Recent Programs
Recent Programs
LECTURE WITH VISITING ARTIST SUE COE
November 29, 2007, 6:30pm
Film Row Cinema, 1104 S. Wabash, 8th Floor
Open to the Public & Free of Charge
Columbia College Chicago's Anchor Graphics will host a week-long artist residency with Sue Coe, one of the most important politically-oriented artists living in the U.S. today. The Institute in collaboration with Anchor Graphics, the Art + Design Department, The Center for Book and Paper Arts, and the College-wide Critical Encounters initiative will co-present a lecture by Sue Coe at Film Row Cinema.
From the outset of her career working as an illustrator for such publications as the New York Times and Time Magazine, Coe was committed to reaching a broad audience through the print media. Working in the tradition of such socially-oriented German artists as George Grosz, Otto Dix and Kathe Kollwitz, Coe uses printmaking as a means of political consciousness raising and social change. A self-proclaimed artist and activist, she has created a profoundly provocative and influential body of work addressing such issues as AIDS, animal rights, apartheid, labor and sweatshop conditions, gender-based violence, and war.
This program is free and open to the public, and will be followed by a reception.
USING HIP-HOP TO EMPOWER YOUNG WOMEN: A WORKSHOP FOR ADULT ALLIES
October 26, 2007, 12:00pm-5:00pm
Conaway Center, 1104 S. Wabash, 1st Floor
The Institute is proud to co-sponsor this adult workshop organized by the Young Women's Action Team designed to assist youth workers, prevention educators, counselors and other adult allies in understanding how mass media and hip-hop culture affect the lives of young women and girls. Through interactive activities and group discussion, participants will explore messages about sexuality, relationships, and gender in hip-hop and popular culture, and discuss strategies used by women and girls of color to resist denigrating media images and to explore using hip-hop as a tool for empowerment and social change. The workshop will be presented by Dr. Carla Stokes, a scholar-activist, health educator, and President and Founder of Helping Our Teen Girls in Real Life Situations, Inc. (HOTGIRLS), an Atlanta-based non-profit organization dedicated to improving the health and lives of black young women and girls.
FESTIVAL OF DEMOCRACY: UNLEASHING RADICAL IMAGINATION
Saturday, October 20, 2007, 1:00pm-9:00pm
Experimental Station, 6100 South Blackstone Avenue
As the 2008 election season speeds ahead, The Public Square at the Illinois Humanities Council in collaboration with the Institute and other partners, presents the Festival of Democracy: Unleashing Radical Imagination, a gathering designed to launch a conversation about the kind of world we want to build together.
Even as the presidential debates enter new territory, with candidates taking part in YouTube and on-line debates, we want to ask: how can we move beyond political platforms and media sound bites to engage in meaningful dialouge? How can we create a more participatory democracy as we raise and wrestle with local and global issues? How do various issues intersect in ways that provide new insights and directions? How can we make connections between ongoing struggles that help us envision a more democratic and just world?
This gathering joins activists, scholars, artists, and all those who are interested, to collectively imagine and grapple with issues of human rights, political power, and struggles for social justice. Featured participants include Rashid Khalidi (Columbia University), Laura Flanders (Air America), Bill Fletcher (Center for Labor Renewal), Bernadine Dohrn (Northwestern University), Salim Muwakkil (In These Times), and many others.
WONDA WOMAN PROJECT: "ENOUGH IS ENOUGH" FILM SCREENING & DISCUSSION
October 11, 2007, 6:00 – 8:00pm
Film Row Cinema, 1104 S. Wabash, 8th Floor
The Wonda Women Project is a Chicago-based network of female hip-hop emcees working to empower women and promote a socially-conscious message through hip-hop music. Led by local emcees Ang13 and Unmuvabo Vendetta, the group is producing a documentary film about their Summer 2007 “Zero Tolerance Tour,” capturing interviews and performances with female hip-hop artists and activists from across the country. Through this film, Enough is Enough, the Wonda Women Project aims to reveal a compelling portrait of women’s experiences in the hip-hop industry, including their battles with misogyny, violence, and the degradation of women. It also hopes to unite women through hip-hop, to promote positive female images among young women and girls, and to support emcees whose socially-conscious work struggles for mainstream attention.
