Calendar of Events - 2006
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Monday, Feb. 13 - Via Campesina and the Movement for Global Justice

7:00 PM, McGraw 165

Jose Bove, the renowned French farmer and activist, known for his
participation in the alter-globalization movement and his opposition of
genetically modified organisms will be speaking about the multinational
agricultural biotechnology corporation, Monsanto, a leading producer
and aggressive marketer of genetically engineered seed.

Sponsored by the Cornell Coalition for Trade Justice, CUSLAR, COLA, and
Cornell for Peace and Justice

Wednesday, Feb. 15- Film: A Man When He is a Man
7:00 PM, Uris Auditorium

Tuesday, February 21 - Seminar: Indigenous Community Radio

12:15 PM, Uris Hall room 153

Mario Murillo, Professor in the Audio-Visual Department at Hofstra University and Producer of "Our Americas the Weekly Report on Latin America and the Caribbean," will discuss his work with the Colombia Media Project and using radio as a means of highlighting the violence and hope behind the current situation in Colombia.

Wednesday, March 1 - Back-to-Back Documentaries
7:00 PM, Uris Auditorium

Remarkable Images-the Ecuadorian Indigenous Uprising

An up-close and on-the-scene documentation of how Indians united with the military against social injustice to oust Ecuadorian President Jamil Mahuad on January 21, 2000.

Water Willies in the Global Village

A look at Tejalpa, Mexico, an ancient Indian town that has kept many of its traditions alive including the fiesta the community celebrates each year in October. On this day the very best of the year’s agricultural harvest is offered to the spirit’s of the town’s main spring. The annual tradition survives despite a rapid process of suburban sprawl and less-than-responsible development, which pollutes the same water that is worshipped every year. The film provides a unique visual perspective on the globalization debate.

March 27 - 28: Bolivian Indigenous Labor Leader Felix Muruchi Poma

From the mines to the prisons to the streets: an activist's history of
Bolivia

When: Monday March 27, 7:00pm

Where: Living Wage Center (in Autumn Leaves Bookstore), The Commons

Urban social movements as engines of political change in Bolivia

When: Tuesday March 28th, 4:30pm

Where: Uris Room G-08

Background: Son of an Aymara-speaking mother and a Quechua-speaking father, Muruchi has long worked with Bolivia’s indigenous majority as well as with various student and labor groups and an organization of political exiles.

Muruchi started working in the mines in Llallagua at an early age, and became a mining union leader. Under the Banzer dictatorship, he was imprisoned in Puerto Montt in southern Chile along with other Bolivian union leaders. He managed to escape with another union leader and fled to the Dutch embassy in Santiago. There he was sent into exile in Holland. He returned to Bolivia in 1979 and went into exile again in 1980 during the Garcia Mesa regime. When he returned from exile, he was instrumental in running an NGO that provided training to ex-miners who had lost their jobs and moved to El Alto (a city on the outskirts of La Paz primarily inhabited by poor indigenous people who come in search of jobs in the capitol). He has lived in El Alto since the mid-1980's, and is active as a leader in the Regional Labor Federation (COR), as well as a student leader at the UPEA (Universidad Pública de El Alto) where he is now studying law.

Muruchi will be taking part in a five-state speaking tour in the US including several more stops in New York State and Philadelphia. These are:

Philadelphia:

Social movements as forces for change: El Alto, Bolivia
Movimientos sociales urbanos como fuerza de cambio: El Alto, Bolivia

When: Wednesday, March 22, 2:40 – 4:00 pm

Where: Temple University, GUS, Gladfelter Hall 310
For information contact: Ben Kohl - tel 215.204.1430 or bkohl@templ.edu

An activist’s story: from the fields, to the mines to the jails to the streets
Testimonio de vida desde lo rural a la mina y a la carcel a las calles

When: Thursday, 23 March, 12:00 - 1:30pm

Where: Solomon Ash Center, University of Pennsylvania
For more information contact: Araceli Garcia del Soto - tel. 215 573 0651

AND

When: Thursday, 23 March, 2:30-4:00 pm

Where: Haverford College, Hilles 109
For more information contact: Roberto Castillo - rcastill@haverford.edu

