The Centre for Social Concern Calendar of Events & Speakers
The Centre for Social Concern is proud to
present its 2007/2008 speaker series. The Centre welcomes
and encourages questions, suggestions and concerns. If you have a
connection to a certain speaker, know of a social justice issue of
particular concern, or want to make a general inquiry then please contact
us.
All events are offered with no admission fee and hosted on King's University College campus unless stated otherwise. Click here for maps and directions.
| Thursday, September 20, 2007 | Economic Alternatives in Guatemala |
| Monday, September 24, 2007 | Electoral Reform in Ontario |
| Friday, September 28, 2007 | |
| Monday, October 1, 2007 | |
| Monday, October 29, 2007 | Benamar Benatta |
| Wednesday, October 31, 2007 | Kevin Annett: Genocide in Canada |
| Friday, November 9, 2007 | Mark Bérubé and the Fugitives |
| Monday, November 12, 2007 | Len Desroches |
| November 15-19, 2007 | School of the Americas Protest |
| Tuesday, November 27, 2007 | Fair Trade and the Solidarity Economy |
| Monday, January 21, 2008 | Solidarity for Ethiopian Political Prisoners |
| Monday, February 4, 2008 | Wealth, Poverty and Inequality |
| Monday, February 4, 2008 | Clean Energy Initiatives |
| Tuesday, March 4, 2008 | Ted Schmidt |
| Monday, March 10, 2008 | Marina Nemat: Prisoner of Tehran |
| Tuesday, March 18, 2008 | Investing in Conflict |
| Wednesday, March 19, 2008 | Monseñor Romero Vive! Monsignor Romero Lives! |
| Postponed | Indigenous Perspectives: Mining in Guyana |
Economic Alternatives in Guatemala
Thursday, September 20, 2007 @ 1:00pm
Location:
Wemple Student Lounge Extension
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Rosa Nelly García Corado is Acting Manager and delegate of Asociación para el Desarrollo Integral de las Comunidades Populares en Resistencia de Petén (ADI CPR-P). She is touring Quebec and Ontario to exchange information with unions, co-operatives, educational and other organizations concerning local market economies, fair trade commerce, and other aspects of her organization’s activities in Guatemala. |
Speakers Include:
Darcie Beckley, Ontario Citizens' Assembly for
Elgin-Middlesex-London
Dr. Hugh Mellon, Professor of Political Science, King's University
College
Monday, September 24, 2007 @ 7:00pm
Location: Wemple Student Lounge
Do Canadians actually have representative democracy? In the 2006 federal election, more than 650,000 Green Party voters across the country elected no one. Meanwhile, fewer than a half-million Liberal voters in Atlantic Canada alone elected 20 MPs. In the prairie provinces, Conservatives won three times as many votes as the Liberals, but were given nearly ten times as many seats. But more than 400,000 Conservative voters in Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver couldn't elect a single MP. The NDP attracted a million more votes than the Bloc, but the voting system gave the Bloc 51 seats and the NDP 29. Using the existing electoral system, called "first-past-the-post", a party can win just 40% of the votes, get 60% of the seats, and 100% of the power. In fact, Ontario has not had a government elected by a majority of voters since 1937.
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On October 10, 2007, Ontarians will vote in a referendum to give future generations what we have never had: a truly democratic voting system. An Ontario where all voters are equal, all votes count, election outcomes are fair and governments represent the majority. This evening r epresentatives from Vote For Mixed Member Proportional will lead a discussion and answer questions on the current electoral system in Ontario and Canada, the Mixed Member Proportional System, and the coming referendum. |
School of the Americas
Watch London:
Torture Survivor Neris Gonzalez
Friday, September 28, 2007 @ 7:00pm
Location: Labatt Hall, LH100
King's University College
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Neris Gonzalez was a young Salvadoran church worker who was eight months’ pregnant when the National Guard abducted her in 1979. Tortured for several days, raped and stomped on, Gonzales was forced to watch another prisoner’s torture and execution. She was finally dumped in the back of a truck full of corpses and left for dead. She managed to crawl to freedom, but her son died two months after being born.
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War Resisters Support Group, London
Monday, October 1, 2007 @ 7:00pm
Location: Wemple Student Lounge Extension
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Breaking Ranks is a documentary
about the plight of four U.S. soldiers seeking sanctuary in Canada
as part of their resistance to the war in Iraq. The film documents
their experiences as they try to exercise their consciences amidst
profound emotional, ethical and international consequences. Filmed
over the course of the refugee process, this provocative film
explores the meaning of duty through the powerful testimonies of
these young soldiers.
