Tuesday, December 31, 2013

#CatalanTalk—Interviews of prominent Catalans, on Twitter, in English

Starting on January 2, 2014, at 17:00 CET (11am EST, 8am PST), I will be interviewing prominent Catalan activists, politicians, writers, academics, artists, and scientists in a unique new format: on Twitter, live, and in English. It seems to me that the best way to find out just what is going on in Catalonia is to ask directly. Twitter will allow us to share the interview in real time, and invite questions and comments. We'll use the hashtag #CatalanTalk.

My first guest will be Ferran Civit, member of the National Board of the Catalan National Assembly (ANC), and the logistical coordinator for the Catalan Way in which more than 1.6 million people held hands from one end of Catalonia to the other to demand independence from Spain this past September. As Civit said in a recent interview in El Punt Avui, “If we are capable of doing this, we'll can win our independence, too.”

Upcoming interviews include Gemma Lienas (writer, feminist, and now chocolatier) on January 9th at 16h CET and Oriol Junqueras, President of Esquerra Republicana Catalana and Leader of the Opposition in the Catalan Parliament on Jan 13 at 17h CET, and we are in the process of scheduling Jaume Cabré, bestselling novelist; Blanca Rosa Roca, Publisher, Roca Editorial; Albert Pont, President of the Cercle Català de Negocis), Salvador Cardús, Sociologist and columnist, member of the National Transition Advisory Board to the Catalan Government; Vicent Partal, Director of online news portal Vilaweb; Quim Torra, Publisher and Director of the El Born Cultural Center; and others. Please send suggestions, via Twitter, or email.)

If you can't follow the interviews live, don't worry. I'll offer a recap later on this blog and eventually in book format. Details to follow!

Thanks to Porter Anderson for the inspiration. His interviews of people in publishing on #PorterMeets, Mondays at 5pm EST are really great.




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