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 Other Events and OpportunitiesPast Events Community Movements: Building Solidarity for Social Change Conference February 8th-10, 2008. Organized by the Trent Students' Association of International Development (SAID), Kawartha World Issues Centre (KWIC), the Seeds for Justice Youth Engagement Program, and the Canadian Association for the Study of International Development/Association canadienne d'etudes de developpement international (CASID). This participatory gathering of students, social activists, academics, grassroots organizations and individuals passionate about community-based social change sought to further deepen communication and promote solidarity among social justice, feminist, labour, indigenous and environmental movements both locally and globally through workshops, dialogue and critical reflections on successes and challenges. An important aspect was the promotion of mutual learning through North-South exchanges. The Building Solidarity Conference would like to thank the following contributors for their financial and in-kind support of this event: The Canadian Association for the Study of International Development/ L'association canadienne d'études du développement international; the International Development Research Centre/Le centre du recherches pour le développement international; the Department of International Development Studies, Trent University; the David Morrison Fund for International Education; the Department of Canadian Studies, Trent University; the Department of Women's Studies, Trent University; the Dean of Arts & Science, Trent University; the Canadian Student Fair Trade Network; the Office of Research, Trent University; the T.E.W. Nind Endowment Fund; the Ontario Natural Food Co-op; the OPIRG Peterborough; the Main Ingredient; Alternative Grounds; Cocao Camino; and Honey Bar. We would like to thank Trent University for their support in this initiative, particularly the Department of International Development Studies for their unwavering commitment to furthering opportunities for education outside of the classroom. We would especially like to thank Dr. Paul Shaffer and Rosemary Devlin, without whom this conference would not have been possible. Conference: Human Rights, Development Ethics and Social Justice The International Development Studies Program and the Canadian Association for the Study of International Development present "Human Rights, Development Ethics and Social Justice",Wednesday, March 1st 2007 in the Champlain Senior Common Room, 9:30-5:00. How do human rights activists respond to the particular challenges posed by development policies and practices that exacerbate issues such as population displacement? Are there links between violent conflicts in developing countries and neoliberal structural adjustment programs? Is the notion of sustainable development compatible with ideas of human and humane security? What possibilities and dilemmas are offered by a development approach characterized by a focus on human rights, ethics, and social justice? Traveling World Community Film Festival The annual Traveling World Community Film Festival is coming to Peterborough! This is a fantastic event that we are fortunate to be able to bring to Peterborough. There are 45 films from all around the world being shown over the three days at four venues: Market Hall, Cinema 379, Gordon Best Theatre and the Public Library. Tickets are available at Speak Volumes, Have You Seen, Cinema 379 and Happenstance Books in Lakefield. The cost is $25 or $12 students/unwaged. For details and the film schedule, go to Quid Novis. The Super Spectacular Ultra Exciting (but very informative) HIV/AIDS Trivia Game! SAID is hosting our very first Trivia Game during International Development Week 2006! This game is bound to be a success and lots of fun; it even says so in the title. It is being held in the LEC Pit on Tuesday January 31, 2006 between 4-6pm. It is a human board game style (where you are the piece and the dice are made from large boxes) and it is based on Snakes and Ladders! So come on out, enjoy the company of your fellow students, learn interesting facts and figures about HIV/AIDS in the world today and get a free condom! See you there! Human Rights in Iran: Political Islam, Abuses of Power, and the Myth of Cultural Authenticity with Payam Akhavan LL.M, S.J.D. (Harvard) Payam Akhavan currently holds the Maxwell Boulton Q.C. Senior Fellowship at McGill University Faculty of Law in Montréal, Canada. He is the President and co-Founder of the Iran Human Rights Documentation Centre in New Haven, Connecticut. Dr. Akhavan has served as the Legal Advisor to the Prosecutor's Office of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia at The Hague (1994-2000), the first person to hold that position. He has also served as Special Advisor to the United Nations in Cambodia, Guatemala, East Timor, and Rwanda, and represented sovereigns before international courts and tribunals. He was previously appointed as Visiting Professor at the University of Toronto, Yale Law School, and Leiden University in the Netherlands. He has published numerous articles on international law and human rights in leading scholarly