As a co-sponsor of the Wonda Women Project, the Institute is proud to present a premiere screening of the film-in-progress, followed by a discussion with:
Ang13, Emcee & Founder, Wonda Women Project
Unmuvabo Vendetta, Emcee & Project Coordinator, Wonda Women Project
Invincible, Detroit Emcee & Hip-Hop activist
Natalie Y. Moore, (Moderator) Journalist and co-author of Deconstructing Tyrone: A New Look at Black Masculinity in the Hip-Hop Generation
This program is sponsored in part by The Boeing Company, and is part of the Institute’s multi-year Gender and Hip-Hop Initiative that engages in critical analysis and public discourse about issues of masculinity, feminism and gender as they are being defined, shaped and applied through this powerful genre.
This program was audio recorded by Chicago Public Radio's WBEZ-Chicago Amplified. Please click on the following link to listen: http://chicagopublicradio.org/Content.aspx?audioID=14395.
DARFUR: IMAGERY & REALITY SYMPOSIUM
October 8, 2007, 7:30pm
The Field Museum, 1400 S. Lakeshore Drive, Chicago
Free & Open to the Public
An internationally touring multimedia exhibit highlighting the
crisis & culture of Darfur is coming to Chicago.
Starting October 7, fifteen community venues, including the Field Museum, will present outdoor projections of photographs taken in Darfur as a form of visual education about the richly multi-cultural region and the horrors of its ongoing humanitarian crisis.
Join us at this free symposium during this city-wide focus:
Panelists
Olivier Bercault, Human Rights Watch
Daoud Hari, Voices from Darfur
Connie Kamara, American Refugee Committee International
Ryan Spencer Reed, Photojournalist
Dr. Lynette A. Jackson, Moderator
Associate Professor, African American Studies and Gender and Women's Studies, University of Illinois at Chicago
Special viewing of the DARFUR/DARFUR outdoor projections
8:30-9:30pm
Groups of 20 or more please RSVP at
symposium@darfurdarfur.org
For individual exhibit locations and schedules please see:
www.darfurdarfur.org and www.fieldmuseum.org.
CRITICAL ENCOUNTERS: POVERTY & PRIVILEGE TOWNHALL FORUM
September 26, 2007, 5:30 – 7:30pm
Conaway Center, 1104 S. Wabash, 1st Floor
Role: Co-presenter
Partners: Office of the Provost, Center for Teaching Excellence
Each year, Columbia College Chicago identifies a theme as the subject for its “Critical Encounters” initiative, a year-long college-wide examination that serves as a model for interactive, community-inclusive civic engagement exploring the relationship between art and social science, artistic action and revolution. During 2007-2008, Columbia College has chosen the theme of Poverty & Privilege. On September 26, Critical Encounters and the Institute for the Study of Women & Gender in the Arts & Media co-hosted a Town Hall Forum to begin a layered and complicated discussion engaging our ideas, perceptions and knowledge about poverty and privilege. The panelists included activists and civic and community leaders, whose professional and personal work is directly related to these broad issues from a variety of perspectives, including: justice, equity, access, health, education, employment, faith, economic development, and participation. The mission of Critical Encounters and the goals of this program are to foster engaged discussions which serve as catalysts to generate new knowledge and understanding, begin to create shifts in attitudes and perceptions, and encourage civic activism. The Townhall forum and select Institute programs are now availabe for listening or download at Chicago Public Radio as part of Chicago Amplified, a new web exclusive audio library of diverse public events recorded throughout the Chicago region. To listen to this program, please visit http://www.chicagopublicradio.org/Program_AMP_Segment.aspx?segmentID=13695.
