By Jonathan Morales

2023年10月20日

Julissa Félix-Gallegos nervously walked on stage, the last speaker in an evening of spoken-word Spanish poetry and short stories. 她尽量不去看台下的80多人，开始读了起来。

“Las casas con techo de lámina suelen ser muy calientes durante verano,” read Félix-Gallegos, a 萨克拉门托 State graduate student, “lo cual hace casi imposible para alguien el conciliar el sueño.” 锡屋顶的房子在夏天通常很热，这使得任何人几乎不可能入睡。

The opening line sets the scene for Félix-Gallegos’ short story, “Chilindrina,” about the death of a beloved family pet, inspired by her childhood growing up in the small, central Mexican town of Mezquital del Oro.

The story won first place in the third annual Voces de 萨克拉门托 competition, a Spanish-language writing contest open to the public and organized by Brenda Romero, 萨克拉门托 State assistant professor of 世界语言文学. Félix-Gallegos and other winners were recognized and read their pieces during a ceremony Oct. 12 in the University Union.

比赛允许西班牙语社区的成员分享他们的故事，并在推广书面西班牙语的同时发表他们的作品。

后一个进球击中了墨西哥人罗梅罗的痛处，她承认自己在美国出生的两个孩子用西班牙语写作的能力与他们的对话技巧并不完全匹配。

“As a mother, I see that we do a very good job of trying to get our kids to speak Spanish, but there are not very many outlets where they can write,” she said. “This competition is aimed at increasing the opportunities that the new generation has to write in Spanish.”

罗梅罗说，此外，疫情对西班牙语社区的打击尤其严重，她希望为人们提供一个平台，分享他们的故事、斗争和梦想。

罗梅罗还是盐湖城犹他大学的一名博士生时，那里的一个组织发起了一场西班牙语写作比赛。 萨克拉门托说西班牙语的人口要多得多，她觉得萨克拉门托会欢迎类似的竞争。

“萨克拉门托之声”向所有人开放，从小学生到老年人。 提交的作品可以是小说或非小说，主题不限，包括短篇小说、诗歌和自传体散文。 罗梅罗说，在双重文化环境中成长的挑战是年轻作家的共同主题，而年长作家则经常利用怀旧之情，比如关于他们童年或家乡的故事。

第一届比赛于2021年在疫情期间举行，吸引了少数几位成人作家。 自那以后，竞争越来越激烈，今年有60份参赛作品，年轻和年长的作者大致平分秋色。

参赛作品分为两类：17岁及以下和18岁及以上。 This year’s youngest submission came from a fourth-grader, while its oldest writer was 90. 提交的材料由五名萨克州立大学教师组成的小组进行评判。 为确保客观性，提交的文章将删除作者姓名。 First-, second-, and third-place winners along with honorable mentions are published in a free, 下载电子书.

“This is something that really encourages everybody to continue writing and to know that their talent is being recognized and published,” Romero said. “It’s also a way to share all these stories with the community. It’s no good if they just live in my hard drive. We want people to read these poems and these short stories and these autobiographical essays and know about the people who live in our community.”

随着比赛的发展，罗梅罗开始接触当地社区组织和K-12学校。 其中之一是羚羊的中心高中，Sac州立大学的校友安娜·埃尔南德斯在那里教西班牙语。

埃尔南德斯说，写作已经是她课程的重要组成部分，她鼓励她的学生把他们的作品提交给萨克拉门托之声。 This year, five of her students did so, and one of her colleague’s students took third place.

In addition to connecting with their culture and identity, Hernandez said, the opportunity to be singled out for their writing is especially important for students at low-income schools such as Center High, where graduation rates are “not the best.”

“It’s a big deal for our students to be recognized,” she said. “They get excited, they work for it, and even though they don’t believe in themselves (initially), at the end of this, they’re like, ‘OK, I can do it,’ and that encourages more students.”

From 囊状态, 10 students, one lecturer, and one staff member participated in this year’s competition, with three winning honorable mention in addition to Félix-Gallegos’ first-place award.

In Félix-Gallegos’ story, a boy awakes to find his beloved dog, Chilindrina, outside and foaming at the mouth. 为了让别人觉得他是个男人，他忍住了宠物死去时哭泣的冲动。 那天晚上，他梦见他已故的祖母是一个天使，将在天堂照顾狗。

The bulk of the story is true: Félix-Gallegos’ family dog died from poisoning when she was a child, and she would subsequently learn that someone in the neighborhood had laid out tainted food to kill all the dogs. 她说，这个严峻的问题在墨西哥并不罕见，她想引起人们对这个问题的关注。

Félix-Gallegos, who received her undergraduate degree in Spanish from 囊状态 in May, is working toward a master’s degree in Spanish. 她希望获得博士学位，成为一名大学教授。 她说，像萨克拉门托之声这样的比赛可以帮助打破西班牙语不如英语复杂或重要的神话。

她说，赢得第一名极大地增强了她的信心。

“Since I was young, I always wanted to be a writer, but then I thought, maybe I'm not good enough. If I write something who’s going to read it?” Félix-Gallegos said. “Seeing how other people think about my writing, that it’s good, it helped me to see that maybe I have some potential, I just needed a little more practice.”

Download the 2023 Voces de 萨克拉门托 e-book at the 萨克拉门托之声网站.