2024 ALTA Conference
2024-10-25 - 2024-10-28 | Milwaukee, WI
This year, I’ll be speaking on a panel about translating computer voices, providing a live demo of one way to use computer-assisted translation software for literary translation, and debuting some translated love poetry from Hamid Ismailov’s next book.

2024 ATA Conference
2024-10-30 - 2024-11-02 | D.C.
Join me and Kate Deimling as we present Making Sense of the Senses: Translating Images, with examples from our work translating French to English and Turkic languages and Russian to English. And come to cheer for me and all the readers at the After Hours Cafe.

Translating In & Out of the Ivory Tower
2024-11-07 18:00 - 19:30 (America/Los_Angeles) | online via Zoom, Seattle, WA
Translators of fiction and nonfiction often find their professional circles overlapping with the academic universe. We might translate books by noted experts, contend for academic awards, handle criticism from scholars, and ask professors to review our books and teach them in their classes. In this revised and expanded talk, two NOTIS translators will discuss their experience navigating aspects of these overlapping worlds.
Zakiya Hanafi will present an overview of the opportunities offered in the scholarly translation market, some of the professional skills required to succeed, and a roadmap of the publication process, from receiving an offer to seeing a manuscript through production.
Shelley Fairweather-Vega will discuss some of the real and imagined differences between independent translators and translators who hold academic positions, and explore the real benefits freelance translators can gain by working closely with their counterparts at universities.
These two short presentations will be followed by a general discussion with Q&A.

Translation in the Spotlight open mic night
2025-07-17 17:30 - 19:30 UTC | Folio, the Seattle Athenaeum, Seattle, WA

Multilingual Translation Workshop
2025-08-19 13:30 - 15:15 UTC | Online
I’m leading a workshop again this year, open to translators with work in progress from any language.

Launch of We Computers
2025-08-20 19:00 - 20:30 UTC | Elliott Bay Book Company, Seattle, WA
With Aria Fani

NOTIS Annual Conference
2025-09-13 | Lynnwood Event Center, Lynnwood, WA, United States

New books: We Computers and Castigation
2025-09-17 19:00 - 20:30 UTC | Third Place Books Ravenna, 6504 20th Ave NE, Seattle, WA, 98115, United States
Double book talk!

Translating Mothersland
2025-09-23 18:00 - 19:00 (Europe/Paris) | Byre Theatre, Abbey Street, St Andrews, Fife, KY16 9LA, United Kingdom
Shahzoda Samarqandi, Shelley Fairweather-Vega, and the Politics of Language
Dr Sarah Gear, School of Modern Language
I’ll be appearing virtually with novelist Shahzoda Samarqandi and Dr Sarah Gear to explore the Soviet legacy, ecocide, feminism and translation’s role in amplifying Central Asian voices. Part of Byre World, celebrating global storytelling and ideas.
Running time: 1h

Three paths to publishing professional literary translations
2025-10-25 13:30 - 15:00 UTC | Westin Boston Seaport, Boston, MA, United States
I’ll present some translation case studies at the American Translators Association 66th Annual Conference! I’ll also be at the After Hours Café and other events throughout the conference.

2025 Hamid Ismailov American tour
2025-10-29 08:00 - 2025-11-24 17:00 UTC | D.C.
Uzbekistan’s most famous author in exile, Hamid Ismailov, is touring the United States this fall to promote his newest book in English, the National Book Award finalist We Computers: A Ghazal Novel.

Most of these events are free and open to the public. A few require registration or a ticket. Visit the links to learn more.

