Join pianist David Rodgers on an uplifting musical journey through Jewish music as well as popular and Broadway music written by Jewish composers. Featuring solo piano performances of Yiddish, celebratory, dance, popular, Broadway, and more, Rodgers will offer historical background info and stories, musical trivia, and a question and answer session.

For their groundbreaking new book, journalist Nico Lang spent a year traveling the country to document the lives of transgender, nonbinary, and genderfluid teens and their families. Drawing on hundreds of hours of on-the-ground interviews with them and the people in their communities, American Teenager paints a vivid portrait of what it’s actually like to grow up trans today.

The Michigan Game Development Conference 2025 Showcase is the final event of the Bluebird Studios and Ann Arbor SPARK Michigan Game Development Conference 2025.
Participants of this conference, who are mostly students and alumni from several universities/colleges throughout the state of Michigan, will showcase their work. Come see and test out participants' games and prototypes which they built within 48 hours.

Enjoy the stellar trio of Kioto Aoki (taiko drums), Haruhi Kobayashi (voice and electronics), and Mai Sugimoto (saxophone) as they perform an improvised score for the classic Japanese silent film Gouketsu Jiraiya (Jiraiya the Hero). 

Following the screening, Aoki, Kobayashi, and Sugimoto will be joined by harpist Anjelic and Detroit Kresge Art Fellow saxophonist Marcus Elliot for an improvised group set.

No art skills, no problem. We'll walk you through how to use analog tools to design a two-color risograph print. Following the event, participants will pick up copies of their design.

In 1866, Malinda Russell published A Domestic Cook Book in Paw Paw, Michigan. As the oldest known cookbook by an African American woman, this slim volume is a landmark in American culinary history. The only known copy resides in the Janice Bluestein Longone Culinary Archive in the University of Michigan Library’s Special Collections Research Center. Join us for a reception and panel discussion celebrating a new edition released by the University of Michigan Press. The reception will begin at 5:15pm, with the conversation to follow at 5:45pm. 

Manoomin's Journey: Wild Rice & the Anishinaabe People is a Crankie Box Show about Manoomin or Wild Rice. Children will learn about manoomin from the perspective of the manoomin to understand our relationships with all living things while having fun searching for items in the beautiful illustrations and learning to say words in Ojibwe.

Linette Lao will present her process in creating a zine about the Ypsilanti Chinese Laundry that was destroyed by a cyclone in the late 19th Century. Through a hands on workshop, she will showcase why creating a zine was the best method to tell this forgotten story and demonstrate how attendees can begin creating their own zines.

Join us for a panel discussion exploring the socio-cultural issues affecting AAPI populations today and in the near future. In this current moment of a hyper-accelerated news cycle, it’s key to reflect on the core topics that directly impact the daily lives of AAPI populations. What are some possible solutions to these issues, and how can we encourage greater awareness and support for addressing them effectively? What strategies can we quickly implement to build a better world for future generations?

Join journalist, poet, essayist, and educator Frances Kai-Hwa Wang in an empowering writing workshop.

“We write to find our voices, to discover our meaning, and to fight for our message - to write for our lives! With short timed writing exercises, we will write and share our stories, discuss ways our stories and struggles may have been discounted by others, and lift up our stories and perspectives to make our mark on today, this moment.” - Frances Kai-Hwa Wang