Weekend events in village center immigration, connection

• By Lauren Shows
• Published: June 4, 2026

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A weeklong series of events centered on immigration and community connection is coming to Yellow Springs this week, anchored by a June 5 speaker event featuring journalist Jose Antonio Vargas and author and University of Michigan public health professor William Lopez.

The programming — organized under the banner “Immigrants Feed America” — grew out of the inaugural YS Speaker Series, produced by Mad River Theater Works. The speaker series — created in collaboration with the YS Library Association and YS Community Foundation — has, thus far, featured writer and cultural critic Hanif Abdurraqib and poets Ross Gay and janan alexandra.

In convening a third iteration of the series, Mad River Theater Works Director Chris Westhoff said he hoped to again platform writers whose work converges with human connection and social justice, particularly as nationwide crises involving immigrants have come close to home with the Trump administration’s ongoing efforts to force Haitians in neighboring Springfield, and elsewhere in the U.S., out of the country.

“I wanted to keep in the direction of bringing alternative or marginalized voices that speak to national and global issues in some kind of way that is also relatable and local,” Westhoff said. “Following everything that was happening in the country with ICE and the way in which it was manifesting itself in our neighborhood in Springfield, that seemed to me something that was worth pursuing.”

The planning phase for the event led him to William Lopez’s recent book, “Raiding the Heartland: An American Story of Deportation and Resistance,” which examines the impacts of immigration raids in Midwestern communities through the lens of public health. Westhoff also hoped to include a second speaker in order to broaden the conversation.

“[Lopez] is coming at it from the perspective of public health, which is really interesting, but I wondered how we could relate it to the humanities — I didn’t know what that was,  so I asked Lopez if I could work on coming up with a pairing that might fit,” Westhoff said.

Westhoff said he reached out to a group of folks that included local resident Jalana Lazar and Village Council member and MAZU owner Angie Hsu for ideas. Fortuitously, Lazar had a family connection to Jose Antonio Vargas, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and founder of the nonprofit Define American. Famously, Vargas publicly revealed in a 2011 New York Times essay that he was living in the United States as an undocumented immigrant — a fact he had concealed since childhood. He later expanded on that experience in his memoir, “Dear America: Notes of an Undocumented Citizen.”

“[Vargas’] perspective is super unique,” Westhoff said. “And Define American is celebrating its 15th anniversary this year, so he’s looking for ways to lift that up.”

At nearly the same time, Westhoff added, Lopez had already separately contacted Vargas seeking support for his forthcoming book tour, so the project was already on Vargas’ radar.

“[Lopez and Vargas] both were just immediately like, ‘Great, let’s do it,” Westhoff said. “They want to talk about the bigger picture and the role of writing, what that means, how they do it, how they maintain their energy and their spirit and the creative impulse that is also behind the activism.”

Community connectedness had already helped shape the speaker series event, and so more ideas began percolating for growing awareness and participation beyond a single evening. Hsu said she was already familiar with Vargas’ work: “I remember reading his New York Times piece and being so moved by it, and I always say my  first piece of activism was when I was 15 years old, and I went to Boulder City Council to speak in support of Dreamers and the Dream Act.”

With activism and connection in mind, Hsu, Lazar, Westhoff and Vargas began imagining what it might look like to build an entire week of programming around the themes of immigration, identity and cultural exchange.

“[Vargas] said, ‘Well, I would love to support work that’s happening in Ohio — how can we make this not just a talk but a bigger event?’” Hsu said. “It was important to us that these events are about sharing and learning about what is happening in immigration today, but also a celebration — that the work and the coming together are still joyful, still with great passion and hope.”

That philosophy stretches across the week’s lineup, with events including an international recipe exchange, a West African dinner to benefit AfroMeals Foundation and Miami Valley Meals, a week of rotating specials at MAZU prepared by immigrant chefs, a screening of Vargas’ documentary “Undocumented” with Q&A at the Little Art and an all-hands-on-deck community art project. (See sidebar for the full schedule of events.)

Hsu said the mural — planned for Kieth’s Alley — will build on existing immigration-themed artwork created by muralist Pierre Nagley over the last few years. The mural will function essentially like a giant paint-by-number project, allowing community members to pick up a paintbrush and leave something of their own hearts and minds behind on the artwork.

“It’s going to be fully interactive,” she said. “We want kids to come out — we want anybody to join us.”

After the paint has dried, community members will be invited to come back to Kieth’s Alley for a street party, featuring food trucks, the unveiling of the mural and music, including from Haitian producer and performer DJ XLOAD, known for spinning up high-energy remixes in the Haitian music scene.

“I’m in touch with the Haitian Support Center in Springfield … so we also wanted to have an opportunity to invite the Haitian community to come celebrate with us,” Hsu said. “So DJ XLOAD is awesome, and he’s going to be playing — and his wife used to work at MAZU, so when we were trying to figure out a DJ, there was that connection.”

Alongside the public events, organizers are also planning a smaller gathering between local immigration advocates and Vargas and Lopez, aimed at creating space for deeper discussion about immigration issues affecting the region.

The growth of the event from a single evening’s talk into a week of conversation, food, art and just being together has become part of the project’s meaning, Westhoff said — par for the course in a small town, and perhaps a touchstone for how people are coming together all over the U.S. to ward off division and isolationism.

“The degree to which [these events are] utilizing strong centers or anchors in our community and outside of our community to create conversation between activism and art and culture, fundamentally represented by food and storytelling, is amazing,” he said.

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