Culturama's 2024 In-Person Workshop Schedule
All workshops times are based on Pacific Standard Time
Friday, October 25th
9:00 - 10:20 AM
Frankie Gutierrez, “Gender as Cosplay”
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Location: Building 1A, Room 1 (1A-1)
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Workshop Description: For years, cosplay has gained global recognition as a facet of performance art. Body modification and gender as performance to the extremes have become commonplace in the cosplay world and have shaped the everyday performance of gender expression and gendered experiences.
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Bio: Frankie Gutierrez is an illustrator and printmaker working within Southern California's print and self-publishing book art communities. Graduating from California College of the Arts (San Francisco), they received their BFA in Illustration, then received their MFA in Studio Art from California State University, San Bernardino. Frankie is currently a freelance illustrator and educator in Southern California. Their work has been featured in national and international exhibitions and libraries including the ZINECOOP Party Hong Kong and London UK, Lavender Menace Queer Book Archive (Edinburgh, UK), and the Hubbell Street Gallery (San Francisco, CA).
9:00 - 10:20 AM
CLS Sandoval, “Writing and Performing Your Own Voice”
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Location: Building 1B, Room C-12 (1B/C-12)
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Workshop Description: In this workshop, participants will focus on writing and presenting their authentic self through any genre they like to write and perform. Whether fiction, non-fiction, memoir, or poetry, we will write in response to prompts and practice performing them aloud. Ideas for creating a write, revise, practice, perform schedule as well as different modes of performing will also be shared. Writers and performers of all levels welcome. If possible, bring a piece that you have practiced and/or performed before. If you don’t have one, come anyway!
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Bio: CLS Sandoval, PhD (she/her) is a pushcart nominated writer and communication professor with accolades in film, academia, and creative writing who speaks, signs, acts, publishes, sings, performs, writes, paints, teaches, and rarely relaxes. She’s presented at communication conferences, served as a poetry and flash editor, published 15 academic articles, two academic books, three full-length literary collections, three chapbooks, and both flash and poetry pieces in literary journals, recently including Opiate Magazine, The Journal of Radical Wonder, and A Moon of One’s Own. She is raising her daughter, son, and dog with her husband in Walnut, CA.
10:30 - 11:50 AM
Tanner Naas, “Promise, Progress, and Payoffs in Fiction Writing”
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Location: Building 1B, Room C-12 (1B/C-12)
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Workshop Description: Learn how iconic franchises like Star Wars and Harry Potter organize their narrative arcs to raise anticipation and create a powerful crescendo to a story’s climax.
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Bio: Tanner Naas is a community college professor of English with a great appreciation for fantasy and young adult novels. He loves reading and has spent significant time researching the advice and practices of different authors in the genre. From the outline writing approach of Brandon Sanderson to the seat-of-your-pants writing used by Stephen King, Tanner has acquired a well-rounded understanding of the different approaches and techniques used in creative writing and is looking forward to sharing them with attendees during Culturama.
10:30 - 11:50 AM
Melissa Macias, “Wool Felting for Cosplay”
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Location: Building 1A, Room 1 (1A-1)
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Workshop Description: Learn basic needle felting techniques to make a unique headpiece for your cosplay designs or just for fun. Supplies will be provided to borrow. Each participant will take home one headband with felted ears.
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Bio: Melissa is a practicing artist and professor at Mt. SAC. She has exhibited work throughout the United States, and explores ideas of memory and mythmaking through mixed media and installation in her personal work.
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1:00 - 2:20 PM
Robert Piluso, “The Two Sword Technique: Reading & Writing and the Teaching Philosophy of The Book of the Five Rings "
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Location: Building 1B, Room C-12 (1B/C-12)
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Workshop Description: In this teaching philosophy exploratory workshop and discussion, Professor Piluso shall guide a group reading and live annotation of key selections from The Book of the Five Rings by Japanese philosopher and samurai Miyamoto Musashi, as applied to teaching reading and writing to composition students—techniques and principles of scholarly mindset to sharpening the sword of the mind of the writer-student.
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Bio: Robert Piluso, M.A., M.F.A., is a Professor of English at Mt. San Antonio College where he teaches composition, literature, mythology, cinema, and fiction writing. He earned his advanced degrees from C.S.U. Fullerton in English and University of Southern California in Writing for Screen and Television. Piluso's independent comic series Redemptor, Señor Zorro, and most recently Gangster Bat have all debuted on the best-selling list of Graphic Novel Adaptations on Amazon. Prior publications include over a decade of entertainment journalism and film criticism at Script Magazine, a chapter in The Essential Sopranos Reader (University of Kentucky Press), The Chaffey Review, and Dash. He lives with his wife Dani Gomez and daughter Madelyn in Southern California.
