Events

Event Description:

The 6th bi-annual conference will be in Houston. The theme is "Black and Brown Unite to Fight-Toward a Human Rights Movement in the Deep South." Program will cover a wide range of topics, among them immigrants' and women's rights, juvenile justice, low wages, felony disenfranchisement, and environmental justice. There'll be workshops, plenaries, a public speakout, and a direct action. If you are reading this on the PAA home page, click on the event title for details.

Event Phone Contact Information:
888-949-9754

Event Website:
www.shroc.org/index1.htm

Event Fee:
$25 registration, $10 student and low income

Event Description:

FILM EVENTS


Houston Institute for Culture
and the Havens Center Present

Topical Films and Discussions

Free and Open to the Public

All films 7:00pm (unless otherwise noted)

Havens Center - 1827 W. Alabama, Houston, Texas 77098

Religion, Culture and Politics in Mexico

Sunday, October 29
-Darkness into Light: Following the Spirit

Sunday, December 10
-Guadalupe: Mother of all Mexico

[Film Descriptions]


Films cosponsored by KPFT, 90.1FM



Stay tuned; more film dates to be announced

-Argentina - Hope in Hard Times
-This Land is Our Land: The Struggle for Land in Brazil
-Approach of Dawn: Portraits of Mayan Women Forging Peace in Guatemala
-Hidden in Plain Site



FILM DESCRIPTIONS

Religion, Culture and Politics in Mexico

Sunday, October 29, 7:00pm

Darkness into Light: Following the Spirit, 2003, 56min
By Patricia Lacy Collins and Robert S. Cozens (San Rafael Films), narrated by Edward James Olmos

To understand the role of public devotions in Mexican life today, one must understand what they have cost. From the 1840s until the 1990s, successive Mexican governments have sought to control and frequently to suppress the religious life of the people. Suppression became particularly bitter following the Constitution of 1917. In a country with almost 90% of the population professing the Catholic faith, how could this be? Following the Spirit, the third documentary in the Darkness into Light series, brings the story of the spiritual journey of the people of Mexico to the present time. It traces a long- standing friction between church and state that resulted, in the 19th and 20th centuries, in somber and bloody repression of religious and human rights in Mexico. Leading historians paint a broad canvas of multiple struggles little known outside of that country.


Sunday, December 10, 7:00pm

Guadalupe: Mother of all Mexico, 2003, 56min
By Patricia Lacy Collins and Robert S. Cozens (San Rafael Films), narrated by Edward James Olmos

Each year ten million people visit the shrine of our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico City. The histories and miracles of our lady of Guadalupe come alive as Mexican scholars and pilgrims on the road tell the wondrous stories behind their devotion to their spiritual mother.

Guadalupe, Mother of All Mexico suggests the strength of pre-Christian life and seeking. Such ancient, impressive sites as Teotihuacan and Monte Alban were built by human hands in cultures that had no beasts of burden. In pre-Christian times, the Mexicans tell us, "there was always a mother, but never like the Virgin Mary." In 1531, she was received by people of the western hemisphere as Our Lady of Guadalupe, the beloved "Madrecita."




PAST FILMS

Sexism and Discrimination

Thursday, September 14, 7:00pm

Havens Center Kids' Digital Story Project Debut "Talking About Sexism", 2006, 10mins

Middle School Children who are part of the Havens Center After-School Program produced a 10-minute digital story about sexism. They spoke with women in the community, including City Councilwoman Sue Lovell and Katrina survivor Mama Suma.

The soundtrack to the digital story will be aired on Houston radio stations in the fall and a DVD of their project will be distributed to area schools for classroom consideration of this important topic.

Who's Counting: Marilyn Waring on Sex, Lies and Global Economics, 1996, 52mins
Produced by The National Film Board of Canada

Marilyn Waring is the foremost spokesperson for global feminist economics, and her ideas offer new avenues of approach for political action. With persistence and wit she has succeeded in drawing attention to the fact that GDP has no negative side to its accounts - such as damage to the environment - and completely ignores the unpaid work of women. "Why is the market economy all that counts?" Ms. Waring asks?

