Header Photo Story

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Hi all:

While searching for an image for your blog’s header, I came across this story in the New York Times about “The Spirit of East Harlem,” a four-story landmark at the corner of East 104th Street and Lexington Avenue, which has been in the neighborhood since 1978. Keep an eye out for this during your walking tour and make sure to take your own photographs of this historic artwork.

The article also mentions a book that might be helpful for your future research entitled On the Wall: Four Decades of Community Murals in New York City.

NPR Radio Diaries

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When you get a chance, take a listen to some of these NPR Radio diaries: http://www.radiodiaries.org/category/stories/portraits/

The radio diary is the inspiration behind our “mini-doc” project. We will talk more about interviewing, recording, and editing (as well as the role of images), but for now just listen and enjoy! Start to think about what makes these stories interesting and which ones you find most compelling.

 

Demetra P

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My name is Demetra Panagiotopoulos. My parents are both Greek immigrants. I grew up in Astoria—an area that is no longer as solidly Greek as it used to be—eating my mom’s Greek food, attending (until high school) a Greek private school, speaking Greek at home, surrounded by Greek people in a Greek community doing Greek things—like celebrating Greek holidays and playing basketball and whatnot—and listening to the Greek music that my dad brought home from his former job with Greek Music and Video.

I’ve only been to Greece four times in my memory. I love my family there, as well as the food, language, and natural beauty of the place. That being said, though, I still prefer to live in America. New York. Maybe not Manhattan, but . . . well . . . Queens.

Gianni Rivera

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My mother is half Italian but she wasn’t raised by her father so I have been surrounded by my Puerto Rican family all of my life. I grew up in the Bronx as did my mother and I visit Puerto Rico at least once a year to see family there. I was raised around my great grandmother who spoke only Spanish so Spanish came naturally to me but as I haven’t been using my Spanish skills very much lately they are kind of rusty. :]

Joseph Pearl

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My mother is from Queens, NY, her grandparents immigrated from Naples and Palermo, Sicily in the early 1900’s. My father was born and raised in Haifa, Israel, and then later a farm village near Tel Aviv, Israel before immigrating to the United States.  I was born on the lower east side, and raised in the east 70’s.