Events, Spring 2002
The theme for Spring 2002 is Migration and Borders. We will culminate the semester with a special Conference on Migration, Borders, and Transnational Organizing to be held on May 2, 2002. Save the date. More information will follow.
Women's Film Series
- Time: 5-7 pm
- Place: Sequoia Hall 104 (Note:This is a change from last year)
- Discussion will follow each film.
| February 14, 2002 | "Picture Bride" 95 minutes | With only a picture in hand, a young women leaves behind all she knows in Japan for the islands of Hawaii and an arranged marriage with a man she never met. (historical piece) |
| Feb 28, 2002 | "Ciudad" | Five vignettes of immigrants from different Latin American countries and their struggle to survive in New York City. A beautiful film. |
| March 14, 2002 | Two short films: "One Hundred Eggs A Minute", 23 minutes 1997 | This innovative documentary portrays the experiences and reflections of a second-generation Chinese American woman who grew up working in her family's fortune cookie factory in San Francisco. |
| "Serving With Dignity" 26 minutes 1997 | This insightful documentary spontlights an essential but unually ignored sement of working class America: the women who make the food -service industry run. The film profiles three single, ethnic women who confront disrespect and exploitation as workers, sexual harassment as women, and the pressures of life as mothers working long hours at low pay. | |
| April 18, 2002 | Bhaji on the Beach 100 min Umbi Films - Colombia Tristar | A witty comody about a gorup of Indian women living in England, who are brought together by a day on the beach. By nightfall they will have discussed, argued, laughed and fought over everything from sex to race, from battered women to male strippers. |
May 2, 2002. Conference on Migration, Borders, and Transnational Organizations
Save the date - More information will be forthcoming. Speakers who have already agreed to come include Martha Ojeda, President of Coalition for Justice in the Maquiladoras; Laura Gonzalez, University of Texas at Dallas anthropologist working with migrants from Guanajuato, Mexico in the United States; Rosemary Hennessy, Professor of English at Cornell University working and writing on cross-cultural border and gender issues; and Martha Jimenez, community activist with the Federation of Zacatecan Clubs in Los Angeles.
Spring 2001 International Women's Film Series
| Tuesday February 20, Sierra Hall 290, 3:30 pm | "Women's Global Strike", 15 minutes, Lecture by Ruth Todasco of Wages for Housework Campaign | This film documents the Women's Global Strike of 2000 in various places around the world. Ruth Todasco will speak about the purpose of the strike and plans for another worldwide Global Women's Strike on March 8, 2001, International Women's Day, including plans for Los Angeles. |
| Tuesday March 20, Sierra Hall 290 3:30 pm | "Sacrifice" by Ellen Bruno 45 minutes Lecture by Louisa Craig of The Burma Forum, Los Angeles | This powerful documentary concerns the sex-trafficking of young girls from Burma to Thailand. The film juxtaposes the beauty of the Thai countryside with the seemingly hidden human rights violations occurring there. Louisa Craig will talk about the situation in the area after the film. |
| Wednesday March 28, Engineering Auditorium, 5-7 pm | "Don't Ask Why" by Sabiha Sumar, 58 minutes | Anousheh lives with her stirct Muslim parents and two brothers in Karachi, Pakistan. At 17, she is at an age where daughters are usually married off. But Anousheh wants to study and refuses to accept the restrictions her religion and culture have imposed onher personal freedom. It causes conflict with her mother and lengthy discussions with her father. Her desire to be "as free as her brothers" is drawing her close to the Islamic political party, Jamaat-i-Islami which, although dominated by men, promises the liberating power of Islam for both men and women. The film follows Anousheh as she struggles to realize her dreams and copes with her share of disappointment. It is a beautifully realized and rare portrait of girls in South Asia and their relationship to Islam at t he beginning of the 21st century. |
| "Writing Desire" by Ursula Biemann, 25 minutes | This video essay on the new dream screen of the Internet and how it impacts on the globalized circulation of women's bodies from the third world to the first world. Although under-age Philippine "pen pals" and post Soviet mail-order brides have been part of the transnational exchange of sex in the ost-colonial and post-Cold War marketplace of desire before the digital age, the Internet has accelerated these transactions. Biemann provides her viewers with a thoughtful meditation on the obvious political, economic and gender inequalities of these exchanges by simulating the gaze of the Interned | |
