[opirgyork] DisO TODAY: Mad Allies, Settler Colonialism, Round Dance + KEYNOTE: Rethinking Solidarity, Rebuilding Alliances

[OPIRG York]

*DisOrientation Continues- Sept. 26th Line-Up! *

*Hi Everyone!

DisOrientation has thus far been amazing with 4 days of awesome events. The
rest of the week week is packed full of more amazing workshops, panels,
film screenings, and OF COURSE- our final Disruption celebration! All of
the details are below.
*
*
*
*--  **Please join us today for an AMAZING Line-Up: Becoming an Ally to Mad
People, Understanding Palestine and Settler Colonialism with SAIA,
Community Round Dance with ASAY at York, and at **6pm in **Curtis Lecture
Hall F, our KEYNOTE Speaker Maia Ramnath (+ Bonita Lawrence and Ajamu
Nangwaya) at*
*Rethinking Solidarity, Rebuilding Alliances: Building anti-colonialism on
our campuses and in our communities**-- Full details are below for the
first these events, but you can also view the full line-up of
DisOrientation events online here: www.opirgyork.ca/diso2012.*
*
*
*
OPIRG-York News*
1) Disorientation @ York University: Strike Back!
2) Disruption Anniversary Party (September 28)
3) Disorientation Callout for volunteers + Disruption Volunteer Schedule
(ONGOING)


*1. DisOrientation @ York University: Strike Back!*

DisOrientation is a radically different, politically progressive week of
events that will offer all students and community members access, critical
thought and insight into the exciting and political social justice spheres
that exist within and beyond York U.

-WORKSHOPS
-DIRECT ACTION
-FILM SCREENINGS
-PANELS
-AND MUCH MORE!

***** ALL EVENTS FREE, WHEELCHAIR ACCESSIBLE and CHILDCARE AVAILABLE! *****

*Please email us at opirg at yorku.ca for all accessibility and childcare
needs!

**************************************

*Wednesday Sept. 26th
12:00PM - 2:00PM
Student Centre 307
Becoming an Ally to Mad People: Resisting Mentalism with Mad Students.
*
This workshop will examine unexposed sites and methods of discrimination
against Mad people, psychiatric survivors, consumers, and those labelled
with “mental illness” diagnoses or mental health disabilities (also called
mentalism or saneism) – especially how mentalism is enacted at school. To
counter stereotypical and medical model understandings of madness (eg.
“mental health awareness”) pervasive in society and on post-secondary
campuses, the presenters will talk about Mad people as a people. Like other
equity-seeking groups, Mad people have a history, language, community, and
culture that would-be-allies need to acknowledge and celebrate. Through
group activity, participants will be encouraged to challenge their
mentalist attitudes and support local (at YorkU, in Toronto) and global
expressions of the Mad Movement.

*Wednesday Sept. 26th
2:30PM - 4:30PM
Student Centre 307
Understanding Palestine and Settler colonialism with SAIA
*
This panel aims to raise the importance of the struggle for
self-determination in Palestine. Utilizing an anti-colonial and
anti-imperialist analysis, it will discuss the nature of Israeli Apartheid
within the context of the global capitalist system. Illustrating the links
between Palestine and other struggles around the world, the panel will then
bring the subject matter back to the Palestine solidarity work being done
in Toronto and the necessity to organize around this topic at York.”

*Wednesday Sept. 26th
5PM - 6PM
Greenspace between Scott Library and the HNES building
Community Round Dance with Aboriginal Student Association @ York (ASAY)*

In many Aboriginal communities across Canada, the Round Dance is an
opportunity to building strong sober communities and allies. Let’s join
together in a celebration for life around a big drum to listen, socialize,
and most importantly, dance! This year’s Round Dance will mark the closing
of 1st Annual YUCAAN: York University Conference on Aboriginal Affairs Now,
a student run, student led conference. With this year’s theme being Health,
we will dance together to honour the health of all York U community
members. The dance will be lead by a head dancer, so don’t be shy, they
will teach you the simple footwork, just follow the leader! Aside from the
round dancing the drummers will offer intertribal songs that everyone is
welcome to partake in. We are excited to bring a traditional Aboriginal
social dance to DisOrientation this year, and we hope to see you there,
dancing!

*Wednesday Sept. 26th
6pm
Curtis Lecture Hall F
Rethinking Solidarity, Rebuilding Alliances: Building anti-colonialism on
our campuses and in our communities
*
*With
Maia Ramnath (author, Decolonizing Anarchism)
Bonita Lawrence (author, “Real” Indians and Others)
Ajamu Nangwaya (organizer, Network for Pan-African Solidarity and Toronto
Haiti Action Committee)
*
With the largest indigenous reserve by population located an hours drive
from Toronto, how well do activists and movements engage with anti-colonial
solidarity? From the Canadian military interventions in Haiti to
international solidarity with South African miners to indigenous solidarity
here at home, what do our movements need to do to be effectively
anti-colonial? How do we go beyond statements of solidarity to actual
relationships and alliance-building?

