News and Upcoming Events

SURCLA | Indigenous Knowledges in Latin America and Australia Locating Epistemologies: Difference and Dissent

Symposium:
8-9 December 2011

Indigenous Film Festival:
10 December 2011

Keynote Speaker:
Les Malezer
Inaugural Co-Chair, National Congress of Australia’s First People
Sydney Ideas Lecture, 6:00pm, 9 December 2011

This symposium brings together Indigenous and non-Indigenous academics and intellectuals from Mexico, Chile and Argentina for an important dialogue with their counterparts in Australia to discuss different models and approaches around Indigenous Knowledges in higher education. The first time for such a dialogue to cross so many cultures, languages and contexts, this event will be accompanied by a Film Festival showcasing work by Indigenous artists from Australia and Latin America.

The Symposium is organised with the generous support of the University of Sydney International Program Development Fund (IPDF), the Faculty of Arts, the School of Languages and Cultures and the School of Social and Political Sciences.

For further information please see the symposium website and flier or contact or .

SURCLA | COLECTIVO MUJER | Film Screening and Q & A session with Luisa Calcumil

Gerónima
Raúl Tosso, 1986, 100 min [Spanish, English Subtitles]

When: Tuesday 16 August, 5.30pm
Where: Carslaw Lecture Theatre 273

Note: Please check the venue location by clicking on this link.

Film Synopsis
This is a compelling docudrama about Geronima (played by Luisa Calcumil), a Mapuche woman from Patagonia. This story is set during Argentina’s most gruesome dictatorial regime. Geronima and her four children were managing to survive until a snowstorm killed off their animals. Soon a representative from the Ministry of Health takes the beleaguered family of five to stay at a hospital in a neighbouring town. Unfortunately, Geronima is separated from her children at the hospital. The film narrates the story of this mother who became severely stressed when kept from her children, and the disastrous consequences of such forced separation as where as her precarious living conditions. Tapes of conversations with the real Geronima in the mid-1970s are played off-screen, and alternate with the re-enactment of her story.

SURCLA | COLECTIVO MUJER | Concert by Luisa Calcumil

Accompanied by Jorge Morales Mardones on guitar, Luisa Calcumil will perform traditional Mapuche songs and storytelling. Her music repertoire also includes songs composed by her and featured in her CD, “La Cantora” (2008). Luisa will perform against a background of images of the Mapuche people, their traditions and their region’s landscape specially selected for her concerts.

When: Wednesday 17 August, 6.30pm
Where: Woolley Common Room

Note: Please check the venue location by clicking on this link.

About Luisa Calcumil:
Luisa Calcumil has worked in theatre since 1975. She started as an actress, presenting twenty theatre performances and acting in five films of international importance and in various television programmes. Luisa says that Aimé Painé, the first renown Mapuche singer, has had a great influence over her life. Luisa always remembers Aimé saying: "El saber quien es uno es el principio de ser culto" (knowing who you are is the first step of learning). After several years of performing without finding plays where she felt represented, Luisa started to write her own scripts or participating in the creation of performances in which she was protagonist. As a theatre, film and music performer, Luisa has has won several national and international awards and has has shared the stage with renown artists such as Mercedes Sosa.