Featured panelists included:
Jim Charlton
Professor, Disability Studies, University of Illinois at Chicago
Reverend Doris Green
Director of Community Affairs, AIDS Foundation of Chicago
Richard L. Jones
PhD President and CEO, Metropolitan Family Services
Ngoan Le
Vice President of Programs, Chicago Community Trust
Douglas Mann
President, Global Business Assist
Amy Rynell
Director, Mid-America Institute on Poverty of Heartland Alliance for Human Needs & Human Rights
Moderator: Shanita Akintonde
Professor, Marketing Communication, Columbia College Chicago
LAS MUJERAS DE LA CAUCUS CHICANA FILM RELEASE
Date: September 1, 2007, 6:00-8:00pm
Location: The Center on Halsted, 3656 N. Halsted
Role: Co-sponsor
Partners: Amigas Latinas, Affinity Community Services, Center on Halsted, Chicago Foundation for Women–Lesbian Leadership Council, Mujeres Latinas en Accion.
The Institute is proud to co-sponsor a public release party for the documentary film “Las Mujeres de la Caucus Chicana” written, directed and produced by Linda Garcia Merchant. The film documents the stories and experiences of pioneering Latina women, and is the first production of Voces Primeras, a company founded by Ms. Garcia and dedicated to bringing these stories to the public. Emerging from the Feminist and Chicano movements of the 1960s and 1970s is the story of six Latinas who through a series of “Aha!” moments answered the call to action. Their ideological differences, personal experiences and upbringings brought them to a monumental turning point in their lives: the National Women’s Political Caucus (NWPC) and the 1977 International Women’s Year National Women’s Convention. As chosen delegates from the states of Illinois, California and Texas, these women formed the NWPC Chicana Caucus, which represented Latina sisters across the nation and worked towards liberation.
OUT at CHM: AIDS, ART & ACTIVISM
Date: June 5, 2007 5:30pm
Location: Chicago History Museum, 1601 N. Clark Street
Role: Co-Sponsor
Partners: Chicago History Museum
The Institute was proud to be a co-sponsor of the OUT at CHM series in 2007, exploring the history of LGBT art, politics and culture in Chicago. In this installment, attendees explored the early response of filmmakers and visual and performing artists to the AIDS crisis through film clips, spoken-word performances, and a panel discussion. Program panelists traced the legacy and direct influence of early gay activism and the women’s health movement on the emergence of AIDS activism. Panelists included Jennifer Brier (Gender and Women’s Studies and History, University of Illinois at Chicago,); Mary Patten (interdisciplinary visual artist and activist involved in the formation of ACT-UP Chicago in the 1980s), and Avery R. Young (spoken word artist and community advocate).
GENETICS & RACE: HOW DOES RACE MATTER
Date: May 23, 2007
Location: The DuSable Museum of African-American History, 740 E. 56th Place, Chicago
Role: Program Partner
Partners: Illinois Humanities Council, National Society of Genetic Counselors, American Medical Association, The Historymakers, DuSable Museum of African-American History, Center for the Study of Race, Politics and Culture at the University of Chicago, Spertus Museum, and Community Renewal Society
The Institute partnered with the Illinois Humanities Council on a year-long series of public programs about genetics. The series consists of 25 programs statewide in a variety of formats: film, lectures, debates, art presentations, etc. The programs take place in the Chicago metro area and are complemented by programs developed locally with other communities throughout Illinois.
The installment focused on new research that aims to identify shared genetic markers that challenges some traditional concepts of race and ethnicity, and may reinforce others. Do the results of this research reduce people to a set of genetic traits, perpetuate old forms of discrimination, and put certain populations at risk for further oppression? How do we ensure that racial and ethnic groups maintain self-definition and self-control as genetic science advances.
The discussion was moderated by Laura Washington (Ida B. Wells-Barnett Professor, DePaul University ad contributing columnist, Chicago Sun-Times) and featured Timothy F. Murphy, Ph.D. (Professor of Philosophy in the Biomedical Sciences, University of Illinois at Chicago and author of Gay Science: The Ethics of Sexual Orientation Research) and Sloan Williams, Ph.D. (Associate Professor, Director of Undergraduate Studies, Anthropology Department, University of Illinois at Chicago).
