can write a regular email or record a short voice memo and attach it for us to listen to.
Visit http://newmexicoculture.org for info about our museums, historic sites, virtual tours, and more.
Our favorite way to fully experience everything they have to offer is with the New Mexico CulturePass. Find out how to get yours here.
Subscribe to El Palacio Magazine
***
Encounter Culture, a production of the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs, is produced and edited by Andrea Klunder at The Creative Impostor Studios.
Hosted by Emily Withnall, editor at El Palacio Magazine
Executive Producer: Daniel Zillmann
Technical Director & Post-Production Audio: Edwin R. Ruiz
Recording Engineer: Kabby at Kabby Sound Studios in Santa Fe
Editor & Production Manager: Alex Riegler
Editor: Monica Braine (Assiniboine/Lakota)
Theme Music: D’Santi Nava
Instagram: @newmexicanculture and @elpalaciomagazine
For a transcript and full show notes, please visit podcast.nmculture.org

What do we lose when we don’t know ALL of our histories? Understanding our great, great, great, great grandparents' lives and how they survived, where they settled or traveled, and what languages they spoke – all of these details reveal so much about who we are and how we landed here in this place, at this moment in time. How our ancestors interacted with other people and with the land has had ripple effects on why things are the way they are today.
Dr. Gregorio Gonzales (Comanche, Genízaro), the tribal liaison for the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs, works to develop relationships with 23 tribal governments based within New Mexico. DCA divisions interact with as many as 34 American Indian tribal governments, which include tribes with ancestral ties to New Mexico and whose tribal headquarters are located in Arizona, Colorado, Oklahoma, and Texas. Gonzales is uniquely suited to this position due to his impressive knowledge of Indigenous history in the state—including Genízaro history which is still largely unknown in the context of United States history. 
Even within New Mexico, groups without any connection to a Genízaro identity are not likely to know this history. And as Gonzales reveals, he didn’t understand the full history and context of his Genízaro identity until he was a young adult.
MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE
We’d love to hear from you! Send feedback to elpalacio@dca.nm.gov. You can write a regular email or record a short voice memo and attach it for us to listen to.
Visit http://newmexicoculture.org for info about our museums, historic sites, virtual tours, and more.
Our favorite way to fully experience everything they have to offer is with the New Mexico CulturePass. Find out how to get yours here.
Subscribe to El Palacio Magazine
***
Encounter Culture, a production of the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs, is produced and edited by Andrea Klunder at The Creative Impostor Studios.
Hosted by Emily Withnall, editor at El Palacio Magazine
Executive Producer: Daniel Zillmann
Technical Director & Post-Production Audio: Edwin R. Ruiz
Recording Engineer: Kabby at Kabby Sound Studios in Santa Fe
Editor & Production Manager: Alex Riegler
Editor: Monica Braine (Assiniboine/Lakota)
Theme Music: D’Santi Nava
Instagram: @newmexicanculture and @elpalaciomagazine
For a transcript and full show notes, please visit podcast.nmculture.org

In a large, low-population state like New Mexico, with lots of rural communities, libraries play a vital role in literacy, education, and job skills training—along with the simple joy that comes from learning and being immersed in the numerous worlds that can be found within a book’s pages. 
Each of the 130 libraries across New Mexico, including 21 tribal libraries, serves the specific needs of its own community. Many tribal libraries, such as the Santa Clara Pueblo’s library, maintain a community archive of historic photos, interviews, and oral histories that preserve the past and help restore the language. 
Also, youth programming plays an important role in helping kids become early readers through story time, summer reading challenges, and special events. Youth programming also provides databases for research, tutoring, and resources for homeschoolers. 
MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE
New Mexico State Library
Santa Clara Pueblo Community Library
Aspen Song Kids
Carnegie Library in Las Vegas
We’d love to hear from you! Send feedback to elpalacio@dca.nm.gov. You can write a regular email or record a short voice memo and attach it for us to listen to.
Visit http://newmexicoculture.org for info about our museums, historic sites, virtual tours, and more.
Our favorite way to fully experience everything they have to offer is with the New Mexico CulturePass. Find out how to get yours here.
Subscribe to El Palacio Magazine
***
Encounter Culture, a production of the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs, is produced and edited by Andrea Klunder at The Creative Impostor Studios.
Hosted by Emily Withnall, editor at El Palacio Magazine
Executive Producer: Daniel Zillmann
Technical Director & Post-Production Audio: Edwin R. Ruiz
Recording Engineer: Kabby at Kabby Sound Studios in Santa Fe
Editor & Production Manager: Alex Riegler
Editor: Monica Braine (Assiniboine/Lakota)
Theme Music: D’Santi Nava
Instagram: @newmexicanculture and @elpalaciomagazine
For a transcript and full show notes, please visit podcast.nmculture.org