War Resisters Suppoort Group member Beth Guthrie, as well as a war resister, will be present to answer questions and lead a discussion following the film. |
Victim of Post-9/11 Racial Profiling
Location: Wemple
Student Lounge
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Benamar Benatta is a 33
year old Algerian citizen who trained as an aeronautical engineer. He
came to North America to flee political persecution and threats to his
life while serving in the Algerian Armed Forces. On September 5, 2001
Mr. Benatta crossed the border into Canada and claimed political
asylum. His biggest fear was being returned to Algeria where he was
certain to be tortured or killed for deserting the military. Canadian
authorities put Mr. Benatta into immigration detention while they
tried to ascertain his identity.
While in Canadian custody and unbeknown to Mr. Benatta, terrorists attacked the World Trade Centre in New York City and other targets on September 11, 2001. Canadian officials alerted U.S. officials to the presence of Mr. Benatta, presumably because he is a Muslim man who knows something about airplanes. Without a hearing, without counsel and without conducting proceedings in his first language (French), Mr. Benatta was unceremoniously driven over the border in the back of a car by Canadian officials and handed over to U.S. officials on September 12, 2001. This was an illegal transfer. This action by Canadian officials was the beginning of a long nightmare for Mr. Benatta. Mr. Benatta was held in the Metropolitan Detention Centre in Brooklyn, New York, where he was treated as a suspect in the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. He was beaten. He was abused. He was held in conditions that the United Nations described as torture. He was forgotten. Mr. Benatta was actually cleared of any terrorist activity by the FBI in November 2001; however, he was never told that he was cleared because he was being held incommunicado and did not have access to a lawyer. In all, Mr. Benatta, an innocent man, spent nearly FIVE years of his life in American prisons in conditions that could be described as torture as found by the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention in an Opinion adopted in 2004. Mr. Benatta also suffered serious abuse at the hands of his prison guards, which is documented by the U.S. Department of Justice. The Canadian Government, various agencies and government officials all bear some measure of responsibility for Mr. Benatta’s ordeal. Mr. Benatta has been allowed to return to Canada to resume his claim for refugee status. His application is pending. He is trying to get his life back. He is trying to find out the truth about why this happened to him. |
Kevin Annett
Wednesday, October 31, 2007 @12.00pm
Location: Wemple Student Lounge
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Read and Hear the
truth of Genocide in Canada, past and present, at:
www.hiddenfromhistory.org
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and the Fugitives
performing their captivating and provocative songs, music and poetry
Location: Wemple
Student Lounge
Cover: $10 at the door*
Cash Bar
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If you are a thoughtful, intellectually engaged, critically conscious student, you won’t want to miss the opportunity to hear, meet and mingle with this amazing group of artists. If you are of an older vintage, you won’t want to miss the opportunity to hear echoes of some of your formative musical influences in the music that currently claims the passion of thoughtful, intellectually engaged, critically conscious youth! The music, lyrics, and “spoken word” of the Fugitives touch the souls of all who are socially reflective, whatever their generation. One astute reviewer described the Fugitives as “a powerhouse of artistic and musical expression...that’s right: powerhouse.” This event marks a new departure from the typical lecture format of The Centre for Social Concern, underlining the fact the social reflection can be elicited not only didactically but can be invited through art and performance in music, song and poetry. Please come out for an unforgettable evening of fun and entertainment. *Part of the proceeds of this event will help support overseas placements for students in the Social Justice and Peace Studies program. For more information, please see attachments http://www.myspace.com/markberubemusic
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Author of: Allow the Water and Love of Enemy: The Cross & Sword Trial
Title: "Nonviolence as a Powerful Force"
7:00PM - Monday, November 12, 2007
Location: Wemple Student Lounge
(Copies of Love of Enemy: The Cross & Sword Trail will be available for purchase for $20)
School of the Americas Protest
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November 15-19, 2007
Location: Fort
Benning, Georgia, USA
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School of the Americas
Protest SOA Watch is an independent organization
that seeks to close the US Army School of the Americas, under
whatever name it is called, through vigils and fasts, demonstrations
and nonviolent protest, as well as media and legislative
work.On November 16, 1989, six Jesuit priests, their co-worker and her teenage daughter were massacred in El Salvador. A U.S. Congressional Task Force reported that those responsible were trained at the U.S. Army School of the Americas (SOA) at Ft. Benning, Georgia. Over its 59 years, the SOA has trained over 60,000 Latin American soldiers in counterinsurgency techniques, sniper training, commando and psychological warfare, military intelligence and interrogation tactics. These graduates have consistently used their skills to wage a war against their own people. Among those targeted by SOA graduates are educators, union organizers, religious workers, student leaders, and others who work for the rights of the poor. Hundreds of thousands of Latin Americans have been tortured, raped, assassinated, “disappeared,” massacred, and forced into refuge by those trained at the School of Assassins. King's University College students and other UWO students, professors and London Community members have participated in the annual protest. This year will be the fifth time London will have representation at the protest. |
SOA and the protest: http://www.soaw.org/
Official WHINSEC website: https://www.infantry.army.mil/whinsec/index.asp
For London community involvement or to join the London group heading to the protest
please send a message to Bernie Hammond at: bhammond@uwo.ca.