GENDER & HIP-HOP COMMUNITY DIALOGUE: DOES HIP-HOP HATE WOMEN?
Date: April 28, 2007 1-3pm
Location: International House Assembly Hall, University of Chicago, 1414 East 59th Street
Role: Co-Presenter
Partner: Center for the Study of Race, Politics and Culture at the University of Chicago
The Institute and Center for the Study of Race, Politics and Culture at the University of Chicago co-presented a two-day program addressing issues of gender, gender identity and representation in Hip-Hop music and videos. The second day featured a panel and community roundtable addressing the question "Does Hip-Hop Hate Women?" Moderated by Bakari Kitwana (co-founder of the first ever National Hip-Hop Political Convention and author of Why White Kids Love Hip-Hop), the panel featured TJ Crawford (co-founder and Chairman of the National Hip-Hop Political Convention), David Ikard (Assistant Professor in English at the University of Tennessee and creator of the first Hip-Hop course taught at the University); Joan Morgan (award winning journalist and author of When Chickenheads Come to Roost: My Life as a Hip-Hop Femininst); Mark Anthony Neal (Associate Professor of Black Popular Culture at Duke University and author of New Black Man: Rethinking Black Masculinity), Amina Norman-Hawkins (writer, activist, Hip-Hop emcee, and Executive Director of the Chicago Hip-Hop Initiative), and Tracy Sharpley-Whiting (Director of the Black World Studies Program at Vanderbilt University and author of Pimps Up, Ho's Down: Young Black Women, Hip-Hop and the New Gender Politics). To listen, visit http://chicagopublicradio.org/Program_AMP_Segment.aspx?segmentID=10969.
GENDER & HIP-HOP COMMUNITY DIALOGUE FILM SCREENING & DISCUSSION
Date: April 27, 2007 6-9pm
Location: Doc Films at the University of Chicago, Ida Noyes Hall, Max Palevsky Theatre, 1212 East 59th Street
Role: Co-Presenter
Partners: Center for the Study of Race, Politics and Culture at the University of Chicago
The Institute and Center for the Study of Race, Politics and Culture at the University of Chicago co-presented a two-day program addressing issues of gender, gender identity and representation in Hip-Hop music and videos. The first day will present a screening of the documentary film Hip-Hop: Beyond Beats and Rhymes, followed by a discussion with Director Byron Hurt and other featured guests. In his film, award-winning producer and director Byron Hurt exposes and explores the structures of violence, hyper-aggression and misogyny in much of today's Hip-Hop, interviewing a number of prominent artists and producers along the way, including Chuck D, Mos Def, Jadakiss, and Russell Simmons. Following the screening was a panel discussion moderated by Cathy Cohen (Professor of Political Science, University of Chicago), featuring Byron Hurt along with Natalie Hopkinson and Natalie Y. Moore (co-authors of Deconstructing Tyrone: A New Look at Black Masculinity in the Hip-Hop Generation) and Stephanie Shonekan (Professor of Humanities and Cultural Studies; Director, Black World Studies Program, Columbia College Chicago).
SHE SPEAKS VOLUMES PANEL DISCUSSION: WHERE DO WE DRAW THE LINE? CREATIVE EXPRESSION VS. THE PERPETUATION OF A RAPE CULTURE
Date: April 26, 2007 noon-1:30pm
Location: Conaway Center, 1104 S. Wabash, 1st Floor
Role: Presenter
Partner: YWCA Metropolitan Chicago
She Speaks Volumes is the cornerstone of the "Arts, Advocacy, and Activism" collaboration between the Institute and the YWCA Metropolitan Chicago, addressing issues of violence against girls and women during Sexual Assault Awareness Month.
