(toronto) if you want to see me in person...
this is not a real entry, just some event announcements:
1. cherrybomb, new queer night every thursday
cherrybomb:
A red, ball-shaped firecracker that explodes with a loud bang.
check out CHERRYBOMB Thursdays
for your bang.
'cause Thursdays are the new Fridays'
CHERRY BOMB!
with dj nikki red & guests
@
The Session
512 Queen St. W.
416-203-7961
no cover
spinning classic funk, olskool, retro beats, new found treats, hipdropping hipbop, and what ever we drip between the lines.
doors open at 8
dj nikki red spins from 9 on
come and enjoy this sexy new space
in upcoming weeks there will
be spoken word artists, performers etc.
contact nikki
musnik@yahoo.com
thesessionqueenstreet@yahoo.com
if you are interested in performing
2. tomorrow night! mpenzi: black womens film & video fest
The 2nd annual Mpenzi: Black Women's International Film & Video Festival
is happening Friday Feb. 17th at 6:30pm (doors open at 5:30) at University
of Toronto's Medical Sciences Building in the King's College Circle.
Tickets: $10 advance, $10 at the door (sliding scale available)
Available at: Toronto Women's Bookstore (Harbord & Spadina), A Different
Booklist (Bathurst & Bloor), Another Story (Roncesvalles) and This Ain't
the Rosedale Library (Church St. - no sliding scale)
Join us for a night of films by many local artists including Natalie
Wood and d'bi young.
Free childcare and ASL interpretation available - must be booked by Feb.
10th (mpenzifilmfestival@hotmail.com or call 416 533 8157)
For more information please visit http://mpenzifilmfestival.tripod.com
3. browngirlworld 5 for IWD with mango tribe & raging asian women
The Toronto Women’s Bookstore and Brownstargirl Productions present:
Browngirlworld 5: Pan-Asian Women Celebrate International Women’s Day
through Spoken Word, Dance and Music
Time: Saturday, March 4, 2006, doors 7:30 PM, show 8:00 PM
Location: Innis Town Hall, 2 Sussex Drive, Toronto.
Price: $8-$20. Advance tickets are available at Toronto Women’s Bookstore.
Fully wheelchair accessible and all-ages space; free childcare available.
Media contact: Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha at brownstargirl@riseup.net
Sick of the same-old same-old for IWD? Brownstargirl Productions and
Toronto Women’s Bookstore are bringing Mango Tribe to Toronto for
International Women’s Day 2006!
On International Women’s Day, women and trans people have historically
come together to celebrate more than nine decades of struggle for freedom,
justice and peace. Browngirlworld 5 will feature performances by the
exciting pan-Asian women’s spoken word collective, Mango Tribe, in their
first ever Toronto appearance, and Toronto’s own all-women’s Taiko
drumming group, Raging Asian Women.
Mango Tribe is an acclaimed 22-member pan-Asian/Pacific Islander women’s
spoken word, hiphop and theatre group. On Saturday March 4, 2006, they’ll
be performing in their first Toronto appearance as part of an expanded
version of Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha’s Browngirlworld women of
color spoken word shows. Toronto’s own Raging Asian Women all-women’s
Taiko drumming group will be opening.
In 2003, Toronto-based spoken word artist Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha
saw a gap in spoken word venues that were both queer-friendly and
welcoming to artists of color. Her Browngirlworld spoken word shows drew
increasing crowds and media attention over the past two years. In 2006,
Piepzna-Samarasinha and Toronto Women’s Bookstore have joined forces to
take the Browngirlworld shows to the next level, producing two large-scale
queer of color spoken word events a year.
4. prisoners' justice film festival- feb 23rd to 26th
PRISONER'S JUSTICE FILM FESTIVAL 2006
Toronto's Prisoner's Justice Action Committee presents
The Second Annual
Prisoner's Justice Film Festival
February 23-26, 2006
This event is generously supported by the Social Justice Cluster,
University of Toronto
The first Toronto Prisoner's Justice Film Festival was held in January
of 2005 and drew hundreds of community members, abolitionists, youths,
activists, students, educators, artists, ex-prisoners, family members
and allies from across Ontario. This year's festival will build on the
first, as we work to build a movement that challenges the
prison-industrial complex, and demands justice, not jails.
Join us for an exciting selection of informative films including
Canadian, U.S., and international submissions. Films will be
accompanied by guest panels including current and ex-prisoners,
families of prisoners, activists and advocates, film-makers,
researchers and writers. Audiences will be encouraged to join in the
discussion. Between films, participants will have the chance to enjoy
musical performances, take in displays of prisoners' art, and check out
ally organizations at our community info fair.
Thursday February 23, 2006 6-9.30pm
Friday February 24, 2006 7pm to late
Saturday February 25, 2006 12noon-10pm
Sunday February 26, 2005 2-9.30pm
All film screenings at Innis Town Hall - University of Toronto
Located at the corner of Sussex Ave and St. George St.
Friday Party at the Multipurpose Room, Student Campus Center
Ryerson University, 55 Gould St.
Festival Schedule
Thursday, February 23rd
6:00 - 9:30pm Health in Prison
Opening with Manitou Kwe Singers (Women Spirit Singers)
Manitou Kwe Singers (Women Spirit Singers), founded in 1995 by Amber
O'Hara (Waabnong Kwe) is an all women's hand drum group. All members of
Manitou Kwe Singers are of Native ancestry. Herstorically, they have
sung for the missing or murdered women in Canada, for prisoners,
justice and against violence in general.
