Sunday, May 07, 2006

Darfur Diaries

Darfur Diaries

In October, 2004 a team of three independent filmmakers Aisha Bain, Jen Marlowe and Adam Shapiro left for Darfur, Sudan and eastern Chad. After monitoring the worsening political and humanitarian crisis for months and recognizing that the mainstream media offered marginal and inadequate coverage, the team set out with the goal of providing a platform for the people of Darfur (both those displaced inside Darfur and those living in refugee camps in Chad) to speak for themselves about their experiences, their fears, and their hopes for the future. The conflict serves as the ongoing narrative in the film, but the focus is on the people who are living through what has been termed a genocide. Through the voices of refugees, displaced persons, and in particular women and children, who are always among the most vulnerable in any conflict situation, this film seeks to provide space for the marginalized victims of atrocities to speak and to engage with the world. Additionally, the film probes the history, culture and heritage of Darfur as a means of deepening understanding of the crisis and complicating easily assumed perceptions by which the conflict is often portrayed (such as a matter of race, ethnicity or religion).

The film presents the Darfurians the filmmakers met (refugees and displaced peoples, civilians and fighters resisting the Sudanese government, child soldiers, teachers, students, parents, children and community leaders) as a people with full lives, culture, and heritage--people with homes that they desperately want to return back to, people undergoing traumatic loss but who demonstrate inspiring strength and resilience, and people whose lives, homes, safety and rights deserve to be protected as vigilantly as a fundamental human right.

You can view a clip from the film at http://www.darfurdiaries.org/themovie.htm. If you are interested in organizing a film/lecture event, with the filmmakers speaking before and after the film, please contact Creativewell, Inc at 1-800-743-9182 or
info@creativewell.com.

If you are interested in organizing a screening of the film only (without filmmaker), please contact the filmmakers at
info@darfurdiaries.org

KXCI Membership Drive

KXCI in Tucson (also on the internet) is having a fundraising drive in attempts to raise $85,000. They're a great indie station, folks! To listen or pledge go to: http://kxci.org/ or call: 520-623-1000

T.

Updated Top Albums of 2006

1. Neko Case - Fox Confessor Brings the Flood
2. T Bone Burnett - The True False Identity
3. Bruce Springsteen - We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions
4. Mark Knopfler and Emmylou Harris - All the Roadrunning
5.
Beth Orton - Comfort of Strangers
6. Rosanne Cash - Black Cadillac
7. Calexico - Garden Ruin
8.
Tom Russell - Love and Fear
9. Alejandro Escovedo - The Boxing Mirror
10. Bruce Robison - Eleven Stories
11. Jolie Holland - Springtime Can Kill You
12. Cordero - En Este Momento

Honorable Mention:
Robinella - Solace for the Lonely
Josh Rouse - Subtitulo
Charlie Hunter Trio - Copperopolis