| Wednesday April 25, Engineering Auditorium, 5-7 pm | "La Boda" by Hannah Weyer, 53 minutes | In an intimate portrait of migrant life along the U.S.-Mexican border, La Bodadelves into the challenges faced by a community striving to maintain their roots in Mexico, while pursuing the "American Dream" across the border. Weyer's camera follows Elizabeth Luis during the weeks before her marriage to Artemio Guerrero interweaving the anticipation of the upcoming wedding with candid stories that explore the architecture of the Luis family. For 22 year-old Elizabeth, migrant life has meant shouldering responsibilities beyond those of an average young adult. Along with her seven siblings, she has contributed to the family income throughout her adolescence and young adulthood, often forced to sacrifice school for fieldwork, social life for travel as she and her family move between Texas, California and Mexico. La Boda tells the story of a young women's coming of age, while also confronting negative stereotypes of the migrant community with the real life biography of a Mexican-American family bridging the gap between countries and culture. |
| The Grrlyshow" by Kara Herold, 18 minutes | The Grrlyshow is a powerful and rebellious message from new voices often left unheard which examines the girly Zine revolution and culture in such a way that the film intellectually and stylistically addresses anyone's question concerning whether or not feminism has reached its 3rd wave: the postmodern. By interweaving head-shot interviews, clips from the zines and 1950s television-esque vignettes, the film clearly illustrates feminism's ability to exist subversively within a system that generally doesn't give women their own voice. The Grrlyshow successfully brings to the survace alternative voices and projects that are vital to the continuation and expansion of feminism. | |
| Wednesday May 9, Engineering Auditorium, 5-7 pm | "Made in India", by Patricia Plattner, 52 minutes | This film is a portrait of the now-famous women's organization in India, called SEWA, the Self Employed Women's Association, that holds to the simple yet radical belief that poor women need organizing , not welfare. It offers union membership to the illiterate women who sell vegetables for 50 cents a day in the city markets, or who pick up paper scraps for recycling from the streets - jobs that most Indian men don't consider real work. Inspired by the political economic and moral model advocated by Gandhi, SEWA has grown since its founding to a membership of more than 217,ooo and its bank now has 61,000 members, assets of $4 million and customers who walk in each day to deposit a dollar or take out 60 cents. Folowing the lives of six of the women involved in the organization, including Ela R. Bhat, its visionary founder, Plattner's documentary is an important look at the power of grassroots global feminism. |
Fall 2000 Women's Film Series
- Time: 5:00-7:00PM
- Place: Engineering Auditorium100
- Films begin at 5:00; discussion following each film.
| Wed. October 4 | "Women Being", by Wen-Jie Qin, 20 minutes | In a critical examination of the changing concepts of beauty and sexuality in modern China, Women Being illustrates how a flood of Western pop culture is adversely affecting women's expectations and self worth. |
| "Women With Open Eyes", by Anne-Laure Folly, 52 minutes | A portrait of African women from Burkina Faso, Mali, Senegal and Benin who speak out and organize around five key issues: marital rights, reproductive health, female genital mutilation, women's role in the economy and political rights. | |
| Thurs. October 26 | "Made in Thailand ", by Eve-Laure Moros & Linzy Emery, 30 minutes | This powerful, revealing documentary about women factory workers and their strggle to organize unions exposes he human cost behind the production of everyday items producted for multinational corporations. |
| "Righteous Babes", by Pratibha Parmar, 50 minutes | Filmmaker Praibha Parmar (A Place of Rage, Warrior Marks) explores the intersection of feminism with populr music. With critical insight and candidness, this film demonstrates the relevance of feminism to women and young girls today. | |
| Thurs. November 30 | "Performing the Border", by Ursula Biemann, 42 minutes | This experimental video essay explores the sexualization of the border region (Mexico and US) through labor division, prostitution, the expression of female desires in the entertainment industry, and sexual violence in the public sphere. |
| "Women of Change", by Joanne Burke, 26 minutes | This three part series by award winning documentarian Joanne Burke focusses on grassroots leaders in Zimbabwe, Guatemala and Thailand as they make a difference in women's lives. |
Spring 2000 Women's Film Series
- Time: 5:00-8:00PM
- Place: Engineering Room 100
- Films begin at 5:00; discussion following each film.
| Feb 10 | "Divorce Iranian Style" | |
| March 2 | "Four Women of Egypt", Followed by special guest speaker Homa Hoodfar. | Dr. Hoodfar, of Concordia University, is the author of Between Marriage and the Market. She is also one of the scholar-members of the international solidarity network, "Women Living Under Muslim Laws." |
| April 6 | "Hollywood Harems" | With special guest filmmaker, Nadia Kemal - Eddin |
| May 4 | "The King of Masks" |
Spring 2000 Community Organizing Conference
"Organizing Women Across Borders & in Los Angeles"
- Date: April 10 & 11
- Place: Whitsett room (Sierra Hall 451)
- Cosponsored by the Women's Studies Department. California State University, Northridge
- For more information, call the WS Department at (818) 677-3110.