Exceptional People's Olympiad
(Canada, 2000, 15min, Big House Productions/CBC)
This film was shot and produced by a film production group inside
Collins Bay Federal Jail near Kingston. This film highlights the
annual weekend Olympics for athletes with disabilities organized and
paid for by prisoners at Collins Bay. This film highlights some of the
relationships that have developed over the course of this event. An
interesting snap-shot of two communities so often made invisible by our
society.
Prison Lullabies (USA, 2003, 83min, Brown Hats Productions)
Dirs: Odile Isralson, Lina Matta
Prison Lullabies is the remarkable portrait of four women living on the
bad side of luck, struggling with drug addiction, arrested for dealing
and prostitution, and serving prison time with one common bond -
arrested pregnant, Amy, Monique, Joann, and Anne Marie have all given
birth behind bars. One of only five prisons in the U.S. to provide a
nursery program for inmates, Taconic Correctional Facility in New York
State allows the women to keep their babies for the first 18 months of
their lives while insisting that the mothers participate in a rigorous
series of classes that range from basic child care to anger management
and drug counseling. Each woman is released in the course of filming.
Each must choose, minute to minute, whether to find a job, break the
cycle of relapse and re-arrest that has led to the loss of her other
children, or pick up the crack pipe, abandon the child, and return to
the streets. Shot in cinema-verité style, Prison Lullabies addresses
these issues by allowing the audience the opportunity to observe and
listen as the stories of the inmate mothers unfold in their own time
and in their own words. Prison Lullabies is an extraordinary tale -
that of four women making life-altering choices and seizing the glimmer
of possibility the prison nursery program is holding out for them and
for the future of their children.
Q&A with
Ayden Scheim, prison activist
Psychiatric survivor, OCAB Speakers Bureau
Friday, February 24th
7:00pm "LYRICIST LINKUP 6: Poetik Justice"
Presented by 8 Rooks Enlightenment & I.S.I.S. CIRCLE ENTERTAINMENT
Ryerson University Multi-Purpose Room (Student Campus Centre), 55 Gould
St.
Hosted by Soul-R & EvE! Featuring Spin, Lady Loxx, Leviathan, Jah Paul
& Elisha, Blak Child, EvE, Soul-R and El Machetero
Open-Mic! Cultural Catering! Vendor's Market!
Sponsors: Ryerson Students' Union, Big It Up International, Lite It Up
Candles, Dogon Star Productions
Music: DJ El Machetero
Contact: 8Rooks.Com
Saturday, February 25th
12:00 - 2:00pm Networking Forum
An opportunity to share information about what various individuals and
groups are currently doing in the area of prisoners' justice activism -
both for new folks who want to get involved, and for folks who are
already involved but want to build stronger connections. Come and
identify networking /collective support needs for prisoner's justice
activists and to brainstorm ideas for keeping each better connected.
Explore the possibility of forming a radical prison workers network and
discuss ideas around organizing a prisoner's justice week and/or other
actions which will help build collective solidarity in the prison
abolition movement.
2:00 - 5:00pm Youth Incarceration
Juvies (USA, 2004, 66 min, Chance Films Inc.)
Dirs: Leslie Neale
From award-winning documentary filmmaker Leslie Neale (Road to Return)
comes this riveting look at a world most of us will never see: the
world of juvenile offenders who are serving incredible prison sentences
for crimes they either did not commit or were only marginally involved
in. For two years, Neale taught a video production class at Los Angeles
Central Juvenile Hall to 12 young people who were all being tried as
adults. Juvies is the product of that class, which was a learning
experience for both students and teacher - and becomes a learning
experience for all of us, as
we witness the heartbreaking stories of children abandoned by families
and a system that has disintegrated into a kind of vending machine
justice. Narrated by actor Mark Wahlberg, himself a former juvenile
offender, and poetry read by Mos Def.
Sun Up 'till Sun Down (USA, 2005, 22 min, Prison Moratorium Project)
Dir. Tania Cuevas
A lively documentary produced by the Prison Moratorium Project about
their campaign against the construction of youth prisons and the
growing movement in New York to end imprisonment. Imaginative
techniques of conveying the startling reality of the prison industry
make this film engaging as well as informative.
Performances by
Spin, spoken word artist, community organizer
Toronto Underground Street Journalist Mr. Bones
Q&A with
Veronica Salvatierra, Community Youth Worker, St Stephen's Community
House
Lee Ann Chapman, B.A. LL.B, staff lawyer at Justice for Children and
Youth.
Jagjeet Chhabra, 81 Reasons Campaign
Representative, Black Youth Taking Action
5:00 - 7:15pm Women Political Prisoners of the Middle East
Women in Death Castles (Palestine, 2004,13min)
Dir: Balata Film Collective
A high proportion of Palestinian women prisoners in Israeli Occupation
prisons are from the Nablus region. In this film, recently released
women from Balata and Nablus speak out about their pain and struggle
while imprisoned. Testimonies describe interrogation, physical and
mental torture, loneliness. The film Includes interviews with
ex-prisoners, children of current prisoners and officials from the
Prisoners' Society.
Red Names (Canada,1999, 12min)
Dirs: Amin Zarghami, Shahrzad Arshadi
This is a short video celebrating the legacy of thousands of women who
lost their lives in Iran between 1979 and 1999 due to their political,
social and religious beliefs. For Amin Zarghami & Shahrzad Arshadi,
working on this video was an opportunity to pay tribute to the memory
of these women - some of whom they knew personally - and grieve their
loss. It is intended as a testament both to their suffering and to the
political tyranny that led to their execution.
