Congratulations to members of the C&M community for their involvement in the 2014 SVA Film Festival! Here is where you can catch C&M student and and alumni film work this year!
********** WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 3rd 2014 (SESSION A) ***********
CONTEMPORARY CULTURAL HERITAGE Marriott Hoover Room
4:45 PM Museum Night – dir. Nica Davidov (55 min, Russia) Q&A
THE CAMERA AND THE TOURIST Marriott Hoover Room
9:00 PM Gringo Trails – dir. Pegi Vail (1 hr 19 min, USA)
***************THURSDAY, DECEMBER 4th 2014 ***************
FROM THE VAULT Marriott Hoover Room
1:15 PM In the Land of the Head Hunters dir. Edward Curtis (1 hr 5 min, Canada) Q&A (C&M alumni Aaron Glass was on the team that restored this film!!)
ANDEAN STORIES Marriott Hoover Room
2:45 PM Let There Be Light – dir. Anna Wilking (52 min, Ecuador) Q&A
Co-Winner: Best Graduate Student Film
4:30 PM Living Quechua – dir. Christine Mladic Janney (19 min, USA) Q&A
*************** FRIDAY, DECEMBER 5th 2014 ***************
TELLING STORIES Marriott Hoover Room
12:45 PM A Correspondence – dir. Leili Sreberny-Mohammadi (16 min, UK/USA/Germany)
***************
And congratulations to C&M alumna Naomi Schiller who was on the jury this year!
Category Archives: Alumni
Lina de Jesús wins video contest
Congratulations to C&M alumna Lina de Jesús! Her short film “Mi Tia de Condado” won second place in the Hazlo Bien HIV prevention video contest! Hazlo Bien is a Puerto Rico-based HIV/AIDS awareness campaign for youth.
IndieWIRE interview with C&M alumna Rachel Lears
C&M alumna Rachel Lears co-directed the award-winning documentary The Hand That Feeds, which is making its NYC premiere this week atDOC NYC. IndieWIRE is running a series of articles about women directors at DOC NYC and interviewed Lears recently about her film. Click here to read! The Hand That Feeds screens Sunday 11/16 and Thursday 11/20 at DOC NYC. Click here for tickets.
THE CANCER MIRROR wins award at Big Apple Film Festival
Congratulations to C&M alumna Sophie Tuttleman! The short documentary she produced while in the Culture & Media Program, The Cancer Mirror, won the award for Best Student Film over the weekend at the 2014 Big Apple Film Festival!
Find out more about The Cancer Mirror here.
Ancestors in our Genome – New Book by Eugene E. Harris
Eugene E. Harris, Professor of Biological Science and Geology at Queensborough Community College (and NYU Anthropology alumnus) has just published Ancestors in our Genome: The New Science of Human Evolution (Oxford University Press)
In 2001, scientists were finally able to determine the full human genome sequence, and with the discovery began a genomic voyage back in time. Since then, we have sequenced the full genomes of a number of mankind’s primate relatives at a remarkable rate. The genomes of the common chimpanzee and bonobo, orangutan, gorilla, and macaque monkey have already been identified, and the determination of other primate genomes is well underway. Researchers are beginning to unravel our full genomic history, comparing it with closely related species to answer age-old questions about how and when we evolved. For the first time, we are finding our own ancestors in our genome and are thereby gleaning new information about our evolutionary past.
In Ancestors in Our Genome, molecular anthropologist Eugene E. Harris presents us with a complete and up-to-date account of the evolution of the human genome and our species. Written from the perspective of population genetics, and in simple terms, the book traces human origins back to their source among our earliest human ancestors, and explains many of the most intriguing questions that genome scientists are currently working to answer.
THE HAND THAT FEEDS to screen in NYC – Thursday 11/6
Filmmaker Rachel Lears (an alumna of our Culture & Media Program) will screen clips from her new film next week in NYC:
Thursday, November 6, 2014
7-9 pm
Hemispheric Institute of Performance & Politics
20 Cooper Square, 5th Floor
New York, NY 10003
Wine reception to follow. This event is free and open to the public. A photo ID is required to enter NYU buildings. 20 Cooper is a wheelchair accessible venue.
This event will be livestreamed. To view the live video feed starting at 7pm (EST), click here.
ABOUT THE FILM: At a popular bakery café, residents of New York’s Upper East Side get bagels and coffee served with a smile 24 hours a day. But behind the scenes, undocumented immigrant workers face sub-legal wages, dangerous machinery, and abusive managers who will fire them for calling in sick. Mild-mannered sandwich maker Mahoma López has never been interested in politics, but in January 2012, he convinces a small group of his co-workers to fight back. Risking deportation and the loss of their livelihood, the workers team up with a diverse crew of innovative young organizers and take the unusual step of forming their own independent union, launching themselves on a journey that will test the limits of their resolve.