journals. Co-sponsored by the Association for Baha'i Studies and the International Development Studies Programme Global Politics Seminars Champlain College will be hosting a series of three seminars on current issues in global politics, led by our journalist-in-residence, Nick Bibby. The seminars will be held in the Seasoned Spoon on Thursday February 2, Thursday February 9, and Thursday February 16. There will be a free light supper each evening at 6PM in the seasoned Spoon, followed by the seminar at 7 PM. The seminar topics are as follows: Food Fights! Mark your calendar for Food Fights! Thursday, February 9th at Trent University. Inspired by the enthusiastic response to last year's conference at Trent University on Food and Rural Development, we've put together a half day series of events dealing with selected themes and issues connecting food and development, particularly those relating to rights, knowledge, and diversity. This includes a documentary screening of Seeds of Change; a panel and discussion with Brewster Kneen, Pat Mooney, Devlin Kuyek and Elisabeth Abergel; and, an evening address by Pat Mooney. Details and schedule are below. In addition to the informative value of the events, we're hoping to generate some excellent discussions. Please join us!! Documentary Screening: Seeds of Change The public has heard the positives and negatives of genetically modified crops from biotech industry representatives and from environmental activists, yet no one has actually heard from those who actually grow the food we eat - the farmers. This documentary gives voice to the most important group in this ongoing debate, the farmers. The screening will be followed by a brief discussion period. Panel Discussion: Food Fights! Rights, Knowledge, Diversity This panel brings together several prominent researchers to present their views on thematic food and seeds concerns such as autonomy and control, technology and knowledge, and cultural and ecological diversity. The presentations will be followed by an open discussion period. Panelists include: Brewster Kneen is the author of several books including "Farmageddon, Food and the Culture of Biotechnology" and "From Land to Mouth: Understanding the Food System"; and is the Founding Director of The Forum on Privatization and the Public Domain. Pat Mooney is the Executive Director of the ETC Group; and author/co-author of several books including "The "ETC" Century: Erosion, Technological Transformation, and Corporate Concentration in the 21st Century" and (with Cary Fowler) "Shattering: Food, Politics, and the Loss of Genetic Diversity". Devlin Kuyek is a researcher with the international organisation GRAIN, Co-ordinator of the Forum on the Patenting of Life, and member of the research group Technosciences du vivant et société at the Université du Québec à Montréal. Elisabeth Abergel (Discussant) is an Assistant Professor and Co-ordinator of the International Studies Program at Glendon College, York University. Evening Address: Pat Mooney "Technologies Converging at the Nanoscale" Research and commercialization in the area of nanotechnology is progressing at a furious rate. It is proving to be a technology platform like no other in history, with applications in the areas of agriculture, materials and commodities, pharmaceuticals, human enhancement and the military. Yet most of us are completely unaware of how this technology could change our lives. Pat will discuss the dimensions of this new technological wave, and its implications for society, especially the most marginalized in the Global South. Year Abroad Open House Trent's International Development Studies Department invites all students to attend our Trent-In-Ghana & Trent-In-Ecuador Open House on Thursday January 19, 2006 at 4pm in the Champlain College POID Centre (E 1.2). Students will have an opportunity to speak with directors and returnees on an informal basis about living, studying and working in Ghana and Ecuador. Light refreshments will be served. Write For Rights The Amensty International Trent Action Group is hosting a "Write for Rights" event on Monday, January 16. We will be in the Champlain College Senior Common Room from 11am - 5pm. Case studies for letter writing will be available outlining human rights abuses in Canada, Colombia and other countries. These all require international attention. Information on Amnesty and current Trent Action Group campaigns will also be available. This is a great opportunity to learn more about Amnesty. Pens, paper, and snacks will be provided. See everyone there! Fair Trade Trent Fair Trade Trent is hosting a movie at Grassroots. Learn how fair trade and sugar affect millions of people worldwide. Get involved or just learn more about the issue. Monday January 16th at Grassroots (395 Aylmer Street at the the corner of Aylmer and Hunter). Free food and coffee at 7:30 pm. Movie starts at 8:00 pm. Closed Doors: The Universal Right to Education Denied The vision that inspired the international community to articulate the universal right to education has yet to be implemented worldwide. Since 1979, the persecution of the Baha'i community in Iran - the country's largest religious minority - has been condemned by the United