Women in Struggle (Palestine, 2004, 56min)
Dir: Buthina Canaan Khoury
This film documents the lives of Palestinian women who are ex-political
detainees, depicting their struggle during years of imprisonment in
Israeli jails and exploring the effect on their present-day life. The
film focuses on the lives of four women who became involved in the
Palestinian national struggle for independence. The women testify in
their own words about their histories, and about daily life in the
current Palestinian Intifada at a time of the "war on terror" and the
apartheid wall. The film seeks to understand the women's efforts to
preserve their dignity and integrate into Palestinian social and
political life. Although these four women are no longer physically
incarcerated, they actually find themselves in a bigger prison carrying
their imprisonment within them in every aspect of their life.
Q&A with
Shahrzad Mojab, Director, Women and Gender Studies Institute,
University of Toronto
Shahrzad Arshadi, filmmaker
Rafeef Ziadeh, Sumoud
Performance by Faith Nolan, singer-songwriter, blues guitarist and
prison activist http://www.faithnolan.org
7:30 - 10:00 Resistance Caged (Political Prisoners)
Mission Against Terror (Cuba/Ireland, 2004, 48 min, Canal Education and
Two Islands Productions)
Dirs: Bernie Dwyer, Roberto Ruiz Rebo
As Havana wakes up to another day, five Cuban men are serving their
time in prisons scattered throughout the United States. Their crime?
Protecting their country and people against terrorism. Arrested on
Sept. 12, 1998 and subjected to a trial, which US civil rights lawyer,
Leonard Weinglass, calls a "violation" from start to finish, the Cuban
five were locked away for a total of three life sentences plus 68
years. There are very few cases that are political by their nature.
This was one. "Mission Against Terror" charts Cuba's 45-year struggle
against terrorism and the five men's fight to win justice.
Souha Surviving Hell (Lebanon, 2001, 60min)
Dir: Randa Chahal Sabbag
From the director of Civilisees, which opened the 2000 Human Rights
Watch International Film Festival and received its Nestor Almendros
Prize, Randa Chahal Sabbag now turns her lens on South Lebanon. The
subject of Chahal Sabbag's film is the charismatic Souha Becharre, whom
many call the "fiance du Liban." In 1989 at the age of twenty-one,
Souha - a devoted communist - agreed to attempt the assassination of
Lebanese General Antoine Lahad, who was collaborating with the Israeli
Army in the South of Lebanon. Lahad survived, but Souha was quickly
arrested and thrown in the Khiam prison where she spent ten years for
the attempt on Lahad's life. Conditions in Khiam were horrific, and
Souha endured six of those years in solitary confinement. Chahal Sabbag
follows Souha in the months following her release, as she tirelessly
travels Lebanon - speaking about her experiences at Khiam and searching
out others who were imprisoned there. And despite all she suffered in
Khiam, Souha is a survivor who shares her story with a sense of hope
for the future - both her own and that of Lebanon.
Q&A with
Representative from Sumoud Political Prisoners Solidarity Group.
Tom Keefer - Seth Hayes Support Committee, Autonomy & Solidarity
Morteza Gorgzadeh, Toronto Forum on Cuba
Sunday, February 26th
2:00 - 4:00pm Immigration Detention and the Secret Trials
Rising Up: the Alams (USA, 2005, 12min)
Dir: Konrad Aderer
An immigrant family, the Alams, are picked up during the special
registration program in the United States after 911. Faced with removal
to persecution they decided to resist with the revolutionary
organization - Desis Rising Up and Moving, a South Asian working class
organization.
Don't Ask Don't Tell (Canada, 2005, 11min)
Dirs: Jean McDonald and Alex Rotalski
Approximately 200,000 non-status immigrants who live in Canada face
deportation and detention. Women abused by the spouse cannot call
police, lesbian couples are refused community housing. In Toronto
immigrant communities are fighting back. This film documents their
struggle.
Whose Rights, Anyway? Justice for Mohammed (Canada, 2005, 23 min)
Dir: Anice Wong
Provides public information about the security-certificates process by
highlighting the case of Mohamed Harkat who has been in detention in
Ottawa for over 18 months.
L'echo du Silence (Echo Of Silence) (Canada, 2003, 23 min)
Dir: Chloe Germain-Therien
In 1997 two Basque men, Gorka Perea and Eduardo Plagaro, sought refugee
status in Canada after being charged with arson in Spain. They claimed
that their confessions to the crime were signed under torture. In 2001
the two men were detained as suspected terrorists in a prison in
Rivière des Prairies, Quebec. The Echo of Silence documents their
experience in Canada: their detention, their temporary release, and
finally their extradition in June 2005, despite an active grassroots
movement to keep them in Canada.
Q&A with
Chloe Germain-Therien, film-maker
Mac Scott - No One is Illegal
Sima Zerehi - Don't Ask, Don't Tell
Matthew Behrens - Toronto Action for Social Change
Family members - Friends and Family of Gary Freeman
4:30 - 6:30 The Politics of Prison
Torture Inc - America's Brutal Prisons (UK, 2005, 24 min)
Dir: Deborah Davies
Savaged by dogs, Electrocuted With Cattle Prods, Burned By Toxic
Chemicals, Does such barbaric abuse inside U.S. jails explain the
horrors that were committed in Iraq? They are just some of the victims
of wholesale torture taking place inside the U.S. prison system that we
uncovered during a four-month investigation for the UK's Channel 4.