The first of this two-part program involved a panel discussion, "Where Do We Draw the Line? Creative Expression vs. the Perpetuation of a Rape Culture." Creative expression represents one's ideas, opinions and personal views as illustrated through various art forms: music, poetry, writing, film, etc. For artists, having the right to express his/her self through their artistry is what drives their passion. However, some forms of creative expression stimulate covert and overt messages of sexual violence, which in turn can have an effect on the perpetuation of a rape culture. Moderated by Misty DeBerry, the panel will feature members of spoken word trio Diva Diction (Bassey, Amalia Ortiz, Ishle Park) and local female Hip-Hop emcees Ang13 and Unmuvabo Vendetta. To listen, visit the link below:
http://chicagopublicradio.org/Program_AMP_Segment.aspx?segmentID=10643.
SHE SPEAKS VOLUMES POETRY SLAM WITH DIVA DICTION
Date: April 26, 2007 6-8pm
Location: HotHouse, 31 E. Balbo
Role: Co-Presenter
Partner: YWCA Metropolitan Chicago
She Speaks Volumes is the cornerstone of the "Arts, Advocacy, and Activism" collaboration between the Institute and YWCA Metropolitan Chicago, addressing issues of violence against girls and women during Sexual Assault Awareness Month.
The second of this two-part program involved a poetry slam performance by the powerful and profound Diva Diction, a female multi-racial spoken word ensemble. The program drew a very diverse audience from across the city to honor survivors of sexual assault and show how art and activism can be fused together to impact social change. The program included Community, Artist and Activist Awards for individuals whose work demonstrates a commitment to anti-violence and social justice; Mary Jo Barrett (Executive Director and Co-Founder, Center for Contextual Change); C.C. Carter (artist and Founder, Pow-Wow Inc.); and Kathy Kempke (Coordinator of Prevention Education, YWCA South Suburban Center). To listen, visit the link below:
http://chicagopublicradio.org/Program_AMP_Segment.aspx?segmentID=10965.
OUT at CHM: GAYS IN THE REVOLUTION: GAYS & LESBIANS IN CHICAGO
Date: April 19, 2007 5:30pm Cocktails, 6:00pm Program
Location: Chicago History Museum, 1601 N. Clark Street
Role: Co-Sponsor
Partners: Chicago History Museum; Center on Halsted; University of Illinois at Chicago Gender and Women's Studies Department; and the Weinberg College of Art and Sciences at Northwestern University
The Institute was proud to be a co-sponsor of the OUT at CHM series in 2007, exploring the history of LGBT art, politics and culture in Chicago. In this installment, attendees learned about Chicago's lesbian and gay liberation movement from the people who led it. Chicago's rich history of gay activism from the late 1960s to the mid-70s remains largely unwritten and mostly forgotten. But two years before the Stonewall Riots in New York City, activists here were using the phrase "gay power." Local gay men and lesbians participated in militant protests and students from many Chicago campuses fought for the right of same-sex couples to dance and socialize in public. Local lesbians published Lavendar Women, one of the most influential lesbian-feminist newspapers in the United States. Chicago was one of only three cities to inaugurate "Pride" marches on the first anniversary of Stonewall, a tradition that continues today.
Panelists in this program included Vernita Gray (an activist for gay and lesbian rights in Chicago since 1969 and the GLBT Liasion for the Cook County State Attorney's Office), Murray Edelman (founder of the Chicago Gay Liberation Movement that began in 1969), Margaret Wilson (retired schoolteacher and gay and women's rights activist since 1967), and John D'Emilio (Professor in the History and Gender & Women's Studies Programs at the University of Illinois at Chicago).
GENETICS & IDENTITY: WHO ARE YOU?
Date: April 18, 2007 6-8pm
Location: Spertus Institute of Jewish Studies, Bederman Auditorium, 618 S. Michigan
Role: Program Partner
Partners: Illinois Humanities Council, American Medical Association, Center on Halsted
The Institute partnered with the Illinois Humanities Council (IHC) on a year-long series of public programs about genetics. The series consists of 25 programs statewide in a variety of formats: film, lectures, debates, art presentations, etc. This program was the first of two the Institute will partner with and participate in. The programs take place in the Chicago metro area and are complemented by programs developed locally with other communities throughout Illinois.