Fair Trade and the Solidarity
Economy
Tuesday, November 27, 2007 @ 7:00pm
Location: Dante Lenardon Hall, Room 112
Speaker: Leocadio Juracan
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Interested in Fair Trade? Looking for alternatives to the current global corporate system?
CAFÉ JUSTICIA (Justice Coffee), the amazing Fair Trade Plus organic coffee produced by Leocadio’s Mayan cooperative will be available for purchase. |
Monday, January
21, 2008 @ 7:00pm
Location: Wemple Student Lounge
Speaker: Aklilu Wendaferew
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A graduate of King's University College, Aklilu Wendaferew is one of the founders and current Chair Person of the Solidarity Committee for Ethiopian Political Prisoners (SOCEPP Canada). SOCEPP- Canada is a community based non-profit organization which advocates for the respect and protection of human rights in Ethiopia and elsewhere. Over the years, SOCEPP Canada has compiled records of numerous violations with extensive evidence and duly exposed such violations to policymakers in Canada and elsewhere. The organization has participated in Human Rights Consultations sponsored by Department of Foreign Affairs, worked very closely with Canadian parliamentarians, and campaigned for the protection of Human and Democratic Rights in Ethiopia. They have organized a number of discussion forums on Human Rights issues including taking an active role in the recent roundtable on human and political rights in Ethiopia held on May 04, 2007 in Ottawa. The roundtable was organized in partnership with AI Canada, Canadian Peace Coordinating Committee, Sub-Sahara Group and Partnership Africa Canada.
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A Participatory Workshop which considers the
dynamics between these three realities and invites participants to
consider practical ways of affecting change. |
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Speakers: Mike Farlow, Connie Cook, Craig Rathburn and Craig Cook
Location: Wemple Student Lounge Extension
Monday, February 4, 2008 @ 7:00pm
| Climate change,
caused by the burning of oil, coal and gas, threatens to devastate
everything from food and water supplies to the pattern of human
settlement. It is often the most marginalized people who are the
most adversely affected by the consequences of environmental
destruction.
Taking the responsibility for conservation into their own hands,
several residents of southwestern Ontario have started projects
aimed at reducing their energy consumption, generating power for
private consumption and reducing their reliance on Ontario Power.
Connie Cook will discuss the basic conservation measures her family (and everyone else) can implement to reduce their consumption of electricity (and other resources) to the point where they can implement a renewable energy system and go off the grid. Mike Farlow will discuss the building a home made wind turbine (based on the Hugh Piggott design) at a fraction of the cost of buying one (please visit www.scoraigwind.co.uk and www.windchasers.ca). Craig Rathburn will discuss the building of the EV2 Electric Jeep, and outline some of the factors that led to its remarkable performance (click on this YouTube link and search for the "EV2 electric jeep" to see several film clips of this vehicle). Craig Cook will complete the session by discussing his project to build a zero emissions home, and how all of the previously discussed topics can be coordinated to make this possible. Wind Chasers, a local grassroots group that meets on Saturdays in Tillsonburg to share ideas and skills, is now helping others to construct their own turbines, thereby spreading the potential for more houses to generate their own clean energy and reduce their consumption of dirty Ontario Power. |
Mining in Guyana
Speaker: Emily Wilson
Location: Wemple Student Lounge
Event postponed
| Since the early 1990s, the government of Guyana has promoted mining as a central economic development strategy. Most mining takes place in the country's interior, on or near the ancestral lands of Guyana's Indigenous Peoples. While the mining industry employs many indigenous people, the social and environmental impacts on members of indigenous communities - in particular women - are numerous. Impacts are exacerbated by the limited legal protection of indigenous people under Guyanese law, and the lacking human, technical and financial capacities to enforce existing laws and monitor mining in the interior. |
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Emily Wilson, an artistic activist with a grant from the Ontario Council for International Co-operation, traveled to Guyana to produce a film which documents the perspectives of Guyanese Amerindians on the issue of consultation within the mining sector, thus giving voice to a set of people who have so far been silenced. The film also offers a case study by focusing on a group of indigenous communities affected by Canadian mining companies
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Following a screening of
her film Emily will lead a discussion on the role of Canadian mining