It's terrible to watch some of the videos and realise that you're not
only seeing torture in action but, in the most extreme cases, you are
witnessing young men dying.
This Black Soil - A Story of Resistance and Rebirth (USA, 2004, 58 min,
Working Hands Productions)
Dir: Teresa Konechne
This inspiring and provocative new film chronicles the successful
struggle of Bayview, Virginia, a small and severely impoverished rural
African-American community, to pursue a new vision of prosperity.
Catalyzed by the defeat of a state plan to build a maximum-security
prison in their backyard, the powerful women leaders and residents
created the Bayview Citizens for Social Justice, a non-profit
organization, secured $10 million in grants, purchased the proposed
prison site land and are now building a new community from the ground
up. Under the leadership of visionary women, this new rural village
challenges all conventional ideas of community development and includes
not only improved and affordable housing, but a sustainable economic
base to earn a living wage, a community center for educating its
residents, a daycare center, laundromat, and a community farm, which
not only provides jobs and income for the organization, but returns
them to their roots, working on the land.
Q&A with
Julia Sudbury, Canada Research Chair in Social Justice, Equity and
Diversity, University of Toronto
Rai Reece, PJAC.
7:00 - 9:00 Indigenous and First Nations Prisoners
The Heart Has Its Own Memory (Canada, 2005, 13 minutes)
Dir: Audrey Huntley
This short film looks at violence against First Nations Women in Canada,
the lack of justice for missing Aboriginal women and racist police
inaction and impunity. Huntley creates a collage of the women's
stories and interviews with family members and friends. The film plays
with native oratory and is a testimony to the pain and grief of the
community as a whole and a message of no more silence.
To Heal The Spirit (Canada, 1991, 47 min)
Why Not Productions Inc.
An emotionally charged documentary that focuses on First Nations women
in prison and the way in which many women discover spirituality and
gain a sense of identity within the oppressive confines of prison
walls.
My Name is Kahentiiosta (Canada, 1995, 30 min)
Dir: Alanis Obomsawin
This affecting film profiles a young, courageous Kahnawake Mohawk woman
who was arrested after a 78 day armed standoff in 1990 between the
Mohawks and the Canadian federal government. Kahentiiosta is detained
four days longer than other women because the court refuses to accept
her aboriginal name. This is a compelling look at a people's movement
for self-determination and one young woman's refusal to capitulate in
the face of great adversity.
Q&A with
Jonathan Rudin, Aboriginal Legal Services of Toronto
Chief Leo Friday, Kashechewan First Nations
Representative from No More Silence
Amber O'Hara (Waabnong Kwe)
9:00pm: Closing Ceremony with Musical Guests
How to get there:
All Film Screenings at Innis Town Hall - University of Toronto, 2
Sussex Avenue. Corner of Sussex Ave and St. George Street, just south
of Bloor Street.
5 minute walk from St. George Station.
Friday Party at the Multipurpose Room, Student Campus Center, Ryerson
University, 55 Gould St, Near Yonge and Gerrard.
5 minute walk from Dundas Station.
All film programmes $5 suggested donation.
Friday night pay-what-you-can $5-$10. This is an all-ages event and all
venues are wheelchair accessible.
About the Prisoner's Justice Action Committee:
The Prisoner's Justice Action Committee believes that prisons do not
make our communities safer or more secure. We believe that the prison
industrial complex perpetuates violence and oppression, including
racism, classism, sexism, colonialism, and homophobia. PJAC works to
end incarceration and detention and to create healthy communities built
on social justice.
Please contact us with your questions, comments or ideas.
Pjac_committee@yahoo.com
Visit our website: http://www.pjac.org
Many thanks to our sponsors
CKLN 88.1fm
Criminology Department, University of Toronto
Defense for Children International, Canada
Equity Studies Department, University of Toronto
Faculty of Nursing, University of Toronto
John Howard Society Toronto
Ontario Public Interest Research Group, York University
Prisoner's HIV/AIDS Support Action Network
Sexual Diversity Studies Program, University of Toronto
Social Justice Cluster, University of Toronto
Toronto Forum on Cuba
Trans Identified/Woman Identified Caucus, CUPE 3903, York University
Women and Gender Studies Institute, University of Toronto
Women Political Prisoners of the Middle East Project (Shahrzad Mojab)
Endorsers
81 Reasons Campaign
8Rook Productions
Aboriginal Legal Services of Toronto
Al-Awda Right of Return Coalition (Toronto)
BIFA, Bath Penitentiary
Black Action Defense Committee
Black Inmates and Friends Assembly
Buried Alive Illustrations
Campaign to Stop Secret Trials in Canada
CKLN
Coalition to Stop the War Toronto
Colours of Resistance - York University
Friends and Family Gary Freeman
Gavel Club, Bath Penitentiary
Isis Entertainment
Justice for Children and Youth
Justice for Mohamed Harkat Committee
Lifers Group, Bath Penitentiary
Lifers Group, Joyceville Penitentiary
Lifting as We Climb
Native Brotherhood, Bath Penitentiary
No One Is Illegal
Ontario Coalition Against Poverty
Prison Talk Online
Resistance on the Sound Dial
Rittenhouse
Satan Macnuggit
St. Clare's Multifaith Housing Society
Strength in SISterhood
Sumoud
Toronto Action for Social Change
Toronto Don't Ask Don't Tell Campaign
Womyn4justice - Kingston
Words Action Resistance
Women's Centre - University of Toronto
1. cherrybomb, new queer night every thursday
cherrybomb:
A red, ball-shaped firecracker that explodes with a loud bang.
check out CHERRYBOMB Thursdays
for your bang.