This installment focuses on the subject of gender and identity. Identity is shaped by a myriad of factors. To what extent do our perceptions of our genes affect our perceptions of ourselves and others? Can new information from genetic testing challenge long-held notions related to race, gender, sexual orientation, personality, or ethnic identity? How might genetic testing be used to include or exclude people from certain groups?
The discussion was moderated by Harry Porterfield, Emmy award-winning reporter who joined ABC7 News in September of 1985 after 21 years at WBBM-TV in Chicago and the panelists included Troy Duster, Ph.D., Professor of Sociology and Director of the Institute for the History of the Production of Knowledge at New York University; Michelle Goodwin, JD, LLM, Wicklander Chair in Ethics and professor of law at DePaul College of Law and Director of the Health Law Institute and the Center for the Study of Race & Bioethics; Blase N. Polite, M.D., Medical Oncologist at the University of Chicago and an Affiliate Member of the Center for Interdisciplinary Health Disparities Research at the University of Chicago and a member of the Strategy Team for California Breast Cancer Research Program's Special Research Initiatives.
GENDER FUSIONS 3: GENDER-GO-ROUND ON THE PLAYGROUND
Date: April 17, 2007 6-11pm
Location: HotHouse, 31 E. Balbo
Role: Co-Presenter
Partners: Columbia College's Office of GLBT Students Concerns & Q-Force
The Institute co-presented Gender Fusions 3, the third annual night of queer performance and community dialogue, featuring renowned transgender activist Leslie Feinberg, a panel discussion with scholars, writers and activists about the notion of play, a performance by Leslie and the Lys, and a spectacle of drag, burlesque, spoken word, theatre, dance and song from a host of performers at Columbia College and throughout the city.
The panel discussion was moderated by Jane M. Saks and featured E. Patrick Johnson (Chair of Performance Studies at Northwestern University and author of "Sweet Tea: An Oral History of Black Gay Men of the South"), Sam Park (Faculty in the English Department at Columbia College), Red Tremmel (Ph.D. candidate in History at the University of Chicago and documentary director and producer), and Lewis Wallace (Columbia College student as well as grassroots community organizer and sex educator).
The mission of Gender Fusions is to produce an annual performance event that creates a queer cultural space and forges a strong, active, vibrant queer community at Columbia College Chicago. Through this program, the partners work toward creating queer and tranny visibility on campus; initiating thoughtful and critical dialogue; building bridges between queer students, staff and faculty at Columbia; and drawing upon the larger Chicago queer community to infuse, energize, and catalyze Columbia's creative and critical community of learners, teachers and workers.
RESISTANCE & SOCIAL MOVEMENTS: THE ON-GOING FIGHT FOR FREEDOM
Date: April 7, 2007 1:30-4:30pm
Location: The DuSable Museum of African American History, 740 E. 56th Place
Role: Program Partner
Partners: Public Square at the Illinois Humanities Council; The DuSable Museum of African American History; African and Black Diaspora Studies, DePaul University; Mansfield Institute for Social Justice, Roosevelt University; Center for the Study of Race Politics and Culture at the University of Chicago; Urban Studies Program, Associated Colleges of the Midwest; Center for African-American History, Northwestern University
The Institute was proud to co-sponsor with the Public Square at the Illinois Humanities Council a special exhibition tour and presentation by Dr. Manning Marable at the DuSable Museum of African American History. The program began with a tour of the nationally-acclaimed exhibition, "381 Days: The Montgomery Bus Boycott Story," chronicling the hardship and courage of thousands of African Americans who successfully challenged a segregated bus system to open its doors to equality. After touring the exhibit, Dr. Marable explored the history of the civil rights era and its lessons for current movements struggling for equality. Marable is a Professor of Public Affairs, Political Science, and History at Columbia University in New York City. Following the presentation, attendees participated in small, facilitated discussions to share reflections on the exhibition and presentation, and explore the history and future of social justice organizing.