GRACE PALEY: Pressing the Limits of Action: April 2009

Monday, April 13, 2009

Grace Paley Award Winner

The William Joiner Center for the Study of War and Social Consequences is pleased to announce that Sơn ca Lâm is recipient of the 2009 Grace Paley Award. Honorable Mention has been awarded to Stephanie Fail and Heather Turner.

The Joiner Center received an overwhelming number of qualified nominees for this award; it's clear that students at UMass Boston are hard at work in the fields of social and political activism. We want to thank the students and faculty who nominated the applicants; our task was bittersweet. We applaud Sơn ca Lâm, Stephanie Fail, and Heather Turner for their work and advocacy; it is an honor to recognize these outstanding individuals.

For the past three years, Sơn ca Lâm has served as a core member of Asian American Studies Outreach (AASO), the student-initiated, student-run arm of the Asian American Studies Program at UMass Boston. She was instrumental in the drafting of Nine Issues of Concern, which framed an agenda of priority issues for Asian and Asian American students. Sơn ca also co-organized all aspects of the 2008 Asian Pacific American Heritage Month Activities on campus. Sơn ca performed at numerous cultural events on and off campus, including The Vagina Monologues. Her academic commitment is outstanding; she is pursuing a double major in Environmental Studies and Comparative Ethnic Studies. Combining her academic skills and her community commitments to full effect, Sơn ca used her GIS mapping skills to plot a profile of Vietnamese nail salons in Boston; similarly, she made use of her academic environmental justice expertise to highlight illegal landfills and dumpsites in the East Vietnamese community in New Orleans. Sơn ca Lâm is due to graduate this year.

Stephanie Fail writes op-eds for The Mass Media, the UMass Boston student newspaper. Her columns have covered a wide range of topics, including politics, the T, racism, history, and the need for students to play an active role in social and political affairs. Her work with the Student Antiwar Coalition has included the development of a website, event planning and outreach through journalism. Stephanie and her colleagues at the Student Antiwar Coalition brought the embedded international journalist, Dahr Jamail, to UMass Boston. This event raised student awareness about the war and its consequences.

Heather Turner has put in many hours as an activist, focusing on the needs of the mentally ill and women at risk. Her grassroots activism includes protesting white supremacist activities, leafleting (addressing issues such as the war on terror, the Patriot Act, and other issues concerning individual privacy and freedom), organizing a group of young people to attend the Democratic National Convention, and counseling and assisting at shelters throughout Boston and Cambridge. A member of the UMass Boston Philososphy Club, Heather is currently involved in fundraising for a conference on the Rwandan Genocide.

A reception honoring Sơn ca Lâm, Stephanie Fail, and Heather Turner will be held at the Harbor Gallery in McCormack Hall on Wednesday, April 15th at noon. This event will be preceded by a reading given by writer and activist Carolyn Forché at eleven o'clock. For details or disability-related accommodations, please contact the William Joiner Center for the Study of War and Social Consequences at (617) 287-5850.

Thursday, April 9, 2009

Passover for Peace and Justice

Philadelphia, PA April 7-8, 2009—This year for the Jewish holiday of Passover, many Philadelphia Jews and their allies will gather at the Israeli Consulate for an 18 hour vigil to remember suffering and commemorate struggles for liberation from ancient Egypt to modern-day Israel-Palestine.

This event, “From Deir Yassin* to Gaza,” begins at 4:00 PM on April 7th and continues through 10:00 am April 8th. The event takes place outside of the Israeli Consulate, 1880 JFK Blvd. in Center City Philadelphia. While Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu once again fails to address Palestinian sovereignty, the organization sponsoring the event, Philadelphia Jews for a Just Peace (PJJP), gathers together for immediate action. PJJP calls for all people of conscience to stand together in mourning of Palestinians who died in Deir Yassin, for an end to the occupation of the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Gaza, and demands an end to the siege of Gaza, and the right of return to Palestinian refugees.

Participants will include individuals, rabbis, community leaders, and groups within the Jewish, Arab-American, Muslim, Christian, Quaker, secular, student, and local Philadelphia peace communities. Rabbi Linda Holtzman of Congregation Mishkan Shalom will lead kaddish, the Jewish mourning prayer, for those killed at Deir Yassin.

Refugees Fleeing Deir Yassin in April, 1948

The event highlights Imam Dawud Assad, a survivor of the Deir Yassin Massacre who lives in New Jersey as a grandfather and advocate for social justice. Mr. Assad will share his story during the Deir Yassin Memorial taking place 6:00-8:00 PM on April 7th.

The 18 hour vigil holds a packed schedule of events, opening at 4:00 PM with political street theater as a prelude to a Deir Yassin Memorial from 6:00-8:00 PM. A Passover Ritual of Memory and Repentance will be followed by an all-night Teach-In on TOPICS including boycott, divestment, and sanctions. The event will conclude with a protest against the siege on Gaza at 8:30 AM the following morning.

*Deir Yassin was a Palestinian village destroyed by 3 Zionist militias in 1948 in which more than 100 men, women and children were massacred. Word of the massacres spread through Palestine and many residents fled. Within a year of the massacre, Deir Yassin, which had been emptied of Palestinians, was re-populated with Jewish immigrants, and its name was removed from the map. During the war of 1948 that ended in the establishment of the state of Israel, over 530 Palestinian villages were destroyed. Deir Yassin has become emblematic for Israeli violence against the Palestinian people.

Thomas Hurndall, who took this photo was shot by an Israeli soldier.
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article1358.shtml
Thomas "Tom" Hurndall (29 November 1981 – 13 January 2004) was a British photography student, a volunteer for the International Solidarity Movement (ISM), and an activist against the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories. On 11 April 2003, he was shot in the head in the Gaza Strip by an Israel Defense Forces (IDF) sniper, Taysir Hayb. Hurndall was left in a coma and died nine months later.