'cause Thursdays are the new Fridays'
CHERRY BOMB!
with dj nikki red & guests
@
The Session
512 Queen St. W.
416-203-7961
no cover
spinning classic funk, olskool, retro beats, new found treats, hipdropping hipbop, and what ever we drip between the lines.
doors open at 8
dj nikki red spins from 9 on
come and enjoy this sexy new space
in upcoming weeks there will
be spoken word artists, performers etc.
contact nikki
musnik@yahoo.com
thesessionqueenstreet@yahoo.com
if you are interested in performing
2. tomorrow night! mpenzi: black womens film & video fest
The 2nd annual Mpenzi: Black Women's International Film & Video Festival
is happening Friday Feb. 17th at 6:30pm (doors open at 5:30) at University
of Toronto's Medical Sciences Building in the King's College Circle.
Tickets: $10 advance, $10 at the door (sliding scale available)
Available at: Toronto Women's Bookstore (Harbord & Spadina), A Different
Booklist (Bathurst & Bloor), Another Story (Roncesvalles) and This Ain't
the Rosedale Library (Church St. - no sliding scale)
Join us for a night of films by many local artists including Natalie
Wood and d'bi young.
Free childcare and ASL interpretation available - must be booked by Feb.
10th (mpenzifilmfestival@hotmail.com or call 416 533 8157)
For more information please visit http://mpenzifilmfestival.tripod.com
3. browngirlworld 5 for IWD with mango tribe & raging asian women
The Toronto Women’s Bookstore and Brownstargirl Productions present:
Browngirlworld 5: Pan-Asian Women Celebrate International Women’s Day
through Spoken Word, Dance and Music
Time: Saturday, March 4, 2006, doors 7:30 PM, show 8:00 PM
Location: Innis Town Hall, 2 Sussex Drive, Toronto.
Price: $8-$20. Advance tickets are available at Toronto Women’s Bookstore.
Fully wheelchair accessible and all-ages space; free childcare available.
Media contact: Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha at brownstargirl@riseup.net
Sick of the same-old same-old for IWD? Brownstargirl Productions and
Toronto Women’s Bookstore are bringing Mango Tribe to Toronto for
International Women’s Day 2006!
On International Women’s Day, women and trans people have historically
come together to celebrate more than nine decades of struggle for freedom,
justice and peace. Browngirlworld 5 will feature performances by the
exciting pan-Asian women’s spoken word collective, Mango Tribe, in their
first ever Toronto appearance, and Toronto’s own all-women’s Taiko
drumming group, Raging Asian Women.
Mango Tribe is an acclaimed 22-member pan-Asian/Pacific Islander women’s
spoken word, hiphop and theatre group. On Saturday March 4, 2006, they’ll
be performing in their first Toronto appearance as part of an expanded
version of Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha’s Browngirlworld women of
color spoken word shows. Toronto’s own Raging Asian Women all-women’s
Taiko drumming group will be opening.
In 2003, Toronto-based spoken word artist Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha
saw a gap in spoken word venues that were both queer-friendly and
welcoming to artists of color. Her Browngirlworld spoken word shows drew
increasing crowds and media attention over the past two years. In 2006,
Piepzna-Samarasinha and Toronto Women’s Bookstore have joined forces to
take the Browngirlworld shows to the next level, producing two large-scale
queer of color spoken word events a year.
4. prisoners' justice film festival- feb 23rd to 26th
PRISONER'S JUSTICE FILM FESTIVAL 2006
Toronto's Prisoner's Justice Action Committee presents
The Second Annual
Prisoner's Justice Film Festival
February 23-26, 2006
This event is generously supported by the Social Justice Cluster,
University of Toronto
The first Toronto Prisoner's Justice Film Festival was held in January
of 2005 and drew hundreds of community members, abolitionists, youths,
activists, students, educators, artists, ex-prisoners, family members
and allies from across Ontario. This year's festival will build on the
first, as we work to build a movement that challenges the
prison-industrial complex, and demands justice, not jails.
Join us for an exciting selection of informative films including
Canadian, U.S., and international submissions. Films will be
accompanied by guest panels including current and ex-prisoners,
families of prisoners, activists and advocates, film-makers,
researchers and writers. Audiences will be encouraged to join in the
discussion. Between films, participants will have the chance to enjoy
musical performances, take in displays of prisoners' art, and check out
ally organizations at our community info fair.
Thursday February 23, 2006 6-9.30pm
Friday February 24, 2006 7pm to late
Saturday February 25, 2006 12noon-10pm
Sunday February 26, 2005 2-9.30pm
All film screenings at Innis Town Hall - University of Toronto
Located at the corner of Sussex Ave and St. George St.
Friday Party at the Multipurpose Room, Student Campus Center
Ryerson University, 55 Gould St.
Festival Schedule
Thursday, February 23rd
6:00 - 9:30pm Health in Prison
Opening with Manitou Kwe Singers (Women Spirit Singers)
Manitou Kwe Singers (Women Spirit Singers), founded in 1995 by Amber
O'Hara (Waabnong Kwe) is an all women's hand drum group. All members of
Manitou Kwe Singers are of Native ancestry. Herstorically, they have
sung for the missing or murdered women in Canada, for prisoners,
justice and against violence in general.
