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Saturday, October 10
 

7:00pm PDT

Claudia Rankine: Triage
Saturday October 10, 2026 7:00pm - 8:30pm PDT
Pay-what-you-can for guaranteed seating; FREE to walk-ups (space depending)

Sponsored by Alta Journal
Co-presented with First Presbyterian Church of Oakland

Poet Claudia Rankine’s work is unfailingly expansive—broadening readers’ understanding of race, social conscience, and the limits of genre. Triage, Rankine’s first book since the groundbreaking “American” trilogy (whose centerpiece, Citizen, was a 2023 Alta California Book Club selection), again defies boundaries. Here Rankine traces a decades-long friendship between two women—the narrator and the theorist—following their evolving relationship against a backdrop of ever-more-turbulent times. Here Rankine creates a politically urgent, uncategorizable mix of essay, criticism, memoir, and photography that Booklist calls “Startlingly original ... A remarkable, soul-stirring work.” In conversation with Cathy Park Hong, whose award-winning nonfiction book Minor Feelings engages intimately with Rankine’s ideas. The Alta Journal team will be on hand to introduce you to upcoming California Book Club selections, and we’ll kick things off with performances by 2026 Oakland Youth Poet Laureate Isaiah Kahn and Vice OYPL Isabel ShenDoors at 6:30pm.
Moderators
avatar for Cathy Park Hong

Cathy Park Hong

Cathy Park Hong’s New York Times bestselling book of creative nonfiction, Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning, was published in Spring 2020 Minor Feelings was a Pulitzer Prize finalist, won the National Book Critics Circle Award for autobiography, and earned her recogni... Read More →
Speakers
avatar for Claudia Rankine

Claudia Rankine

Claudia Rankine is the author of nine books, including Just Us: An American Conversation, Citizen: An American Lyric and Don’t Let Me Be Lonely: An American Lyric; three plays including HELP, which premiered in March 2020 (The Shed, NYC), and The White Card, which premiered in... Read More →
avatar for Lina Norris-Raman

Lina Norris-Raman

Thirteen-year-old Lina Norris-Raman is an 8th grader at Edna Brewer Middle School. Lina has been writing since she was 7 years old. Poetry is her refuge from the universe. At times, she feels like poetry isn't just something she does, but something she’s made of. It shapes how she thinks, how she feels, how she ex... Read More →
avatar for Isaiah Kahn

Isaiah Kahn

Isaiah Kahn, the 2026 Oakland Youth Poet Laureate, is a sixteen-year-old writer at Oakland School for the Arts. Poetry is his main focus, and what gives him the most confidence. It allows him to not get stuck on small things, at least not by accident—if he ever does, maybe it’s poetic... Read More →
avatar for Isabel Shen

Isabel Shen

Seventeen-year-old Isabel Shen, 2026 Oakland Vice Youth Poet Laureate, is a junior at Head Royce. She is an Oakland poet, oral history advocate, and the daughter of a Hong Kong immigrant. Through her poetry, she aims to amplify the voices of Oakland’s rich and diverse immigrant community and to change the way thei... Read More →
Saturday October 10, 2026 7:00pm - 8:30pm PDT
First Presbyterian Church of Oakland Fellowship Hall 2619 Broadway, Oakland
 

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