How do we sustain these relationships long-term?

Join us for a panel discussion with three amazing writers and activists who
will share their experiences and thoughts on anti-colonial and anti-racist
activism. This panel will engage with questions with how activists can
relate and build relationships with communities and movements engaged in
anti-colonial work. And how to sustain them.

The event is free and wheelchair accessible. Please contact
opirg at yorku.ca if you need ASL interpretation.


*
*
*REMAINING EVENTS THIS **WEEK**:*


*Thursday Sept. 27th
12PM - 2PM
Location: Student Centre room 313
Un-Settling: Performance and Interactive Workshop with Nisha Ahuja
*
Do you hear that? In the distance, but like its right underneath us? She’s
running from that rumbling In White Face. The colonized becomes the
colonizer. The settled-on becomes the settler Dis-ease settles into the
body, heart, mind, and spirit. Until the rumbling erupts, forcing an
unsettling. Who is on top? Who is at the centre? And is that really where
we want to be? This playful and puncturing performance followed by a
theatre-based workshop examines the impacts of colonial legacies on gender,
race, class, power, and privilege locally and globally.

*Thursday Sept. 27th
2:30PM - 4PM
Vari Hall, meet outside the rotunda.
Radical History Tour of York U
*
This political history tour attempts to get you on your way to uncovering
and developing a historical knowledge of York. York has, is and always will
be a contestable space, and is a space that will always need to be fought
over. As members of York’s community we are responsible for the actions of
the University and holding the University accountable for its actions.
Building resistance to inequities produced by and through the university
cannot spring from nowhere. The history of successful resistance at York
goes back before the first buildings were built or the York University Act
was introduced in 1959. Contemporary campaigns, actions, coalitions, and
solidarities can be built on this tradition- or historical memory - of
resistance and political organization. The tour guides will provide you
with a brief history of political actions on campus to help you better
understand the politics of education at York University and better
strengthen historical memory. The tour will take about 1.5 hours.

*Thursday Sept. 27th
4PM - 6PM
GSA Student Centre 325
Queering Bystander Intervention with Alexandria Maclachlan SASSL &
Christine Sinclair, Denise Mertiri, Brittany Harris CLASP
*
There are many bystander intervention workshops out there but this one is
radically different. During the two hours we have together, we will dispel
some of the myths surrounding what sexual assault/domestic violence and its
perpetrators look like. We will go where other workshops don’t, daring to
discuss how power and privilege affect how we can respond to situations.
Self-care will also be discussed and recognized as animportant part of
being a community member in a society where sexual assault/domestic
violence happens daily. This workshop will be interactive but the amount of
involvement you have with it is up to you.
*
Thursday Sept. 27th
6:30PM - 8:30PM
Curtis Lecture Hall I
"WHO'S UNIVERSITY? OUR UNIVERSITY! A Public Forum on the Future of
Post-Secondary Education in Ontario
*
Over the summer, the Government of Ontario embarked on a secretive
consultation program designed to garner support for a series of proposals
to drastically change post-secondary education. Their proposals amount to
nothing more than cost-cutting and attempting to do more with less,
effectively opening the door for privatization of our public colleges and
universities.A deadline for September 30 has been set to submit concerns,
questions and suggestions to the Ministry of Training, Colleges and
Universities. Join us as we take part in a public town hall explaining the
report, its implications for you and how we can build an alternative vision
for higher education that is free, accessible, public and of high quality!"

*Friday Sept. 28th
12PM - 4PM
GSA Student Centre 325
Racial Profiling: An Approach to Address with Black Action Defence
Committee (BADC), Justice is not Colour Blind (JINCB), Rights Watch Network
(RWN)
*
An Approach to Address is an interactive action packed half day session
giving participants an uninhibited opportunity to become aware of Racial
Profiling. The workshop will give many an eye opening experience in the
structures surrounding Racial Profiling and an clear informed knowledge of
political actions on the horizons to address and eradicate the practice of
racial profiling.

*Friday Sept. 28th
CLOSING EVENT! Doors 8PM, until 2AM
United Steelworkers Hall, 25 Cecil Street (near College and Spadina)
DISRUPTION: Decades of Resistance, Decades More to Come!
*
For several decades, OPIRG-Toronto, OPIRG-York and the York University
Graduate Student’s Association have been agitating and demonstrating for
social change. OPIRG-Toronto and the Graduate Student's Association are
reflecting on 30 years, and OPIRG York on 20 years, of student organizing,
grassroots education and action on social and environmental justice. We
have been disrupting the normal run of things since our inception, and we
don’t plan to stop anytime soon! We invite you to Disruption! a anniversary
party recognizing decades of resistance, and decades more to come! This
isn’t your everyday birthday party- this is a story sharing, art making,
eclectic musical celebration!