Exceptional People's Olympiad
(Canada, 2000, 15min, Big House Productions/CBC)
This film was shot and produced by a film production group inside
Collins Bay Federal Jail near Kingston. This film highlights the
annual weekend Olympics for athletes with disabilities organized and
paid for by prisoners at Collins Bay. This film highlights some of the
relationships that have developed over the course of this event. An
interesting snap-shot of two communities so often made invisible by our
society.
Prison Lullabies (USA, 2003, 83min, Brown Hats Productions)
Dirs: Odile Isralson, Lina Matta
Prison Lullabies is the remarkable portrait of four women living on the
bad side of luck, struggling with drug addiction, arrested for dealing
and prostitution, and serving prison time with one common bond -
arrested pregnant, Amy, Monique, Joann, and Anne Marie have all given
birth behind bars. One of only five prisons in the U.S. to provide a
nursery program for inmates, Taconic Correctional Facility in New York
State allows the women to keep their babies for the first 18 months of
their lives while insisting that the mothers participate in a rigorous
series of classes that range from basic child care to anger management
and drug counseling. Each woman is released in the course of filming.
Each must choose, minute to minute, whether to find a job, break the
cycle of relapse and re-arrest that has led to the loss of her other
children, or pick up the crack pipe, abandon the child, and return to
the streets. Shot in cinema-verité style, Prison Lullabies addresses
these issues by allowing the audience the opportunity to observe and
listen as the stories of the inmate mothers unfold in their own time
and in their own words. Prison Lullabies is an extraordinary tale -
that of four women making life-altering choices and seizing the glimmer
of possibility the prison nursery program is holding out for them and
for the future of their children.
Q&A with
Ayden Scheim, prison activist
Psychiatric survivor, OCAB Speakers Bureau
Friday, February 24th
7:00pm "LYRICIST LINKUP 6: Poetik Justice"
Presented by 8 Rooks Enlightenment & I.S.I.S. CIRCLE ENTERTAINMENT
Ryerson University Multi-Purpose Room (Student Campus Centre), 55 Gould
St.
Hosted by Soul-R & EvE! Featuring Spin, Lady Loxx, Leviathan, Jah Paul
& Elisha, Blak Child, EvE, Soul-R and El Machetero
Open-Mic! Cultural Catering! Vendor's Market!
Sponsors: Ryerson Students' Union, Big It Up International, Lite It Up
Candles, Dogon Star Productions
Music: DJ El Machetero
Contact: 8Rooks.Com
Saturday, February 25th
12:00 - 2:00pm Networking Forum
An opportunity to share information about what various individuals and
groups are currently doing in the area of prisoners' justice activism -
both for new folks who want to get involved, and for folks who are
already involved but want to build stronger connections. Come and
identify networking /collective support needs for prisoner's justice
activists and to brainstorm ideas for keeping each better connected.
Explore the possibility of forming a radical prison workers network and
discuss ideas around organizing a prisoner's justice week and/or other
actions which will help build collective solidarity in the prison
abolition movement.
2:00 - 5:00pm Youth Incarceration
Juvies (USA, 2004, 66 min, Chance Films Inc.)
Dirs: Leslie Neale
From award-winning documentary filmmaker Leslie Neale (Road to Return)
comes this riveting look at a world most of us will never see: the
world of juvenile offenders who are serving incredible prison sentences
for crimes they either did not commit or were only marginally involved
in. For two years, Neale taught a video production class at Los Angeles
Central Juvenile Hall to 12 young people who were all being tried as
adults. Juvies is the product of that class, which was a learning
experience for both students and teacher - and becomes a learning
experience for all of us, as
we witness the heartbreaking stories of children abandoned by families
and a system that has disintegrated into a kind of vending machine
justice. Narrated by actor Mark Wahlberg, himself a former juvenile
offender, and poetry read by Mos Def.
Sun Up 'till Sun Down (USA, 2005, 22 min, Prison Moratorium Project)
Dir. Tania Cuevas
A lively documentary produced by the Prison Moratorium Project about
their campaign against the construction of youth prisons and the
growing movement in New York to end imprisonment. Imaginative
techniques of conveying the startling reality of the prison industry
make this film engaging as well as informative.
Performances by
Spin, spoken word artist, community organizer
Toronto Underground Street Journalist Mr. Bones
Q&A with
Veronica Salvatierra, Community Youth Worker, St Stephen's Community
House
Lee Ann Chapman, B.A. LL.B, staff lawyer at Justice for Children and
Youth.
Jagjeet Chhabra, 81 Reasons Campaign
Representative, Black Youth Taking Action
5:00 - 7:15pm Women Political Prisoners of the Middle East
Women in Death Castles (Palestine, 2004,13min)
Dir: Balata Film Collective
A high proportion of Palestinian women prisoners in Israeli Occupation
prisons are from the Nablus region. In this film, recently released
women from Balata and Nablus speak out about their pain and struggle
while imprisoned. Testimonies describe interrogation, physical and
mental torture, loneliness. The film Includes interviews with
ex-prisoners, children of current prisoners and officials from the
Prisoners' Society.
Red Names (Canada,1999, 12min)
Dirs: Amin Zarghami, Shahrzad Arshadi
This is a short video celebrating the legacy of thousands of women who
lost their lives in Iran between 1979 and 1999 due to their political,
social and religious beliefs. For Amin Zarghami & Shahrzad Arshadi,
working on this video was an opportunity to pay tribute to the memory
of these women - some of whom they knew personally - and grieve their
loss. It is intended as a testament both to their suffering and to the
political tyranny that led to their execution.
