MLA/DLACon2025: Full Schedule

4:00pm EDT

All Conference Reception

Wednesday May 7, 2025 4:00pm - 4:30pm EDT

Bayfront Ballroom

Wednesday May 7, 2025 4:00pm - 4:30pm EDT
Bayfront Ballroom

Social Event, Conference Comm

4:30pm EDT

Opening Keynote: Lady Brion

Wednesday May 7, 2025 4:30pm - 5:30pm EDT

Bayfront Ballroom

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Speakers

Lady Brion

Poet

Lady Brion is an international spoken word artist, activist, organizer and educator who has captivated audiences with her powerful performances. She became the Women of the World Poetry Slam Champion and International Poetry Slam Champion (team slam) in April 2021. In 2024 she was... Read More →

Wednesday May 7, 2025 4:30pm - 5:30pm EDT
Bayfront Ballroom

Keynote, Conference Comm

5:45pm EDT

Free for All: The Public Library (Documentary Screening)

Wednesday May 7, 2025 5:45pm - 7:45pm EDT

Bayfront Ballroom

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Free for All: The Public Library tells the story of the quiet revolutionaries who made a simple idea happen. From the pioneering women behind the “Free Library Movement” to today's librarians who service the public despite working in a contentious age of closures and book bans, meet those who created a civic institution where everything is free and the doors are open to all.

Maryland Public Television will be facilitating a discussion after the one-hour film

Wednesday May 7, 2025 5:45pm - 7:45pm EDT
Bayfront Ballroom

Social Event, Conference Comm

12:00pm EDT

Maryland Author Award Keynote Luncheon: Roseanne A. Brown

Thursday May 8, 2025 12:00pm - 1:30pm EDT

Bayfront Ballroom

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Speakers

Roseanne A. Brown

Author

Roseanne A. Brown is an immigrant from the West African nation of Ghana and a graduate of the University of Maryland, where she completed the Jimenez-Porter Writers’ House program. Her debut novel A Song of Wraiths and Ruin was an instant New York Times Bestseller, an Indie Bestseller... Read More →

Thursday May 8, 2025 12:00pm - 1:30pm EDT
Bayfront Ballroom

Keynote, Conference Comm

6:00pm EDT

Thursday Evening Keynote and Banquet: Kristen Arnett

Thursday May 8, 2025 6:00pm - 7:30pm EDT

Bayfront Ballroom

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Keynote speaker to be announced soon. Dinner banquet is a separate ticket.

Speakers

Kristen Arnett

Author

Kristen Arnett is the queer Floridian author of With Teeth: A Novel (Riverhead Books, 2021) which was a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award in fiction and the New York Times bestselling debut novel Mostly Dead Things (Tin House, 2019) which was also a finalist for the Lambda Literary... Read More →

Thursday May 8, 2025 6:00pm - 7:30pm EDT
Bayfront Ballroom

Keynote, Conference Comm

8:00pm EDT

Pub Quiz

Thursday May 8, 2025 8:00pm - 10:00pm EDT

Bayfront Ballroom

Thursday May 8, 2025 8:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
Bayfront Ballroom

Social Event, Conference Comm

7:30am EDT

MLA Annual Member Meeting and Breakfast

Friday May 9, 2025 7:30am - 9:00am EDT

Bayfront Ballroom

Open to all MLA members

Friday May 9, 2025 7:30am - 9:00am EDT
Bayfront Ballroom

Meeting, MLA

9:30am EDT

Closing Keynote: Temim Fruchter

Friday May 9, 2025 9:30am - 10:30am EDT

Bayfront Ballroom

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Speaker to be announced soon

Speakers

Temim Fruchter

Author

Temim Fruchter is a queer nonbinary anti-Zionist Jewish writer who lives in Brooklyn, NY. She holds an MFA in fiction from the University of Maryland, and is the recipient of fellowships from the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities, Vermont Studio Center, and a 2020 Rona Jaffe... Read More →

Friday May 9, 2025 9:30am - 10:30am EDT
Bayfront Ballroom

Keynote, Conference Comm

12:00pm EDT

Lunch pickup

Friday May 9, 2025 12:00pm - 12:30pm EDT

Bayfront Ballroom

Present your pre-purchased lunch ticket to receive your boxed lunch.

Friday May 9, 2025 12:00pm - 12:30pm EDT
Bayfront Ballroom

Conference