1:00 - 2:20 PM
Matthew Nevarez, “Starting Your First Cosplay and Joining the Community"
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Location: Building 1A, Room 1 (1A-1)
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Workshop Description: If you are someone who has been considering cosplaying, or is about to start one, then this workshop will help you kick off your first cosplay. In this workshop you will learn how to plan your cosplay, what kinds of cosplay there are, where to get your materials, about the community itself, and the benefits cosplay itself can bring.
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Bio: Matthew Nevarez is a former Mt. SAC student and a Woodbury University 2021 graduate with a Bachelor's Degree in Animation with a focus on being a 3D Artist. He has cosplayed since 2015 with Anime Expo being his first time going to a convention in cosplay, and he has been cosplaying since then as a hobby with his favorite being a Judge from the 2012 film “Dredd” starring Karl Urban. To him, cosplay is a form of expression for the person in costume that allows one to let loose. His latest cosplay was dressing up as a heister from the Spanish television show, La Casa De Papel.
2:30 - 3:50 PM
Robert Piluso, “COMIC BOOK WRITING AND PRODUCTION: PAGE ONE—2, 3, GO!"
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Location: Building 1B, Room C-12 (1B/C-12)
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Workshop Description: If you've always dreamed of turning an idea into a comic book, this is the workshop where you can start to make that dream into a reality. Every comic begins with the first pages, just as every journey begins with the first few steps. Here, Professor Piluso (best-selling graphic novel adaptation author of the Redemptor series, Gangster Bat, and the upcoming Lit Comics Medusa) will explore and teach from famous graphic novel opening pages, analyzing key techniques of writing (captions and dialogue) and panel composition, and the writer will learn how to apply these techniques to developing the writer's own story. The goal is for each student to have a rough outline of their comic's first three pages by the workshop's conclusion. Bring your ideas and Piluso will have the pages and pens for you to start making it happen in a fun, supportive community of artists! No drawing or writing prior experience required, and all are welcome.
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Bio: Robert Piluso, M.A., M.F.A., is a Professor of English at Mt. San Antonio College where he teaches composition, literature, mythology, cinema, and fiction writing. He earned his advanced degrees from C.S.U. Fullerton in English and University of Southern California in Writing for Screen and Television. Piluso's independent comic series Redemptor, Señor Zorro, and most recently Gangster Bat have all debuted on the best-selling list of Graphic Novel Adaptations on Amazon. Prior publications include over a decade of entertainment journalism and film criticism at Script Magazine, a chapter in The Essential Sopranos Reader (University of Kentucky Press), The Chaffey Review, and Dash. He lives with his wife Dani Gomez and daughter Madelyn in Southern California.
2:30 - 3:50 PM
Julia Amante, Bill Cushing, Gregory (GT) Foster, and Gary Seigel: “JUST THE FACTS (mostly)”
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Location: Building 1A, Room 1 (1A-1)
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Workshop Description: A discussion focused on the infusion of history within narrative writing along with selected readings from the panelists
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Bio:
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Julia Amante based her book, Let Us Begin, on her parents' immigration to the United States and their search for the American Dream using letters that her father and grandfather wrote to each other to tell the story. It shows challengesof adapting to a foreign culture and the effect it has on success and family. She is a faculty member at Cal State San Bernardino.
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Bill Cushing taught at Mt. SAC for over 20 years and still haunts the campus part time. Although known as a poet, he has two non-fiction books: one of personal recollections, the other an award-winning historical non-fiction look at the Civil War. Bill also published a short story collection that uses history and personal biography in some of the selections.
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Gregory (GT) Foster is a retired educator who is a California native and has been a major force behind the Pasadena poetry environment. He served in the Army as a heavy equipment operator in the late sixties. His recently-released The Boys are Not Refined presents a book that is part novel and part memoir focused on his service in Thailand during the Vietnam War.
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A retired English instructor and professional writing presenter, Gary Seigel is the aurhor of Haskell Himself, and LGBTQ historical novel set in the mid-1960s and published by Acorn Press in 2020. He is currently completing a sequel, The Undergraduate, loosely based on turbulent events in Los Angeles during the height of the Vietnam War.