Women in Struggle (Palestine, 2004, 56min)
Dir: Buthina Canaan Khoury
This film documents the lives of Palestinian women who are ex-political
detainees, depicting their struggle during years of imprisonment in
Israeli jails and exploring the effect on their present-day life. The
film focuses on the lives of four women who became involved in the
Palestinian national struggle for independence. The women testify in
their own words about their histories, and about daily life in the
current Palestinian Intifada at a time of the "war on terror" and the
apartheid wall. The film seeks to understand the women's efforts to
preserve their dignity and integrate into Palestinian social and
political life. Although these four women are no longer physically
incarcerated, they actually find themselves in a bigger prison carrying
their imprisonment within them in every aspect of their life.
Q&A with
Shahrzad Mojab, Director, Women and Gender Studies Institute,
University of Toronto
Shahrzad Arshadi, filmmaker
Rafeef Ziadeh, Sumoud
Performance by Faith Nolan, singer-songwriter, blues guitarist and
prison activist http://www.faithnolan.org
7:30 - 10:00 Resistance Caged (Political Prisoners)
Mission Against Terror (Cuba/Ireland, 2004, 48 min, Canal Education and
Two Islands Productions)
Dirs: Bernie Dwyer, Roberto Ruiz Rebo
As Havana wakes up to another day, five Cuban men are serving their
time in prisons scattered throughout the United States. Their crime?
Protecting their country and people against terrorism. Arrested on
Sept. 12, 1998 and subjected to a trial, which US civil rights lawyer,
Leonard Weinglass, calls a "violation" from start to finish, the Cuban
five were locked away for a total of three life sentences plus 68
years. There are very few cases that are political by their nature.
This was one. "Mission Against Terror" charts Cuba's 45-year struggle
against terrorism and the five men's fight to win justice.
Souha Surviving Hell (Lebanon, 2001, 60min)
Dir: Randa Chahal Sabbag
From the director of Civilisees, which opened the 2000 Human Rights
Watch International Film Festival and received its Nestor Almendros
Prize, Randa Chahal Sabbag now turns her lens on South Lebanon. The
subject of Chahal Sabbag's film is the charismatic Souha Becharre, whom
many call the "fiance du Liban." In 1989 at the age of twenty-one,
Souha - a devoted communist - agreed to attempt the assassination of
Lebanese General Antoine Lahad, who was collaborating with the Israeli
Army in the South of Lebanon. Lahad survived, but Souha was quickly
arrested and thrown in the Khiam prison where she spent ten years for
the attempt on Lahad's life. Conditions in Khiam were horrific, and
Souha endured six of those years in solitary confinement. Chahal Sabbag
follows Souha in the months following her release, as she tirelessly
travels Lebanon - speaking about her experiences at Khiam and searching
out others who were imprisoned there. And despite all she suffered in
Khiam, Souha is a survivor who shares her story with a sense of hope
for the future - both her own and that of Lebanon.
Q&A with
Representative from Sumoud Political Prisoners Solidarity Group.
Tom Keefer - Seth Hayes Support Committee, Autonomy & Solidarity
Morteza Gorgzadeh, Toronto Forum on Cuba
Sunday, February 26th
2:00 - 4:00pm Immigration Detention and the Secret Trials
Rising Up: the Alams (USA, 2005, 12min)
Dir: Konrad Aderer
An immigrant family, the Alams, are picked up during the special
registration program in the United States after 911. Faced with removal
to persecution they decided to resist with the revolutionary
organization - Desis Rising Up and Moving, a South Asian working class
organization.
Don't Ask Don't Tell (Canada, 2005, 11min)
Dirs: Jean McDonald and Alex Rotalski
Approximately 200,000 non-status immigrants who live in Canada face
deportation and detention. Women abused by the spouse cannot call
police, lesbian couples are refused community housing. In Toronto
immigrant communities are fighting back. This film documents their
struggle.
Whose Rights, Anyway? Justice for Mohammed (Canada, 2005, 23 min)
Dir: Anice Wong
Provides public information about the security-certificates process by
highlighting the case of Mohamed Harkat who has been in detention in
Ottawa for over 18 months.
L'echo du Silence (Echo Of Silence) (Canada, 2003, 23 min)
Dir: Chloe Germain-Therien
In 1997 two Basque men, Gorka Perea and Eduardo Plagaro, sought refugee
status in Canada after being charged with arson in Spain. They claimed
that their confessions to the crime were signed under torture. In 2001
the two men were detained as suspected terrorists in a prison in
Rivière des Prairies, Quebec. The Echo of Silence documents their
experience in Canada: their detention, their temporary release, and
finally their extradition in June 2005, despite an active grassroots
movement to keep them in Canada.
Q&A with
Chloe Germain-Therien, film-maker
Mac Scott - No One is Illegal
Sima Zerehi - Don't Ask, Don't Tell
Matthew Behrens - Toronto Action for Social Change
Family members - Friends and Family of Gary Freeman
4:30 - 6:30 The Politics of Prison
Torture Inc - America's Brutal Prisons (UK, 2005, 24 min)
Dir: Deborah Davies
Savaged by dogs, Electrocuted With Cattle Prods, Burned By Toxic
Chemicals, Does such barbaric abuse inside U.S. jails explain the
horrors that were committed in Iraq? They are just some of the victims
of wholesale torture taking place inside the U.S. prison system that we
uncovered during a four-month investigation for the UK's Channel 4.