companies abroad, and the situation in Guyana. Screening of this film has been delayed due to editing issues. Please visit www.undermined.ca for further information and updates on the status of this production. |
Journeys to the Heart of
Catholicism
Speaker: Ted Schmidt
Location: Wemple Student Lounge
Tuesday, March 4, 2008 @ 7:00pm
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In the twenty chapters on the institutional church the author weaves together two kinds of stories, critiques of the Church he so obviously loves and accounts of his heroes who have stood out in their call to society and the Church’s leadership to live by Christ’s call to aid the poor, those who mourn and demand peace. This is no pious rant against those who would turn our Church back to a “Church of the little flock”, rather it is as hard hitting, blunt and honest account of where and how the Church has lacked the courage to read and respond to the “signs of the times” and to listen to its prophets. John Borst, Tomorrow’s Trust: A Review of Catholic Education, November 17, 2007
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Ted Schmidt, award-winning columnist and former editor of the Catholic New Times, pioneered Holocaust education in
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Prisoner of
Tehran
Speaker: Marina Nemat
Location: Wemple Student Lounge
Monday, March 10, 2008 @ 7:00pm
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In 1982, sixteen-year-old Marina Nemat was arrested on
false charges by Iranian Revolutionary Guards and tortured in
Tehran’s notorious Evin prison. At a time when most teenaged
girls are choosing their prom dresses, Nemat was having her feet
beaten by men with cables and listening to gunshots as her
friends were being executed. She was condemned to die, but
survived because one of the guards, whose family was
well-connected to the Khomeini regime, pleaded for her life. But
the price Ali exacted was high: Nemat, a fervent Christian,
would have to convert to Islam and marry him.
Soon Nemat found herself being welcomed lovingly into the family of her husband and captor. She learned that Ali was not the monster his actions suggested; that although he was an interrogator in an evil regime, he was also a beloved son and brother who truly believed his unwilling wife would come to love him. Marina Nemat’s nightmare ended when members of a rival political faction assassinated Ali. She was returned to prison but, ironically, it was Ali’s family who eventually secured her release. She rejoined her own family but was further traumatized by their reluctance to acknowledge her ordeal. She found solace with the young man who had waited for her; they married and emigrated to Canada. An extraordinary tale of faith and survival, Prisoner of Tehran is a testament to the power of love in the face of evil and injustice. |
Investing in
Conflict:
North American Mining Companies, Trickle Down
"Development,"
and Environmental Destruction
Speaker: Dawn Paley
Location: Wemple Student Lounge
Tuesday, March 18, 2008 @ 7:30pm
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Conflicts around Canadian-U.S. mining projects in Central America have accelerated since the first recent open pit mines were initiated in Honduras in 2000. What are the causes of these conflicts? Who benefits from these mining operations, and who pays? What is the role of North Americans – governments, private sector and citizens - in allowing these conflicts to continue, and how can we help bring them to and end? |
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This event is brought to you by Rights Action, and co-sponsored by the Latin American Canadian Solidarity Association. |
Monseñor Romero Vive!
– Monsignor Romero
Lives!
El Salvador: 28 years after a martyr’s
death
Speaker: Rev. Roberto Pineda
Location:
Wemple Student Lounge
Wednesday, March 19, 2008 @ 7:00pm
| Sixteen years
after the end of its civil war, El Salvador continues its struggle
in search of peace. Currently, Salvadorans live under the
oppressive effects of the neo-liberal agenda that has further
polarized its social classes through free trade agreements and
repressive laws that impede genuine progress from grassroots
movements. Rev. Roberto Pineda is a Lutheran Church Pastor and a member of the popular church movement that has rescued Monsignor Romero’s legacy to look after the disadvantaged. Rev. Pineda will be heading a speaking tour across Ontario, in which he will expose a vision of the current situation of El Salvador . This event is brought to you in cooperation with LACASA (Latin American – Canadian Solidarity Association) & COSPES (Committee of Solidarity with the People of El Salvador ). |
Some of the previous year's speaker presentations and forums have been recorded and are available in the G. Emmett Cardinal Carter Library on the King's University College Campus. Not all previous events have been recorded but a list is of available recordings is on file in the library for borrowing purposes.
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Speakers
Studies Program
Centre for Social Concern
King's University College at The University of Western Ontario
266 Epworth Avenue, London, Ontario, N6A 2M3
Phone: (519) 433-3491 ext. 4380 toll-free: 1-800-265-4406
fax: (519) 433-0353 email: bhammond@uwo.ca