New York:

Friday, March 31st - Colgate University, 12:30pm at the Womens' Studies Center

Monday, April 3rd - New York University
Tuesday, April 4th - Brecht Forum
Wednesday, April 5th - Colombia
Thursday, April 6th - Fordham

Wednesday, March 29 - Film: Today and Tomorrow
7:00 PM, Uris Auditorium

Friday, March 31 - CUSLAR Wine and Cheese

5:00 - 7:00 PM, 413 South Albany St., Ithaca

Join us for CUSLAR's annual fundraising event and help support our programs to promote peace and respect for human rights in Latin America.

Friday, March 31-Sunday, April 2 - 1st Annual Colombian Documentary and Film Festival

March 31: 165 McGraw Hall, 6:30pm-10pm, April 1: Goldwin Smith Hall HEC Auditorium, 10am-11pm, April 2: Goldwin Smith Hall HEC Auditorium, 10am-6pm

This will be a new annual event designed to present the works produced by the newest Colombian talent within the field of documentaries and short films with the aim of promoting cross-cultural understanding and raising awareness about struggles for peace in Colombia. CUSLAR plans to partner with other universities in the future to create a traveling film festival in order to give talented filmmakers the chance to show their work in a variety of venues. Works presented will explore elements of Colombian culture, people, politics, and social condition through the exploration of themes as varied as indigenous communities and womens’ rights movements, violence and civil strife, US-Colombian relations, racism, the Colombian peace communities, musical movements, and youth activism.

For more information on the film festival or to view a list of documentaries and films being featured, visit the website at: http://colombiandocufilm.tripod.com.

Monday, April 3 - Informational Meeting for Summer Program in Buenos Aires!

5:00pm - 6:30pm, Edwards Room, Anabel Taylor Hall

Want to work on your Spanish and explore beautiful Buenos Aires?

Pues, vamos al sur entonces!

The Vamos Al Sur summer program in Argentina is led by Andrés
Lema-Hincapié, CUSLAR's own wonderful Spanish professor who's highly
experienced, very energetic, patient and attentive to his students. Great
internship opportunities and cultural immersion! The program comes highly
recommended by it's alums. Come here them speak about the program, find
out more, and enjoy wonderful Argentine food and drink!

Students, Faculty, Staff, Retirees,...
Everyone in Ithaca is Invited

Contact: Dr. Andrés Lema-Hincapié
andreslemah@yahoo.com / 607-277-9008

April 5-6 - Baldemar Velasquez to speak as part of the 2006 ILR Union Days

This year's theme for the ILR Union Days is "Migrant and Immigrant Workers." Baldemar Velasquez, of the Farm Labor Organizing Committee, will speak on Wednesday, April 5 at 4:30 pm and perform music on the evening of Thursday, April 6. There will also be some discussion on potential summer internship opportunities for students interested in organizing campaigns in Ohio and North Carolina.

Thursday, April 6 - Cocanomics: analysis of the legal market for coca leaves in Peru

4:30 pm, Rockefeller 115

Manuel Glave Testino holds a Ph. D. in Economics from the University of Illinois at Urbana – Champaign. A Senior Researcher at the Group of Analysis for Development (GRADE), where he is member of its Executive Committee since 2003, and an Associate Professor of the Department of Economics at the Catholic University of Peru, he is currently a Visiting Professor at the Department of Economics and Policy Studies at the University of Notre Dame. He is a specialist on sustainable rural development studies with international experience in Bolivia, Ecuador, Guatemala and Peru. Most recently he has been working on the social and environmental impact of extractive industries on rural communities in the Peruvian Andes and Amazon, and on the functioning of the internal market for coca leaf in Peru.