It's terrible to watch some of the videos and realise that you're not
only seeing torture in action but, in the most extreme cases, you are
witnessing young men dying.
This Black Soil - A Story of Resistance and Rebirth (USA, 2004, 58 min,
Working Hands Productions)
Dir: Teresa Konechne
This inspiring and provocative new film chronicles the successful
struggle of Bayview, Virginia, a small and severely impoverished rural
African-American community, to pursue a new vision of prosperity.
Catalyzed by the defeat of a state plan to build a maximum-security
prison in their backyard, the powerful women leaders and residents
created the Bayview Citizens for Social Justice, a non-profit
organization, secured $10 million in grants, purchased the proposed
prison site land and are now building a new community from the ground
up. Under the leadership of visionary women, this new rural village
challenges all conventional ideas of community development and includes
not only improved and affordable housing, but a sustainable economic
base to earn a living wage, a community center for educating its
residents, a daycare center, laundromat, and a community farm, which
not only provides jobs and income for the organization, but returns
them to their roots, working on the land.
Q&A with
Julia Sudbury, Canada Research Chair in Social Justice, Equity and
Diversity, University of Toronto
Rai Reece, PJAC.
7:00 - 9:00 Indigenous and First Nations Prisoners
The Heart Has Its Own Memory (Canada, 2005, 13 minutes)
Dir: Audrey Huntley
This short film looks at violence against First Nations Women in Canada,
the lack of justice for missing Aboriginal women and racist police
inaction and impunity. Huntley creates a collage of the women's
stories and interviews with family members and friends. The film plays
with native oratory and is a testimony to the pain and grief of the
community as a whole and a message of no more silence.
To Heal The Spirit (Canada, 1991, 47 min)
Why Not Productions Inc.
An emotionally charged documentary that focuses on First Nations women
in prison and the way in which many women discover spirituality and
gain a sense of identity within the oppressive confines of prison
walls.
My Name is Kahentiiosta (Canada, 1995, 30 min)
Dir: Alanis Obomsawin
This affecting film profiles a young, courageous Kahnawake Mohawk woman
who was arrested after a 78 day armed standoff in 1990 between the
Mohawks and the Canadian federal government. Kahentiiosta is detained
four days longer than other women because the court refuses to accept
her aboriginal name. This is a compelling look at a people's movement
for self-determination and one young woman's refusal to capitulate in
the face of great adversity.
Q&A with
Jonathan Rudin, Aboriginal Legal Services of Toronto
Chief Leo Friday, Kashechewan First Nations
Representative from No More Silence
Amber O'Hara (Waabnong Kwe)
9:00pm: Closing Ceremony with Musical Guests
How to get there:
All Film Screenings at Innis Town Hall - University of Toronto, 2
Sussex Avenue. Corner of Sussex Ave and St. George Street, just south
of Bloor Street.
5 minute walk from St. George Station.
Friday Party at the Multipurpose Room, Student Campus Center, Ryerson
University, 55 Gould St, Near Yonge and Gerrard.
5 minute walk from Dundas Station.
All film programmes $5 suggested donation.
Friday night pay-what-you-can $5-$10. This is an all-ages event and all
venues are wheelchair accessible.
About the Prisoner's Justice Action Committee:
The Prisoner's Justice Action Committee believes that prisons do not
make our communities safer or more secure. We believe that the prison
industrial complex perpetuates violence and oppression, including
racism, classism, sexism, colonialism, and homophobia. PJAC works to
end incarceration and detention and to create healthy communities built
on social justice.
Please contact us with your questions, comments or ideas.
Pjac_committee@yahoo.com
Visit our website: http://www.pjac.org
Many thanks to our sponsors
CKLN 88.1fm
Criminology Department, University of Toronto
Defense for Children International, Canada
Equity Studies Department, University of Toronto
Faculty of Nursing, University of Toronto
John Howard Society Toronto
Ontario Public Interest Research Group, York University
Prisoner's HIV/AIDS Support Action Network
Sexual Diversity Studies Program, University of Toronto
Social Justice Cluster, University of Toronto
Toronto Forum on Cuba
Trans Identified/Woman Identified Caucus, CUPE 3903, York University
Women and Gender Studies Institute, University of Toronto
Women Political Prisoners of the Middle East Project (Shahrzad Mojab)
Endorsers
81 Reasons Campaign
8Rook Productions
Aboriginal Legal Services of Toronto
Al-Awda Right of Return Coalition (Toronto)
BIFA, Bath Penitentiary
Black Action Defense Committee
Black Inmates and Friends Assembly
Buried Alive Illustrations
Campaign to Stop Secret Trials in Canada
CKLN
Coalition to Stop the War Toronto
Colours of Resistance - York University
Friends and Family Gary Freeman
Gavel Club, Bath Penitentiary
Isis Entertainment
Justice for Children and Youth
Justice for Mohamed Harkat Committee
Lifers Group, Bath Penitentiary
Lifers Group, Joyceville Penitentiary
Lifting as We Climb
Native Brotherhood, Bath Penitentiary
No One Is Illegal
Ontario Coalition Against Poverty
Prison Talk Online
Resistance on the Sound Dial
Rittenhouse
Satan Macnuggit
St. Clare's Multifaith Housing Society
Strength in SISterhood
Sumoud
Toronto Action for Social Change
Toronto Don't Ask Don't Tell Campaign
Womyn4justice - Kingston
Words Action Resistance
Women's Centre - University of Toronto