In 1975, when she was just 22 years old, she was elected to the New Zealand parliament. She was re-elected three times and eventually brought down the government on the issue of making New Zealand a nuclear free zone. When she was chairperson of the Public Expenditures Committee, she perfected what she calls the "art of the dumb question." Ever since she has challenged the myths of economics, its elitist stance, and our tacit compliance with political agendas that masquerade as objective economic policy.


Immigration and Globalization
Cosponsored by Nuestra Palabra

Friday, September 22, 7:00pm

The Other Side, 2001, 27mins
Directed by Chris Walker; Produced by Television Trust for the Environment

Over the last century, hundreds of thousands of Mexicans have crossed the border to the United States in pursuit of permanent jobs, and a better life. But in the new millennium, that journey has become increasingly dangerous, and the costs are starting to outweigh the benefits.

This program reveals the devastating impact of Mexican-US migration. The people who attempt to cross suffer horribly and frequently die. The families and communities left behind are disabled and their languages and cultures are being destroyed. The Other Side tells the story of the villagers who have had enough - and now are trying to make sure their children will no longer have to migrate to realize their dreams.

Oaxacan Hoops, 2002, 20mins
Directed, Produced and Edited by Olga R. Rodriguez

Oaxacan Hoops explores how basketball, one of the most revered sports in the United States, has helped many Zapotec Indians living in Los Angeles build community, keep traditions alive and maintain a connection to their villages in Mexico.

The film opens in the mountains of the Sierra Norte, in the state of Oaxaca, where we find out how basketball became a cultural tradition for Zapotecs, the largest of 16 indigenous groups in the state and among Mexico's shortest people. The film crosses paths with "The Other Side," taking us to Los Angeles, where thousands of Zapotecs have gone looking for work. It is here that the biggest Oaxacan basketball tournament outside of Mexico, the Oaxaca Cup, takes place.


Saturday, September 23, 7:00pm

North of Ojinaga, 2004, 24mins
Directed by Rommel Eclarinal

Two young immigrants - a Chinese woman and a Mexican man - are smuggled across the U.S. border from Mexico and abandoned in the vast unforgiving Texas desert.

Pavements of Gold, 2001, 27mins
Directed by Steve Bradshaw; Produced by Television Trust for the Environment

Urban poverty is one of the biggest challenges facing the world in the 21st century. In 1950, three hundred million people were living in urban areas; by 2001 that figure had increased to 2.85 billion, or almost half the world's population. And the flow of rural migrants arriving in the world's mega cities shows no signs of slowing down. "It is a trend which cannot be stopped," says Anna Tibaijuka, the executive director of the UN Center for Human Settlements, "even in the developing countries..."

With the backdrop of Lima, Peru, this program examines the enduring magnetism of big cities and asks whether the migrants who have moved here now feel that city life is the answer to their dreams.

Mexico City: The Largest City, 2004, 26mins

This program defines Mexico City's globalization in terms of winners and losers, examining how, in the world's largest metropolis, immigration challenges are linked to poverty and population influx from surrounding rural areas. Contrasting the city's high-tech facilities and fashionable neighborhoods with its sprawling slums and their struggling inhabitants, the program outlines the relationship between foreign investment and the worldwide need for cheap labor, which Mexico and its indigenous peoples readily supply. Glimpses into a tech-savvy youth culture and the persistent Zapatista movement reinforce the capital's nickname: City of Contrasts.


Sunday, September 24, 7:00pm

A World Without Borders: What is Happening with Globalization, 2000, 26mins

As globalization gains momentum, industrialized and developing countries are, to a greater or lesser extent, becoming increasingly similar, with middle-class luxury and abject poverty coexisting side by side. This program explores the repercussions of globalization as well as a growing resentment toward the G8 countries and nongovernmental organizations. Concerns over third-world debt, environmental degradation, biodiversity, the concentration of power, and the future of democracy are aired by globally oriented young adults who are poised to inherit a world without borders, or rules.

Cochise County USA: Cries from the Border, 2005, 69mins (for discussion purposes we will view an except of the film)
Directed by Mercedes Maharis

Mercedes Maharis, a Mexican American resident of southeast Arizona, documented the activity of immigrants and anti-immigrant groups, as well as humanitarian organizations working to prevent deaths in the Arizona desert. A migrant trail for thousands of immigrants passes through Cochise County. The film reveals the dangers immigrants face, as well as related border issues of human and drug trafficking.