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4:00 - 5:00 PM
“Cosplay Contest"
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Location: Building 12, Room 1280 (Auditorium)
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Workshop Description: Mt. SAC students will show off their fantastic and amazing cosplay, and the best cosplay will win prizes! Come out and support them and you'll have a chance to win some free giveaways too!
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Cosplay Categories
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Purchased Cosplay
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Plain Clothes Cosplay
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Constructed Cosplay
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Event Rules:
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Particpants must be registered to Culturama via Eventbrite.
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Contest is open to all ages.
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Costumes must be appropriate and follow the official Mt. SAC standards of conduct.
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Saturday, October 26th
9:00 - 10:20 AM
Phoebe Millerwhite, “It Could Only Be You: Crafting compelling narratives that are uniquely yours”
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Location: Building 1A, Room 1 (1A-1)
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Workshop Description: The author Willa Cather famously wrote: “There are only two or three human stories, and they go on repeating themselves as fiercely as if they had never happened before.” Whether you are borrowing a character from a favorite movie, rewriting a fairytale set in the present, or sampling lyrics from a beloved song, how you choose to tell and re-tell a story is unique to you. When done thoughtfully, the product can be as compelling as the original. This hands-on writing workshop will guide participants through the delights and challenges of turning beloved narratives into something fresh and innovative. Please bring a notebook and something to write with, or a laptop/tablet.
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Bio: Phoebe Millerwhite is an artist, writer, and educator based in Southern California. She was the director and curator of the Diana Berger Gallery at Mt. SAC (2022-23) and continues to teach in the museum and gallery certificate program. Phoebe holds a BA in Literature and Creative Writing from Eugene Lang College of Liberal Arts at The New School, New York, and an MA in Folklore with an emphasis in Material Culture and Folk Art from Memorial University of Newfoundland, Canada. For over a decade Phoebe has specialized in arts education and championing the work of self-taught artists (also known as folk or “outsider” artists). Her ceramic sculptural work draws inspiration from myths, legends, and – always – a deep love of narrative.
9:00 - 10:20 AM
Allen Callaci, Juanita E. Mantz (“JEM”), and Victoria Waddle “Telling Our Short Stories”
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Location: Building 1B, Room C-12 (1B/C-12)
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Workshop Description: Come hear published short story authors Victoria Waddle, Allen Callaci and Juanita E Mantz share their work, workshop and get tips how to craft your own short stories and how to write short stories that connect into part of a larger collection.
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Bios:
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Allen Callaci has blogged for BK Nation, The Huffington Post, and Inland Weekly where he has written on such literary figures such as Harlan Ellison, Ursala Le Guin, and Charles Bukowski. He is the author of the memoir Heart Like a Starfish, an account of his heart transplant; Louder Than Goodbye: Reflections and Rememberances from Kurt Cobain to Mary Tyler Moore to the Most Sinister Man to Ever Walk the Earth, the17 & Life, a reflection upon the brutal 1983 murder of an Upland High School senior and its lingering impact on the community. When not writing or singing, he works as the assistant director at the Upland Public Library and has been an adjunct English instructor at Mt. SAC where he has taught Preparation for College Writing, Freshman Composition, and Critical Thinking
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Juanita E. Mantz ("JEM") is a USC Law educated deputy public defender, writer, performer, and podcaster. She has 2 books, a memoir titled "Tales of an Inland Empire Girl" (Los Nietos Press, 2022) which won bronze at the 2023 Latino Books to Movie Awards and a hybrid chapbook titled "Portrait of a Deputy Public Defender, or how I became a punk rock lawyer" (Bamboo Dart Press, 2021) about the intersection of punk rock and mass incarceration which won gold at the 2022 International Latino Book Awards for best first book. On her "Life of JEM: Writers on Writing" Apple podcast, she interviews writers. Find everything on her author website: Juanita E. Mantz ("JEM")
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Victoria Waddle is a Pushcart-nominated writer, with work published in literary journals and anthologies, including AQR and Best Short Stories from The Saturday Evening Post Great American Fiction Contest. Her publications include a collection of short fiction, Acts of Contrition (Los Nietos Press) and a chapbook, The Mortality of Dogs and Humans (Bamboo Dart Press). Sha has a YA novel, Keep Sweet, forthcoming from Inlandia Institute. Her recent essay on the harm of sexual purity culture went viral on HuffPost. Previously the managing editor of the journal Inlandia: A Literary Journey, she helped to establish a yearly teen issue. Seh was formerly a high school English teacher and a teacher librarian. She can be found on the Substack Be a Cactus, (http://VictoriaWaddle.Substack.com) where she writes about book bans and other literary topics.
