Skip to main content
  • Home
  • About
  • Faculty Experts
  • For The Media
  • ’Cuse Conversations Podcast
  • Topics
    • Alumni
    • Events
    • Faculty
    • Students
    • All Topics
  • Contact
  • Submit
Arts & Culture
  • All News
  • Arts & Culture
  • Business & Economy
  • Campus & Community
  • Health & Society
  • Media, Law & Policy
  • STEM
  • Veterans
  • University Statements
  • Syracuse University Impact
  • |
  • The Peel
  • Athletics
Sections
  • All News
  • Arts & Culture
  • Business & Economy
  • Campus & Community
  • Health & Society
  • Media, Law & Policy
  • STEM
  • Veterans
  • University Statements
  • Syracuse University Impact
  • |
  • The Peel
  • Athletics
  • Home
  • About
  • Faculty Experts
  • For The Media
  • ’Cuse Conversations Podcast
  • Topics
    • Alumni
    • Events
    • Faculty
    • Students
    • All Topics
  • Contact
  • Submit
Arts & Culture

Human Rights Film Festival brings compelling new films to Syracuse Sept. 15-17

Thursday, August 25, 2011, By News Staff
Share

Members of the Syracuse University and Central New York communities will have an opportunity to view award-winning films from around the world during “Illuminating Oppression: 9th Annual Human Rights Film Festival,” Thursday, Sept. 15, through Saturday, Sept. 17. This three-day festival is part of Syracuse Symposium 2011: Identity, and is presented by the SU Humanities Center and the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications.

budrusAll of the films will be shown in Syracuse University’s Life Sciences Complex Auditorium and are free and open to the public. Public parking will be available for $4 on Thursday, Sept.15, at Booth Garage (Comstock Avenue); on Friday morning, Sept. 16, at University Avenue Garage; on Friday evening and all day Saturday at Q4 (College Place).

Tula Goenka, associate professor of television-radio-film in the Newhouse School and co-director of the festival, says, “Be they fiction or non-fiction, the films that most resonate with viewers have always centered on human conflict, especially the struggle of the human spirit to survive against great odds. These are the stories that we choose to screen at Illuminating Oppression.”

“The events of the past year have continued to demonstrate the crucial role the camera plays in human rights activism around the world,” says Roger Hallas, associate professor of English in The College of Arts and Sciences and co-director of the festival. “It is very heartening to witness the growth of human rights film festivals around the world, including our own, for it proves that there is a substantial audience out there for informative, provocative and engaged filmmaking. Films can make a difference.”

The festival will open on Thursday, Sept. 15, at 7 p.m. with a screening of “Budrus” (Julia Bacha, USA, 2009), a powerful documentary that follows Ayed Morrar, a Palestinian community organizer, as he unites local Fatah and Hamas members along with Israeli supporters in an inspiring nonviolent movement to save his village of Budrus in the West Bank from destruction by Israel’s Separation Barrier. Hailed by Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times as a “must-see documentary,” “Budrus” illuminates the promising strategies of a progressive and inclusive movement for non-violent change in the region. Winner of numerous awards at major film festivals in Jerusalem, San Francisco, Berlin and New York, “Budrus” will be introduced by Nadav Greenberg, outreach and programming coordinator at Just Vision, the organization that produced the film. Greenberg will also lead a discussion after the screening.

Following a highly successful inauguration at last year’s festival, the Digital Witness Symposium returns this year with a focus on the power of the archive for digital human rights media, highlighting projects related to African American history, AIDS activism and the Holocaust. Speakers will include Sam Pollard (filmmaker, editor and professor at the Tisch School of the Arts, New York University); Jim Hubbard (filmmaker and co-founder of the ACT UP Oral History Project); Samuel Gruber (lecturer, Judaic Studies Program, SU); and Lydia Wasylenko (librarian, SU Library). The symposium will be held at 10 a.m., Friday, Sept. 16, in the Joyce Hergenhan Auditorium, Newhouse 3.

On Friday evening, the festival presents “We Were Here,” David Weisman’s reflective and deeply moving portrait of San Francisco’s gay community during the early years of the AIDS epidemic. Through the perspectives of five men and women who survived this unimaginable crisis, the film reveals how San Francisco’s compassionate, multifaceted and creative response to AIDS remains today a powerful standard to aspire to in seeking a healthier, more just and more humane society. The screening will be followed by a panel discussion with Hallas and local AIDS activists Michael Salvo and Nick Orth (Friends of Dorothy Catholic Worker House).

Major co-sponsors of the festival are the Central New York Humanities Corridor, an Andrew W. Mellon initiative; the Syracuse University Library; the Program for the Advancement of Research on Conflict and Collaboration (PARCC); the South Asia Center at the Daniel Patrick Moynihan Institute for Global Affairs; the Office of Multicultural Affairs; the Alexia Foundation; and SASSE: Students Advocating Sexual Safety and Empowerment.

