From Feb. 17 to March 7, the Elizabethtown College Center for Global Understanding and Peacemaking (CGUP) sponsored and led a series of screenings of documentaries related to themes of imperialism, globalization and socioeconomic injustice. These screenings, referred to by CGUP as a “Docu-Series,” are part of the Center’s ongoing Forum on White Supremacy and Global Colonization. For Spring 2022, it has been the goal of CGUP and its affiliated personnel to facilitate the discussion of themes related to colonization, racism and social bigotry.

According to associate professor of education and Interim Director of CGUP Dr. Shannon Haley-Mize, the Docu-Series was designed in such a way to allow for students to gain a broader understanding of issues happening both internationally and domestically. “The idea is really for us to talk about those global issues but really have those conversations and explore those parallels about what has happened in our own country,” Haley-Mize said.

In crafting and promoting events for CGUP and the Forum, Haley-Mize works alongside a student leadership team. According to Haley-Mize, the Docu-Series was “the brainchild of the CGUP student leadership team.”

Some of these students were directly involved in the facilitation of discussions following the screenings of documentaries of their choosing. One of these students, sophomore Misaki Yamaguchi, was involved in this capacity. Regarding the planning stages of the Docu-Series, Yamaguchi expresses her concern regarding the fact that “There are some students who don’t really know about colonization, it’s not around us— it’s not visually (something) you can see.”

To this end, there was an understanding of a need to provide students with ways in which to understand the continued relevance of colonization. To understand, as Yamaguchi puts it, how “the history impacts us.”

From fall to spring, CGUP has transitioned the Forum from discussing issues of racial violence and prejudice on a domestic level to broadening the scope to understand these issues as international and globally intertwined. The documentary that Yamaguchi screened and facilitated discussion on, “Roots,” was a title emblematic of this transition as it discussed the colonial history of anti-Black racism in the United States.

For Yamaguchi and the CGUP leadership team, it is important to emphasize the global interconnectivity of issues of bias, oppression and discrimination. Broadening the lens to discuss international issues does not take away from the importance of issues happening in our own country.

“The shift from domestic to international was very significant for students to actually learn about what is happening…in the current world, current society where we live,” Yamaguchi said. “We learned a lot from each other and what we talked [about] was how participation is really important on campus to engage with more opportunities and experiences.”

Another member of the leadership team involved in the Docu-Series was freshman Ahsa Sadhukhan, who screened and led a dialogue on the documentary “Living on a Dollar” that explores the lived experiences of those dealing with extreme poverty in Guatemala.

“We can talk about poverty until we’re blue in the face,” Sadhukhan said. “But without experiencing it ourselves or seeing it…that [is what] drives the message home even further.”

Regarding the events themselves, Sadhukhan emphasizes the importance of student engagement: “One thing that I’ve been thinking about a lot is the importance of coming to these events. You may not realize how important these things are until you actually come to it.”

In addition to the initiatives taken by CGUP student leaders, faculty interest has also been crucial in the development of the Docu-Series. It was due to associate professor of public health Dr. Robert Aronson’s desire to get his students to engage with decolonized perspectives on global health that CGUP was able to secure the rights to screen “I am Belmaya.” This documentary centers the lived experiences of a Nepali woman grappling with domestic abuse, misogyny, classism and poverty.

According to Aronson, it is important that experts in global and public health offer care that is intersectional and aware of the realities of colonialism, racism, misogyny, poverty and all forms of socioeconomic marginalization that may lead to increased health risks.

“It’s been basically a continuation of colonialism,” Aronson said. “Colonial approaches to dealing with global health problems…it takes away from investing, from schools, from institutions that are vital to [a] country’s survival.”

In developing a decolonized perspective on global health issues, Aronson feels that it is most important to prioritize the perspectives and needs of those most greatly impacted. He also cautions against white saviorism, giving the advice: “Don’t solve problems you don’t understand for people you know nothing about.”

Aronson had taken the initiative not only to secure funding from CGUP to screen the film on campus, but he also reached out to the film’s director, Sue Carpenter. Both Carpenter and the film’s subject, Belmaya Nepali, participated in a panel after the screening to answer questions.

In an interview with Carpenter, she expanded on ideas Aronson brought up regarding the importance of giving tools to the underprivileged that allow for them to express themselves— as opposed to attempting to speak on behalf of anyone.

“In the context of my film itself, I was very very aware that as a white, privileged Westerner coming in I didn’t want to tell Belmaya’s story with my voice, I wanted to tell it through her voice and give her the tools to conduct her own storytelling,” Carpenter said. “Where there are vulnerable people who have less of a voice, if you can give them the tools to do things their own way…is really the way forward.”

While this ethos shows up in Carpenter’s work as a whole, and especially within “I am Belmaya,” it was not a straight-forward process. Carpenter explores how she worked to de-center her own perspective, in order to prioritize the telling of Belmaya’s story on her own terms: “Having her narrate, so that she tells her own story from the beginning [was crucial],” Carpenter said. “When I first started conceiving it, it is very hard to get out of your own point of view— and my point of view was that I had known her for seven years, and that she was a sparky, fiery woman with a feminist spirit that had been crushed….I started with a teaser…with me narrating, and we decided that was not what we wanted to do as that kept her in the position of subject.”

The Docu-Series events have underscored what Carpenter describes as: “The importance of really listening and hearing international voices from all different walks of life and really valuing those is what’s important, and not trying to stamp our perspective over theirs.”

 “It has gone so well that we are considering doing a CGUP Docu-Series and discussion every spring,” Haley-Mize said.