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10:30 - 11:50 AM
K. Andrew Turner, “Flash Fiction- Crafted Bite-Sized Narratives”
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Location: Building 1B, Room C-12 (1B/C-12)
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Workshop Description: Unlock the art of short form storytelling and learn how to distill complex ideas, vivid characters, and rich worlds into a few short paragraphs that linger in the reader's mind long after the last word. This generative workshop will guide you through the techniques and strategies to create powerful, bite-sized stories that pack a punch. Students are encouraged, but not required, to share their work.
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Bio: Coming Soon
10:30 - 11:50 AM
Ron Husband, “Storytelling through Animation”
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Location: Building 1B, Room 3 (1B/C-3)
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Workshop Description: The inner workings of what you see on the screen.
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Bio: Ron Husband, a 38-year veteran of The Walt Disney Company retired as a character artist from Disney Consumer Products after 8 years. Ron joined Walt Disney Feature Animation in 1975 as an animation trainee and worked for 30 years in that department. He holds the distinction of being the first African American animator and the first African American supervising animator for Walt Disney Feature Animation.
1:00 - 2:20 PM
Shannon Phillips, “Kiss and Sell': The Basics of Self-Publishing Erotica"
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Location: Building 1B, Room C-12 (1B/C-12)
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Workshop Description: Have you ever wanted to make money from your writing but absolutely hate marketing? Even if erotica is not a genre you write in, we will be going over passive marketing and other how-to information that can be applied to the genre you do like to write in.
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Bio: Shannon Phillips is an award-winning poet and freelance copyeditor who received her MFA in Creative Writing at California State University, Long Beach. She also runs Picture Show Press and Blue Font Books, a pop-up bookshop in Santa Ana, California.
1:00 - 2:20 PM
Jennifer Chen, “Prints of Play: Cosplay Characters in Relief"
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Location: Building 1A, Room 1 (1A-1)
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Workshop Description: This workshop invites participants to carve and print imaginative characters, blending cosplay culture with the art of an exquisite corpse zine to create collaborative, unexpected compositions.
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Bio: Jennifer Chen is an artist and educator specializing in printmaking and drawing. Her work explores the intersection of art and ecology through the lens of cultural history, often focusing on ornamental flora and urban arboreal environments.
2:30 - 3:50 PM
Monica Fernandez, “Getting the Word Out: Navigating Publicity in the Literary World”
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Location: Building 1B, Room C-12 (1B/C-12)
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Workshop Description: Whether you just published a book, or you're just starting to write, learn some tips and tricks on how to market your work and yourself within the literary community, and become a great literary citizen! You'll learn best practices, social media tips, and get a chance to create your own publicity plan and write mini-pitches for yourself and your work.
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Bio: Monica Fernandez (she/her) is the Media Director at Red Hen Press. She graduated from the University of California, Irvine cum laude with a BA in English with an emphasis on Creative Writing, and from City University London with a MA in Creative Writing and Publishing. She has had several short fiction and creative nonfiction pieces published in The Chaffey Review, Rind Literary Magazine, Scribendi, The Left Coast Review, Creepy Gnome, and Pure Slush Magazine’s Envy anthology. She is Filipino-American and a film and theatre enthusiast.
2:30 - 3:50 PM
Cuyler Smith, “Digital costume design workshop”
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Location: Building 1B, Room C-3 (1B/C-3)
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Workshop Description: This workshop enables students to design their own costume for a character while learning about drapery folds, patterns, and textures. No prior digital experience is required.
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Bio: Cuyler Smith is a Clio award winning illustrator that is inspired by visual storytelling. He obtained his BFA in animation from Laguna College of Art and Design and his MFA in illustration from California State University Fullerton. Cuyler's pop culture inspired illustrations have been featured in the New York Post, Entertainment Weekly, and Cineplex Magazine. His clients include Sony Pictures, Lionsgate, AMC, HBO, ThinkGeek, Sony PlayStation, Fandango, TSN, and the LA Kings to name a few.
4:00 - 5:00 PM
“Open Mic”
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Location: Building 12, Room 1280 (Auditorium)
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Workshop Description: Join us for a fun, free-flowing conversation about all the awesome things we learned and created at Culturama. We can talk about our creative passions, routines, and goals, and even share some of the art we created at Culturama. And so that you remember us for 2025, we'll have colorful and creative Culturama-themed giveaways for you to enjoy!