Poetry is everywhere. Poetry is in the way we speak or sing or the ways we imagine. Poetry offers space and possibility. And poetry is the best kept open secret we have. Because as it turns out, poetry can sometimes have the unfortunate reputation of not being for everyone. 
Thankfully, state poets laureate are working to change this perception and helping people find the magic and meaning in poetry. New Mexico State Poet Laureate, Lauren Camp, is no exception. Now midway through her three-year term, she’s made it her mission to traverse the vast reaches of the state to build community and poems. 
Camp’s passion for poetry is infectious. Whether making poems as collages or writing about goatheads or night skies, her poetry invites readers and other poets and would-be poets in.
MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE
Lauren Camp’s website
In Old Sky: Poems Inspired by the Grand Canyon
New Mexico Epic Poem Project/New Mexico Arts
Article: New Mexico’s Queen of Poetry, El Palacio, spring 2023
We’d love to hear from you! Send feedback to elpalacio@dca.nm.gov. You can write a regular email or record a short voice memo and attach it for us to listen to.
Visit http://newmexicoculture.org for info about our museums, historic sites, virtual tours, and more.
Our favorite way to fully experience everything they have to offer is with the New Mexico CulturePass. Find out how to get yours here.
Subscribe to El Palacio Magazine
***
Encounter Culture, a production of the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs, is produced and edited by Andrea Klunder at The Creative Impostor Studios.
Hosted by Emily Withnall, editor at El Palacio Magazine
Executive Producer: Daniel Zillmann
Technical Director & Post-Production Audio: Edwin R. Ruiz
Recording Engineer: Kabby at Kabby Sound Studios in Santa Fe
Editor & Production Manager: Alex Riegler
Editor: Monica Braine (Assiniboine/Lakota)
Theme Music: D’Santi Nava
Instagram: @newmexicanculture and @elpalaciomagazine
For a transcript and full show notes, please visit podcast.nmculture.org

Creating art in the face of grief can be complicated and hard to navigate, especially when the grief feels both private and personal—and a part of a much larger epidemic, like the Missing and Murdered Indigenous People (MMIP) crisis. 
Both Bobby Brower (Iñupiaq) and Tara Trudell (Santee Sioux/Rarámuri/Mexican/Spanish) found their way into speaking about the MMIP crisis through clothing and adornment that are linked to a long history of protection, prayer, and collaboration. 
On this episode of Encounter Culture, Brower and Trudell talk with host Emily Withnall about creating Native Alaskan atikluks and creating beads out of paper, respectively, and the reason it is so important to do this work in community. 
Brower is a fashion designer whose work has been featured on the TV series Alaska Daily and in New York Fashion Week, among others. Trudell is a multi-media artist working in fabric, paper, photography, and film, among other mediums. 
For both women, the art cannot exist without community, and it is in community that important stories and information can be shared and held. 
MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE
Museum of International Folk Art
Bunnell Street Center Arts Center
Alaska Daily (TV series)
Tower Gallery
Ashlynne Mike AMBER Alert in Indian Country Act
We’d love to hear from you! Send feedback to elpalacio@dca.nm.gov. You can write a regular email or record a short voice memo and attach it for us to listen to.
Visit https://newmexicoculture.org for info about our museums, historic sites, virtual tours, and more.
Our favorite way to fully experience everything they have to offer is with the New Mexico Culture Pass. Find out how to get yours here.
Subscribe to El Palacio Magazine
***
Encounter Culture, a production of the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs, is produced and edited by Andrea Klunder at The Creative Impostor Studios.
Hosted by Emily Withnall, editor at El Palacio Magazine
Executive Producer: Daniel Zillmann
Technical Director & Post-Production Audio: Edwin R. Ruiz
Recording Engineer: Kabby at Kabby Sound Studios in Santa Fe
Editor & Production Manager: Alex Riegler
Theme Music: D’Santi Nava
Special music in this episode: “Kinship Honor – K’é Biyiin,” written by Herman Cody & Radmilla Cody, performed by Radmilla Cody. Courtesy Canyon Records. Also, “Mother’s Words – Amá Bizaad,” written by Herman Cody & Radmilla Cody, performed by Radmilla Cody, courtesy Canyon Records. 
Instagram: @newmexicanculture and @elpalaciomagazine
 

Jemez Historic Site, like all of New Mexico’s Historic Sites and museums, offers unique historical and cultural perspectives on the deep and wide-ranging communities, languages, and traditions across the state. And while New Mexico contains a complicated and layered history, these Sites not only honor history but vibrant and ongoing cultures that continue to this day. 
Marlon Magdalena, the Instructional Coordinator Supervisor at Jemez Historic Site and member of the Jemez Pueblo, says that all aspects of his community, currently and in the past, are important.
“My primary goal is just to tell people who the Jemez people are--that we're people that are still around. We're Indigenous people, Native American people, that we still exist. We’re still here. And we still have our languages, we still have our language, we have our culture traditions.” 
In this episode of Encounter Culture, Marlon Magdalena shares his knowledge of the night skies, his perspective on the Pueblo Revolt, and his flute making and flute playing. Notably, Marlon played with Clark Tenakhongva and Matthew Nelson of Öngtupqa in the United Arab Emirates. Clark and Matthew's music (featuring Gary Stroutsos on flute) is featured throughout season 4 of Encounter Culture, which tells the story of Miguel Trujillo. 
MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE
Visit https://newmexicoculture.org for info about our museums, historic sites, virtual tours, and more.
Our favorite way to fully experience everything they have to offer is with the New Mexico Culture Pass. Find out how to get yours here.
Subscribe to El Palacio Magazine
***
Encounter Culture, a production of the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs, is produced and edited by Andrea Klunder at The Creative Impostor Studios.
Hosted by Emily Withnall, editor at El Palacio Magazine
Executive Producer: Daniel Zillmann
Technical Director & Post-Production Audio: Edwin R. Ruiz
Recording Engineer: Kabby at Kabby Sound Studios in Santa Fe
Editor & Production Manager: Alex Riegler
Theme Music: D’Santi Nava
Instagram: @newmexicanculture