Illinois Libraries Present (ILP) will showcase “Poverty: A Discussion with Matthew Desmond” at 7 p.m., Tuesday, May 13, the East Moline Public Library announced.
Mr. Desmond, whose book inspired the traveling national exhibit Evicted, will be in conversation with Natalie Moore. She’s an award-winning journalist based in Chicago. Mr. Desmond is a professor of sociology at Princeton University. He also is author of the award-winning book, “Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City.”
The online-only event will close out ILP’s fourth season. To watch the livestream from home, register here.
A recipient of a MacArthur “Genius” Fellowship, he was named in 2016 as one of “fifty people across the country who are most influencing the national political debate” by Politico 50. His research focuses on poverty in the United States, city life, housing insecurity, public policy, racial inequality, and ethnography.
Ms. Moore’s reporting tackles race, housing, economic development, food injustice and violence. She is the author of the acclaimed “The South Side: A Portrait of Chicago and American Segregation.” She co-authored “The Almighty Black P Stone Nation: The Rise, Fall and Resurgence of an American Gang.” The winner of the Chicago Library Foundation’s 21st Century Award and a Studs Terkel Community Media Award has helped shift the way Chicagoans today think about segregation in the region, according to a blog post from the East Moline library.
In January, ILP announced it is becoming part of Illinois Library Association (ILA) effective Jan 15. Both organizations share a commitment to cost-effective library events. ILP welcomes the opportunity to increase statewide access with ILA’s reach, expertise, and reputation.
Evicted exhibit inspires
In the Quad Cities, the Pulitzer-prize winning book “Evicted” inspired a traveling, thought-provoking exhibit of the same name. Evicted had a 12-week run in the summer of 2024 at SouthPark Mall in Moline.
Among the sponsors was Rock Island-based Project NOW. Leaders brought in the exhibit in hopes of raising awareness of the national housing shortage problem. Opening in May of 2024, Evicted was set up in a vacant storefront at the Moline mall.
It encouraged Quad Citians and area nonprofits who deal with housing issues to come and explore the causes and impacts of eviction. The Quad Cities was only the second Illinois stop (after Chicago) for the exhibit It fir opened at the National Building Museum in Washington, D.C., in 2018.
In addition to Project NOW, the exhibit was sponsored by Supportive Housing Providers Association. The SHPA facilitates the Illinois Homelessness Education and Technical Assistance (TA) Center. Its Illinois stop also was made possible by the TA Center and support from the Illinois Department of Human Services.
