On Wednesday January 22nd at 7:30pm, our College will host Pamela Yates and Paco de Onis who will screen the 2024 documentary, Borderland: The Line Within. The film suggests that the “United States border is not just a geographic location. The border is everywhere. It lies within every undocumented immigrant family with the threat that at any moment they can be captured, incarcerated, deported; their lives destroyed.” The film exposes the profitable business of immigration and its human cost. It weaves together the stories of immigrant heroines and heroes intent on building a movement in the shadow of the border industrial complex. This movement is a way forward that recognizes the human rights of all.
The film directors Pamela Yates and Paco De Onis are well known for some of their other projects on Central America, including Granito: How to Nail a Dictator and When the Mountains Tremble). They will be on campus for the screening and a Talk Back Q&A on Thursday January 23rd from 11am-noon. Joining the directors will one member of the digital humanities team of investigators, Roopika Risam (Dartmouth), Alex Gil (Yale), and Manan Ahmed (Columbia). These academics used government data to spot patterns in public spending to tell a story about where, and how, U.S. taxpayer money is spent at the border. Their models also trace the flow of money toward politicians on all sides of the issue and directly connect to how immigration policy in the U.S. is made.
The Talk Back is part of the Martin Luther King Justice Dialogues. These events are free. The film screening will take place at 7:30pm in theGault Recital Hall in the Scheide Music Center, which is at the corner of University St. and Beall Ave (#21 on the campus map). We hope to screen a bilingual version of this film, which means that both Spanish and English speakers will be able to follow along either with audio or subtitles.
The location for the Talk Back with the film directors will be in the Alley at our Student Center at 11am. Since the Talk Back is a collaboration with the MLK Committee, they will graciously be providing some food.
This event has been collaboratively planned by a group of faculty, staff, and students. It is sponsored by the Global and International Studies Program – Atlantic Fund, The Challenging Borders GLCA Grant and MLK Committee, with co-sponsorship from following departments and endowed funds: English (Hilty Fund), Political Science (Adams Fund), German and Russian Studies (Olthouse Fund).