Join the Story Collider in Chicago for an evening of five personal stories about what it is to lose hope, faith, a body part, or another piece of yourself and still keep going despite it all.
Hosted by Lily Be and Reyhaneh Maktoufi. Doors at 7:30.
Stories by:
Leesha Maliakal is a Ph.D. student in the Technology and Social Behavior program at Northwestern. Inspired by the family and communities that raised her, she now designs, builds, and tests systems that improve the ways in which people reflect, practice, learn, grow, and support one another in their communities as they work towards their own goals. Leesha received her B.A. in Computer Science at Northwestern.
Xavier Jordan is a University of Illinois graduate in chemistry and molecular and cellular biology. He is currently applying for microbiology research positions in Chicago. He's been telling stories for a long time and is glad to be part of the scene again.
Lily Be started sharing stories in Chicago by accident in 2010. She never had a want to express herself artistically. This is not something she ever planned on doing. Lily is from the westside of Chicago, born and raised where she's spent most of her days raising her son. Storytelling fell into her lap one day and she's gone on to do crazy amazing wonderful things with it. From winning story competitions that would inspire and oftentimes usher more Latinos and marginalized people to tell their stories, to teaching people from all walks of life to share theirs, Lily has not stopped giving back to the artform that changed and saved her life.
Lily produces The Stoop and Story Collider, is an editorial assistant for Story News magazine, and account manager for GoLucky Studios. She teaches storytelling all over the city both in person and online, is writing a book, and hosting a myriad of community and storytelling events. She's half magic, half amazing, and 100% real.
Eiren Caffall is a writer and musician whose work on loss and nature, glaciers and extinction has appeared in The Rumpus, Entropy Magazine, Tikkun Daily, The Nervous Breakdown, Punk Planet, and the book The Time After. She is currently working on a book-length work of nonfiction and her latest record. She has completed a Social Justice News Nexus Fellowship in environmental justice writing at Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism in Chicago and a residency in environmental journalism at the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity in Alberta, Canada, as well as creative nonfiction residencies at Hedgebrook and the Millay Colony for the Arts. In 2019, she will attend at creative nonfiction residency at Ragdale. The short film Becoming Ocean, adapted from her essay I am Become Ocean, Destroyer of Worlds has been screened at the Wild and Scenic Film Festival, the Sedona International Film festival, and the D.C. Environmental Film Festival. Born in New York, and raised in New England, she lives with her husband and son, two cats and a turtle in the Logan Square neighborhood of Chicago.
Jonathan is just some nerd. His friends seem to like his stories.