Nations, foreign governments and human rights groups. Although this pressure has helped to stop the overt persecution of the Baha'is, the government has persisted in a more subtle policy designed to suffocate the Baha'i community by denying members access to institutions of higher learning on the basis of religious affiliation. This violation of the right to education, upheld by Iran in numerous international agreements and covenants, has persisted despite public protests by the Baha'i community at the national and international levels. With the recent intensification of persecution, the Baha'i Community is now calling for assistance from students and academics to draw international attention to this injustice. Please visit http://denial.bahai.org for more detailed information on the subject. Tuesday, November 22nd from 4-6pm in the LEC Lecture Hall (EC 201) About our speakers: Gordon Naylor is President and Founder of the Stratford College of Liberal Arts. He is Executive Director of Nancy Campbell Collegiate Institute and serves as Chairman of the National Spiritual Assembly of the Baha'is of Canada. He has been instrumental in creating, developing and successfully implementing programmes for the education and empowerment of youth and families in North and South America. Tahirih Naylor is a lawyer who was called to the Bar in 2004 after receiving a Bachelors degree in sociology and focusing on international and human rights law in her legal studies. She has worked and travelled in over 25 countries and is currently a Representative of the Office of Governmental Relations for the Baha'i Community of Canada. Her areas of work include freedom of religion, the right to education, and sustainable development. Sponsored by the Association for Baha'i Studies, Trent Amnesty Action Group, WUSC and OPIRG Democratic Republic of Congo: A Silent Genocide In August 1998, the widest interstate war in modern African history began. It involved nine African nations and had a devastating impact on the Democratic Republic of Congo. It directly affected the lives of 50 million Congolese leaving up to 4.5 million dead. Millions more have become internally displaced or sought refuge in neighbouring countries. The war was listed as the worst conflict in human history since the second world war. Despite these shocking statistics, people know surprisingly little about this war. Join us on November 23rd for a presentation by Trent faculty and students and gain deeper insight into the causes and effects of this war. This presentation will contain some graphic photographs. Wednesday November 23 at 7pm in the Politics and IDST Center (formerly TIPEC) CCE1.2. Sponsored by WUSC. Light refreshments will be served. About our speakers: Dr. Tim Stapleton is the Chair of the History Department and a professor in African History at Trent. His research interests include Southern African resistance to colonial conquest, the development of ethnic identity and oral tradition as historical evidence. Kayembe Tshikele is a computer science major in his first year at Trent. He is from the D.R.C. and will share with us some of his experiences. Film Presentation: Scared Sacred In a world teetering on the edge of self-destruction, award-winning filmmaker Velcrow Ripper sets out on a unique pilgrimage. Visiting the 'Ground Zeros' of the planet, he asks if it's possible to find hope in the darkest moments of human history. Ripper travels to the minefields of Cambodia; war-torn Afghanistan; the toxic wasteland of Bhopal; post-9/11 New York; Bosnia; Hiroshima; Israel and Palestine. This powerful documentary captures his five-year odyssey to discover if humanity can transform the 'scared' into the 'sacred'. Deep in the jungles of Cambodia, Ripper meets Aki Ra, a child soldier forced to lay landmines for the Khmer Rouge. Today Aki wanders his ravaged country with a simple wooden stick, decommissioning thousands of mines each year. In the shattered land of Afghanistan, Ripper searches for a Sufi musician who was banned from performing or even listening to music, by the reign of fundamentalism. The musician discovered a way out: he filled his house with songbirds. In each Ground Zero, he unearths unforgettable stories of survival, of ritual, resilience and recovery. Scared Sacred deftly weaves together stunning footage with haunting memories, inspirational stories, and an evocative soundscape. Featuring an engaging, first-person narrative, this film is an exquisite portrait of a search for meaning in times of turmoil, a luminous gift to a world in shadows. Running time: 105 min. Thursday November 24th at 7:00pm in the Bata Film Theatre (Basement Level of Library) SAID Meet and Greet The Student Association of International Development (SAID) is holding our first ever student-faculty meet and greet!! Come on out and meet other IDS students, professors, TA's, in a fun informal setting. Have some fun and make new friends (or study partners). Wednesday November 9 from 6:30- 8:30 p.m. in the Champlain Senior Common Room (underneath The Seasoned Spoon) Trent Events Calendar Check the Trent University Calendar of Events online for upcoming lectures, colloquia and other events – or submit your own notice for administrative approval. |