The film, which anti-immigrant activists point to as evidence for increased border protection, features interviews with Cochise County residents and officials, Border Patrol officials, "civil defense" organizers, civil rights activists and immigrants, and documents treacherous border crossings in the Arizona-Sonora desert.


Indigenous Peoples and Environment
Cosponsored by People of Earth

Friday, October 6, 7:00pm

Drumbeat for Mother Earth - Persistent Organic Pollutants Threatening Indigenous Peoples, 1999, 54mins
Directed by Joseph Di Gangi, PhD, and Amon Giebel; Produced by Indigenous Environmental Network and Greenpeace

Many scientists and tribal people consider persistent toxic chemicals to be the greatest threat to the long-term survival of Indigenous Peoples. "Drumbeat for Mother Earth" explores how these chemicals contaminate the traditional food web, violate treaty rights, travel long distances, and are passed from one generation to the next during pregnancy causing cancer, learning disabilities, and other serious health problems.

Indigenous Peoples' connection to Mother Earth places them on a collision course with these chemicals. Continued survival within a contaminated environment means making life and death decisions that could alter whole cultures, diets, ceremonies and future generations.

Huicholes and Pesticides, 1994, 27mins
Directed by Patricia Diaz-Romo

The indigenous Huichol people of Mexico consider themselves responsible for keeping the flames of life burning, and maintaining the forces of nature in balance. Paradoxically, as this documentary describes, they are also the primary victims of a disastrous environmental health crisis: their exposure to dangerous chemical pesticides, which are responsible for more than 1,500 deaths per year. In this film, doctors, anthropologists, and the Huichol people themselves describe this tragedy. The practitioners of subsistence agriculture for centuries, the Huichols' insertion into a market economy has led them to work as fieldworkers for multinational agribusiness concerns based in Mexico.

The film explains the pervasive use of pesticides there as an example of the exportation of environmentally and medically dangerous industries to the Third World, where low wages and lax enforcement of labor and environmental laws allow for the maximization of profits at catastrophic costs to the local population, especially for the marginalized indigenous populations, already suffering from the effects of poverty and malnutrition.


Saturday, October 7, 7:00pm

Pavements of Gold, 2001, 27mins
Directed by Steve Bradshaw; Produced by Television Trust for the Environment

Urban poverty is one of the biggest challenges facing the world in the 21st century. In 1950, three hundred million people were living in urban areas; by 2001 that figure had increased to 2.85 billion, or almost half the world's population. And the flow of rural migrants arriving in the world's mega cities shows no signs of slowing down. "It is a trend which cannot be stopped," says Anna Tibaijuka, the executive director of the UN Center for Human Settlements, "even in the developing countries..."

With the backdrop of Lima, Peru, this program examines the enduring magnetism of big cities and asks whether the migrants who have moved here now feel that city life is the answer to their dreams.

Ecuador: The Indigenous Woman, 1997, 57mins

Isolated in jungles, or crowded into large cities, Latin American Indians constitute the most exploited sector of society. This program traces the harsh life of indigenous women from several tribes, including the Otavalan, Puruha, and Quechua of Ecuador, from pre-Columbian times to the present. Topics discussed include rape as an ongoing practice; labor exploitation; the effects of acculturation; and racial and sexual discrimination.


Sunday, October 8, 7:00pm

In the Light of Reverence - Protecting America's Sacred Lands, 2001, 73mins
Directed by Christopher McLeod; Narrated by Peter Coyote and Tantoo Cardinal; Produced by the Sacred Land Film Project of Earth Island Institute

Across the United States, Native Americans are struggling to protect their sacred places. Religious freedom, so valued in America, is not guaranteed to those who practice land-based religion. Every year, more sacred sites - the land-based equivalent of the world's great cathedrals - are being destroyed. Strip Mining and development cause much of the destruction. But rock climbers, tourists, and New Age religious practitioners are part of the problem, too. The biggest problem is ignorance.

"In the Light of Reverence" tells the story of three indigenous communities and the land they struggle to protect: the Lakota of the Great Plains, the Hopi of the Four Corners area, and the Wintu of northern California.

Event Sponsor:
Houston Institute for Culture

Event Contact Name:
Mark Lacy

Event Phone Contact Information:
713.521.3686

Event Email Address:
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Event Website:
www.houstonculture.org/film

Event Fee:
Free