Oct. 29, 6:00 pm New York, NY – Words Without Borders gala – https://wordswithoutborders.org/events/the-2025-words-without-borders-gala/
Nov. 4, 5:15 pm Northfield, MN – Carleton College, with Adeeb Khalid and Shelley Fairweather-Vega – https://www.carleton.edu/calendar/?eId=usGB
Nov 9, 6:00 pm San Francisco, CA – The Sycamore, happy hour and reading with Shelley Fairweather-Vega – https://thesycamoresf.com/events
Nov. 10, 12:00 pm Palo Alto, CA – Stanford University, with Shelley Fairweather-Vega – https://dlcl.stanford.edu/events/we-computers
Nov. 12, 4:30 pm New Haven, CT – Yale University, with Shelley Fairweather-Vega – https://macmillan.yale.edu/europe/central-asia-initiative/events/2025-11-12/cai-we-computers-book-talk-hamid-ismailov-and
Nov. 13, 7:00 pm Boston, MA – Brookline Booksmith with Shelley Fairweather-Vega and Sunil Sharma – https://brooklinebooksmith.com/event/2025-11-13/hamid-ismailov-and-shelley-fairweather-vega-sunil-sharma
Nov. 14, 4:30 pm South Bend, IN – University of Notre Dame with Shelley Fairweather-Vega – https://asia.nd.edu/events/2025/11/14/presentation-of-hamid-ismailovs-new-novel-we-computers/
Nov. 17, 4:30 pm Swarthmore, PA – Swarthmore College with Shelley Fairweather-Vega – https://swatcentral.swarthmore.edu/?trumbaEmbed=view%3Devent%26eventid%3D1315322843
Nov. 18, 7:00 pm New York, NY and online – National Book Awards Finalist Reading at NYU Skirball Center – https://as.nyu.edu/departments/cwp/reading-series/FALL-2025/2025-national-book-awards-reading.html
Nov. 19, 8:00 pm New York, NY and online – National Book Awards ceremony – https://www.nationalbook.org/awards2025/
Nov. 20, 7:30 pm Washington, D.C. – ASEEES convention: Celebrating Central Asian and Southeast European Literature in Translation with Turkoslavia (conference registration required): https://aseees.org/convention/2025-convention/
Nov. 22 Miami, FL – Miami Book Fair – https://www.miamibookfair.com/

Rate-Sharing Edit-a-Thon at ALTA
2025-11-07 12:00 - 2025-11-08 13:50 (America/Los_Angeles) | Tucson Marriott University Park, Tucson, AZ, United States
The Literary Translators Division of the National Writers Union needs your help! Drop in at lunchtime on Friday or Saturday to contribute your own data to our rate-sharing tool. We’re building a tool we can use to organize translators for better pay and working conditions.

Envisioning the Perfect Contract: ALTA Panel
2025-11-08 10:45 - 12:00 UTC | Tucson Marriott University Park, Tucson, AZ, United States
I’m joining Larissa Kyzer and Allana Lieberman to discuss translation contracts at ALTA!
Literary translation is an artistic endeavor, but publishing a translation is a business transaction, ideally governed by a fair and mutually beneficial contract. Knowing basic contractual terms governing payment, rights, and deadlines empowers you as a translator. This panel will share reference materials for drafting and reviewing contracts and will feature the panelists’ real-life experiences negotiating
recent translation agreements.
We will address contracts between publisher and translator, between author and translator, and between agent and translator, with the goal of arming literary translators with the knowledge they need to ensure fair agreements. This panel is organized by members of the Translators Organizing
Committee (now the Literary Translators Division!) of the National Writers Union.

Eurasia in Translation: Shifting Canons, Shaping Contexts
2025-11-08 15:45 - 17:00 (America/Los_Angeles) | Tucson Marriott University Park, Tucson, AZ, United States
I will speak with Naomi Caffee, Sabrina Jaszi, and Tatiana Filimonova on this first-ever ALTA panel dedicated to translating the literature of Eurasia.
This panel brings together translators working across multiple languages and contexts of Central Asia, the Caucasus, Eastern Europe, Siberia, and the Russian Far North, who will share their experiences creating anthologies and working with translations as educators and scholars. They will discuss the challenges of translating, contextualizing, analyzing, and canonizing literary texts from a part of the world that is often ignored in literary markets and university curricula. Speakers include contributors and editors of Tulips in Bloom: An Anthology of Central Asian Literature (Palgrave, 2024), Amanat: Women’s Writing from Kazakhstan (Gaudy Boy, 2022), Reindeer Caravan: An Anthology of Indigenous Literature from Siberia (forthcoming, Amherst College Press) and the journal Turkoslavia.

Celebrating Central Asian and Southeast European Literature in Translation with Turkoslavia
2025-11-20 19:30 - 21:00 (America/New_York) | Washington Hilton, Washington, D.C.
I’ll be reading with author Hamid Ismailov and other notable translators and writers at this ASEEES convention ancillary event.