April 7-9 - Spring 2006 Conference through the East Coast Chicano Student Forum
Details TBA

Wednesday, April 12 - Film: Justice
7:00 PM, Uris Auditorium

This fascinating feature documentary, winner of several international prizes, offers an intimate look inside the Brazilian justice system, closely observing the everyday work of attorneys, judges, prosecutors and other legal professionals, as well as the defendants passing through the system-a young man caught with a stolen car, another charged with complicity in petty theft, and a teenager arrested for possession of drugs and weapons. The film succeeds in revealing a broader social picture, one involving clear implications of police corruption, an oppressive judicial system that basically seems designed to punish the poor for petty crimes, and a penal system characterized by horrifically inhumane conditions. In a very compelling way, JUSTICE reveals the legal system as a sort of public theater dramatizing the social relations and power structures of Brazilian society at large.

Saturday, April 22 - Latin Night at the Barn: A benefit for Ithaca's Sister Community of Cajibio, Colombia
9:00pm-1:00am, Big Red Barn

Free dance lessons starting at 9pm! Then dancing and fun until 1am!

Donations warmly accepted to support the community of Cajibio

Sponsored by: los Aficionados del Espanol, CUSLAR, ISPB, SalsaAmigos of Cornell, and the Cornell Colombian Students Association

Wednesday, April 26 - Aristide and the Endless Revolution
7:00 PM, Uris Auditorium

Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the former president of Haiti, was twice removed from office with the complicity of the international community. A rigorous investigation into the events that led to his ouster, Aristide and the Endless Revolution exposes the geopolitical intrigue, the economic alliances between the Haitian and U.S. elite, the armed criminals posing as freedom fighters and other factors that have consistently threatened this young democracy.

Thursday, April 27 - The Zapatistas Over a Decade Later: From 'Verticalist' Solutions to Horizontal Alternatives

7:30pm, Goldwin Smith HEC Auditorium

Come hear a dynamic talk by Roberto Flores, Member of the “Autonomous People’s Collective,” Eastside Café, and La Otra Campana en el Otro Lado.

Flores is a doctoral candidate at the University of Southern California (USC) and has been involved with the Zapatista Movement since immediately after their 1994 Uprising. He is currently involved with their latest initiative and is affiliated with several “autonomous projects” in Los Angeles attempting to apply “Zapatismo” in the United States.

Sponsored by: MEChA, the Latina/o Graduate Student Coalition, CUSLAR, the Center for the Study of Contentious Politics, the Office of the Dean, the Bartels Family, the American Indian Program, Department of Government, and the Latino/a Studies Program

Monday, May 1 - A Call to Action/A Day Without an Immigrant

12:00pm-1:30pm, Downtown Ithaca Commons

Join students, faculty, staff and community members in a rally for immigrants' rights as part of a nationwide boycott designed to demonstrate the importance of immigrants in the US economy. Because immigrants' rights are human rights!

Sponsored by the CUSLAR, the Latino Civic Association, Ithaca Asian American Association, and the Immigrant Rights Center

Friday, May 5 - Community Cinema w/ITVS

7:00pm, Henry St. John Bldg. Suite 103, Clinton and Geneva Sts in Downtown Ithaca

Guerilla Griots human rights media arts center presents The Devil's Miner. Living in poverty with their mother in the mountains of Bolivia, 14-year-old Basilio and his 12-year-old brother, Bernardino, work long shifts in the Cerro Rico silver mines, braving deadly conditions to earn enough money to attend school. The Devil's Miner follows the brothers into the underground mining tunnels as they tempt fate in order to gain a better life.

The Devil's Miner will also air nationally on the Emmy Award-Winning PBS series Independent Lens on Tuesday, May 23, 2006 at 10:00pm. Check local listings.

For more information on ITVS Community Cinema visit www.itvs.org/outreach.

Saturday, May 20 - March on Washington: Stop the U.S. Intervention Against Venezuela and Cuba

A broad group of organizations and individuals have called for a national march on Washington in solidarity with Cuba and Venezuela. The demands are for the U.S. government to: end the blockade of Cuba; lift the travel ban and allow U.S. citizens and legal residents free travel to Cuba; normalize U.S.-Cuban relations; defend Venezuela's sovereignty; free the Cuban five political prisoners held in U.S. prisons; and to extradite Luis Posada Carriles. If you want to go, contact Kathy Russell at 607-273-4523 or gavagai05@yahoo.com to find out more about a carpool being organized. For other information: May20@yahoo.com. To endorse: endorseMay20@yahoo.com.