The Media and Conflict Interchange
The Media and Conflict Interchange starts today at the National Media Museum.
Organised by the Bradford Media School and Department of Peace Studies. Each film will be introduced by one of our academics.
The Media and Conflict Interchange is a unique factual and fictional film event, held at the Pictureville cinema in the National Media Museum. Four film screenings will be accompanied by talks from academic speakers, including Paul Rogers, author of ‘Why We’re Losing the War on Terror’. The Interchange is a lively and highly entertaining event, but with a very serious focus – the relationship between the media and real-world conflict.
Tickets are free for a limited number of University staff and students.
We aim to:
- Critically examine the place of media and its ability to impact on and represent real-world issues of conflict and identity.
- To offer a high quality series of materials and talks, for students studying Media or Conflict related subjects at The University of Bradford, University staff, academic networks and the public at large.
- To ‘cross-pollinate’ between the staff and students of Peace Studies, Bradford Media School, Creative Technology, outside organisations and the public.
- To screen some excellent films in a wonderful venue, and have an opportunity to discuss them!
Programme
Monday 15th October:
14:00pm: The Island President
Speaker: Paul Rogers (Peace Studies)
Tuesday 16th October
14:00: Waltz with Bashir
Speaker: David Robison (Bradford Media School)
Wednesday 17th October:
15:15: Eyes Wide Open: Exploring Today’s South America
Speaker: Fiona Macaulay (Peace Studies)
Thursday 18th October
14:00 Tahrir, Liberation Square
Speaker: Ray Bush (Leeds University)
Friday 19th October
Free workshops and discussions at The University of Bradford. More details about these will be released soon.
This event is organised by the Bradford Media School, with collaborators from Peace Studies and The National Media Museum. The screenings and talks are free to Bradford University students and staff; others pay the normal cinema charge.
See www.mediaandconflict.co.uk for details.
E-mail: d.robison@bradford.ac.uk
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/groups/182684996689/
About the Films and Speakers
The Island President: Monday 15 October, 2pm
Dir. Jon Shenk USA 2011 102 mins (PG) format
Documentary with Mohamed Nasheed
Until February this year Mohamed Nasheed was President of the tiny state of Maldives. Shortly after gaining power Nasheed became preoccupied with climate change – an urgent priority since parts of the low-lying island are being washed away by rising sea levels. Refusing to accept this as a lost cause, Nasheed travels to Copenhagen to try and save his country.
Speaker: Paul Rogers, Professor of Peace Studies and international security correspondent of the Open Democracy web journal.
Waltz with Bashir: Tuesday 16 October, 2pm
Dir. Ari Folman Israel/Germany/France 2008 90 mins (18) Digital
Voices: Ari Folman, Ori Sivan, Ronny Dayag, Shmuel Frenkel
Waltz with Bashir uses an innovative animation style to convey the horror and desperation of war. Our narrator Ari chats to a friend in a bar about dreams, and they find there is a connection between the nightmares and their experiences in the first Lebanon War. Ari soon realises his memory surrounding that period of his life is lacking, and he tries to remember.
Speaker: David Robison, Senior Media lecturer at the University of Bradford and organiser of the Media and Conflict Interchange.
With My Eyes Wide Open: Wednesday 17 October, 3.15pm
Dir. Gonzalo Arijon Uruguay 2010 110 mins (adv. 12A) Subtitles DVD
Documentary with Eduardo Galeano, George W. Bush, Hugo Chávez, Condoleezza Rice
Documentary filmmaker Gonzalo Arijon looks at centuries of economic exploitation in South America in With my Eyes Wide Open. His search takes him from the soybean plantations of the Brazilian Amazon and the tin mines of Bolivia to the deep jungles of Ecuador. Offering hope for change, Arijon shows how the current crop of leftist leaders in these countries are attempting to resist the squandering of natural resources by large, international companies.
Speaker: Fiona Macaulay, Lecturer in Development studies at Bradford, previously Research Fellow in Brazilian Studies, Oxford, where she convened the Human Rights Programme.
Tahrir, Liberation Square: Thursday 18 October, 2pm
Dir. Stefano Savona France/Italy 2011 91 mins (adv. tbc) format
Documentary
When the revolution in Egypt broke out in early 2011, Documentary filmmaker Stefano Savona headed straight to Cairo’s Tahrir Square to film the people who had congregated to try and oust president Mubarek. This absorbing account of the revolution’s early days takes an unadorned, observational view of a movement that remained remarkably focused even without a defined leader.
Speaker: Ray Bush, Professor of African Studies and Development Politics, his most recent publication includes, editor, with Habib Ayeb, Marginality and Exclusion in Egypt (Zed Books 2012)