Daily themes and the films to be screened during the festival include:

OPENING NIGHT
Thursday, Sept. 15, 7 p.m.
“Budrus”
Julia Bacha (82 mins, USA, 2009)
The screening is co-sponsored by the Middle Eastern Studies Program and the Judaic Studies Program.

DIGITAL WITNESS SYMPOSIUM
Friday, Sept. 16, 10 a.m.
Joyce Hergenhan Auditorium, Newhouse 3
This year’s symposium explores the significance of archives for digital human rights media.

WITNESSES TO THE EPIDEMIC
Friday, Sept.16, 7 p.m.
“We Were Here”
David Weissman (90 mins., USA, 2011)
This screening is co-sponsored by the LGBT Resource Center and the LGBT Studies Program.

RESISTING GENDERED VIOLENCE
Saturday, Sept. 17, 1 p.m.
“Pink Saris”
Kim Longinotto (96 mins., UK/India, 2010)
An intimate portrait of the indefatigable Indian activist Sampat Pal Devi, who leads a powerful grassroots movement against the discrimination and sexual abuse faced by Dalit women in Uttar Pradesh.

THE SITE OF MEMORY
Saturday, Sept. 17, 4 p.m.
“Nostalgia for the Light”
Patricio Guzmán (90 mins., France/Chile/Germany, 2010)
In his hauntingly beautiful odyssey across Chile’s Atacama Desert, Guzmán explores an aching paradox: the burial site for many disappeared victims of Pinochet’s regime is also the best place on earth for astronomers to view the heavens. This screening is co-sponsored by the Latino-Latin American Studies Program.

FRAGMENTED LIVES/UNBROKEN DREAMS
Saturday, Sept. 17, 7 p.m.
“I Am”
Onir (110 mins, India, 2010)
Weaving together the tumultuous lives of four characters struggling with their identity, this provocative film paints a compelling portrait of contemporary Indian society as it grapples with the vital issues of religious conflict, homophobia, sexual abuse and single motherhood. Starring Juhi Chawla, Manisha Koirala, Rahul Bose, Nandita Das, Sanjay Suri and Purab Kohli.

  • Author

News Staff

  • Recent
  • Vintage Over Digital: Alumnus Dan Cohen’s Voyager CD Bag Merges Music and Fashion
    Monday, July 7, 2025, By John Boccacino
  • Empowering Learners With Personalized Microcredentials, Stackable Badges
    Thursday, July 3, 2025, By Hope Alvarez
  • WISE Women’s Business Center Awarded Grant From Empire State Development, Celebrates Entrepreneur of the Year Award
    Thursday, July 3, 2025, By Dawn McWilliams
  • Paulo De Miranda G’00 Received ‘Much More Than a Formal Education’ From Maxwell
    Thursday, July 3, 2025, By Jessica Youngman
  • Law Professor Receives 2025 Onondaga County NAACP Freedom Fund Award
    Thursday, July 3, 2025, By Robert Conrad

More In Arts & Culture

Former Orange Point Guard and Maxwell Alumna ‘Roxi’ Nurse McNabb Still Driving for an Assist

As point guard for the Orange women’s basketball team, Raquel-Ann “Roxi” Nurse McNabb ’98, G’99 was known for helping her teammates ‘make buckets’—a lot of buckets. The 1997 Syracuse University Athlete of the Year, two-time team MVP and three-time BIG…

Vintage Over Digital: Alumnus Dan Cohen’s Voyager CD Bag Merges Music and Fashion

Bucking the trend of streaming music platforms and contrary to what one might expect of a member of his generation, musician Dan Cohen ’25 prefers listening to his favorite artists on compact disc (CD) and record players. His research and…

Empowering Learners With Personalized Microcredentials, Stackable Badges

The University is enhancing its commitment to lifelong learning with digital badges, a tool that recognizes and authenticates the completion of microcredentials. The badges aim to support learners in their professional and personal development by showcasing achievements in short, focused…

Rose Tardiff ’15: Sparking Innovation With Data, Mapping and More

While pursuing a bachelor’s degree in geography in the Maxwell School, Rose Tardiff ’15 became involved with the Salt City Harvest Farm, a community farm near Syracuse where newcomers from all over the world grow food and make social connections….

Paulo De Miranda G’00 Received ‘Much More Than a Formal Education’ From Maxwell

Early in his career, Paulo De Miranda G’00 embarked on several humanitarian aid and peacekeeping assignments around the world. “When we concluded our tasks, we wrote reports about our field work, but many times felt that little insight was given…

Subscribe to SU Today

If you need help with your subscription, contact sunews@syr.edu.

Connect With Us

  • X
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Youtube
  • LinkedIn
Social Media Directory

For the Media

Find an Expert Follow @SyracuseUNews
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Youtube
  • LinkedIn
  • @SyracuseU
  • @SyracuseUNews
  • Social Media Directory
  • Accessibility
  • Privacy
  • Campus Status
  • Syracuse.edu
© 2025 Syracuse University News. All Rights Reserved.