MUSIC FROM PROGRESS, LAL, MAIKO WATSON, WOLF J
DJ Sets from DJ Zehra & DJ Saira Chibber
*Venue is wheelchair accessible with fully accessible washrooms. *Childcare
available – Please get in touch with us if you require childcare at
opirg.toronto at gmail.com.
$5 suggested donation or pay what you can
*No one turned away for lack of funds*



*2) Disruption Anniversary Party *

*JOINT ANNIVERSARY EVENT*
Disruption! Decades of resistance, and decades more to come!
OPIRG-Toronto, OPIRG-York and York University Graduate Student’s
Association Anniversary Party!

This isn’t your everyday birthday party- This is a story-sharing, art
making, eclectic musical celebration!
Friday September 28th, 2012
DOORS at 8 PM
MUSIC FROM PROGRESS, LAL, MAIKO WATSON, WOLF J
DJ SETS FROM ZEHRA & SAIRA CHHIBBER

United Steelworkers Hall, 25 Cecil Street (near College and Spadina)
*Venue is wheelchair accessible with fully accessible washrooms*
*Childcare available
*$5 suggested donation or pay what you can*
*No one turned away for lack of funds*

For several decades, OPIRG-Toronto, OPIRG-York and the York University
Graduate Student’s Association have been agitating and demonstrating for
social change. OPIRG-Toronto and the Graduate Student's Association are
reflecting on 30 years, and OPIRG York on 20 years, of student organizing,
grassroots education and action on social and environmental justice. We
have been disrupting the normal run of things since our inception, and we
don’t plan to stop anytime soon! We invite you to Disruption! a anniversary
party recognizing decades of resistance, and decades more to come!

Join us as we celebrate our achievements and reflect on our involvement in
so many amazing and influential campaigns over the years. What better way
to end two packed weeks of DisOrientation than sharing stories and dancing
the night away with friends and comrades! With performances from LAL,
Progress, Maiko Watson and Wolf J, this night is sure to be one to
remember! DJs Zehra and Saira Chhibber will end off the night and keep you
on your feet with their sweet beats. Take a look at the archived posters
and materials from 30 years of Toronto's political work, and don't forget
to grab your anniversary swag: silk screened birthday t-shirts, buttons,
patches and a collaborative mural, to be produced the night of the party.
Good food, drinks and great friends.

Check out the Facebook event:
http://www.facebook.com/events/341439582609870/

*3) Disorientation Callout for volunteers (ONGOING)*
*
*We are looking for folks from all walks of life to join us this year to be
a part of DisOrientation 2012, which promises to be a series of exciting
and engaging events that will promote and support critical thinking and
activism in our communities on and off campus. No experience is necessary
for any of these positions – training, tokens, food and reference letters
will be provided. If you are interested, please get in touch with us at
disoyork at gmail.com, or drop by anytime at the OPIRG office at 449C Student
Centre!
We need volunteers for the following exciting positions:

**Media Documentation Team: Love Media? Recording? Video? Wanna learn about
these things? You + teammates will be:
- Audio recording each event - Film/Video recording each event -
Photographing each event *All equipment and training will be provided

**Promotion/Outreach Team: Wanna meet people and have lots of energy? This
is the team for you!
- Promote and give out DisOrientation programs - Help staff give class
talks - Poster and leaflet handing out - Table Schmoozing/chilling

**Event Logistics Team: Well organized? Think on your feet? Wanna watch
magic happen?
- Assist Programming Coordinator with event coordination - Be the go-to
person on the day of for workshops - Participate in the DisOrientation
events - Ensure that facilitators have what they need


*Disruption! Volunteering*
Thanks to all those that have put in volunteer hours already for
Disorientation Week at either OPIRG-Toronto and OPIRG-York. Both PIRGs are
putting together an anniversary party on Friday with the York University
Graduate Students Association, and we need volunteers throughout the night
to help make this event a success!

The volunteer roles for the night include:
- Set-up (anytime between 5 pm to 8 pm), includes decorating, setting up
sound equipment, bar and welcome table, etc.
- Doors (anytime between 8 pm to 2 am), includes asking for donations at
the door, distributing group materials
- Clean-up (2 am to 3 am), includes taking down all decorations, cleaning
the space, etc.

Please fill out your availability for the night here:
http://doodle.com/ec2ibm3vys9vvmpp
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