ABOUT THE EVENT: Mahoma López and Vergilio Arán of the Laundry Workers Center, the main subjects of the film and organizers of the Hot and Crusty campaign, will join filmmakers Rachel Lears and Robin Blotnick in a simultaneously translated discussion. They will relate the strategies it took to overcome a two-month lockout, back door legal battles, and a picket line that divided a neighborhood and the soul it took to ensure they will never be exploited again.
The Hand that Feeds is directed and produced by Rachel Lears and Robin Blotnick.
The Critical Tactics Lab (CTL) is the Hemispheric Institute’s permanent forum for discussion and research on the practices and methods of contemporary and historical political action. Drawing on the work of Yes Lab and the Creative Activism Series and the Institute’s ongoing work with political artists and activists from the Americas, the CTL’s mission is to promote and strengthen critical reflection about the tactics and strategies of political movements as well as the multiple processes and modes of analysis through which these are arrived at. Through lectures, workshops, courses, and other modes of assembly—and with an emphasis on laughter and embodied practice—the CTL seek to provide a space in which the expansive affinities of critical practice and action can be made visible and strengthened.
Culture & Media Program at DOC NYC
The NYU Culture & Media Program is well represented at the upcoming DOC NYC Film Festival! Congratulations to all!
9-MAN
Associate Produced by Bing Wang (C&M alumna)
Played since the 1930s, 9-Man, a variant of volleyball, was developed by Chinese immigrants to America as both an athletic pastime and a social outlet in a time of widespread anti-Chinese sentiment, discrimination and segregation. Ursula Liang’s film traces the game’s fascinating history as a backdrop to the present-day national championship, in which Asian-American players, now fully integrated into mainstream North American culture, defy stereotypes about Asian masculinity and athleticism even as they connect to their heritage.
2:00 PM, Sat Nov 15 | SVA Theatre
THE HAND THAT FEEDS
Directed by Rachel Lears (C&M alumna) and Robin Blotnick
NYC PREMIERE An Upper East Side Hot & Crusty bakery serves as the unlikely setting for an old-fashioned David vs. Goliath story in Rachel Lears and Robin Blotnick’s rousing film. After years of exploitation, Mahoma López, an unassuming sandwich maker, leads his fellow service workers as they demand better working conditions and wages. Risking their livelihood—and, for some, deportation—they take to the streets to plead their case to their regular customers, partnering with impassioned young Occupy activists in a hard-fought battle to prove the power of labor organizing.
2:30 PM, Sun Nov 16 | IFC Center
BACK ON BOARD: GREG LOUGANIS
Directed by Cheryl Furjanic (C&M’s Media Production Specialist)
NYC PREMIERE This strikingly candid profile explores the triumphs and tragedies of Greg Louganis, considered by many the greatest diver of all time. A four-time Olympian, Louganis became a household name and an inspiration to countless athletes, but after he publicly revealed his sexuality and HIV status, the backlash cost him dearly. Back on Board follows Louganis as he simultaneously faces the loss of his home and the possibility of redemption, returning to the diving board to mentor the 2012 US Olympic diving team. This screening is co-presented by NewFest.
6:45 PM, Sun Nov 16 | SVA Theatre
CAST IN INDIA
Directed by Natasha Raheja (C&M alumna)
Iconic and ubiquitous, thousands of manhole covers dot the streets of New York City. Enlivening the everyday objects around us, this short film is a glimpse of the working lives of the men behind the manhole covers in New York City. This is playing part of the SHORTS PROGRAM: PARTS + LABOR
9:00 PM, Sun Nov 16 | Bow Tie Chelsea Cinemas
New book by Ulla D. Berg
Congratulations to Rutgers University professor (and Culture & Media alumna) Ulla D. Berg! Her new book “Mobile Selves: Race, Migration, and Belonging in Peru and the U.S.” will be published by NYU Press in 2015!! 
Alumna Anya Bernstein Receives Literary Award
Alumna Anya Bernstein, an Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Harvard University, has received the 2014 Award for Excellence from the American Academy of Religion for her book Religious Bodies Politic: Ritual and Sovereignty in Buryat Buddhism (University of Chicago Press, 2013). Congratulations, Anya!
You can read more about her book here.
Find out more about Anya’s current research and interests here.
The Hand that Feeds wins Jury Award
Congratulations to C&M alumna Rachel Lears! Her film The Hand That Feeds won the Jury Award for Best Documentary Feature at the 16th annual Sidewalk Film Festival in Birmingham, Alabama!
