BENTONVILLE, Ark — On Wednesday, March 4, the Spring Arts and Culture Festival’s “Words Between Us” event started off the day. During this event students and staff read excerpts from their favorite writers and books.

The Spring Arts and Culture Festival happens every year and started in 2015 with Lindsey Hutton, former English professor at NWACC. This year the members of the SACF organizing committee were Brandon Andrews, April Brown, Samantha Bunker, Raquel De Avelar Bilck, Sharon Fox, Jessica Gutierrez, Kendrea James, Kate Knoll, Cody Taylor, Shawna Thorup and Matt Evans.

Each year has a different theme with this year being connection(s). According to Evans, professor of Political Science, the intent was to have readings that reflected connections and disconnections in a variety of ways. He mentioned that this event was similar to last year’s “Risky Writers” only that this time there was an emphasis for it to be in-person.

This year’s readers were Heather Lundy who read “Excepting Mrs.Pentherby,” “Gone to the Grave: Burial Customs of the Arkansas Ozarks, 1850-1950,” and “The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender,” Stephanie Freeman, who read “Frankenstein,” Emily Safcsak who read “Tender is the Flesh” and Evans, who read “The Kentucky Derby Is Decadent and Depraved” and “The Drowned and the Saved.”

Evans mentioned that he chose “The Kentucky Derby is Decadent and Depraved” because it represents “a journalist failure and triumph for the writer, but offers an interesting depiction of the localized connections produced through the fanfare and industry of horseracing.”

He added that the writer of the book, Hunter S. Thompson made up the story because he didn’t do the work properly but had to produce a story anyway to be paid. However, after he published it, the story created a celebrity culture around him focused on a new style of writing called “Gonzo journalism.”

The next writer Evans talked about was Primo Levi, who was a Holocaust survivor and wrote “The Drowned and the Saved,” and mentioned that the writer didn’t let his experience be utilized to hurt others. To connect this writer to the theme, Evans said, “His writing, for me, spoke to the disconnection we find in making others less human, stripping away their humanity as others to be contained, deported, imprisoned, or killed.”

The Spring Arts and Culture Festival has since ended, but there was plenty to see and learn. Many students and staff attended the events excited to hear about history, community and how we’re all connected.