Wednesday, April 23: 7:00 PM in Sperry 205

From Oscar®-and Emmy®-nominated filmmaker Kirby Dick(This Film Is Not Yet Rated; Twist of Faith) comes The Invisible War, a groundbreaking investigative documentary about one of America’s most shameful and best kept secrets: the epidemic of rape within the U.S. military. The film paints a startling picture of the extent of the problem—today, a female soldier in combat zones is more likely to be raped by a fellow soldier than killed by enemy fire. The Department of Defense estimates there were a staggering 22,800 violent sex crimes in the military in 2011. 20% of all active-duty female soldiers are sexually assaulted. Female soldiers aged 18 to 21 accounted for more than half of the victims.

Focusing on the powerfully emotional stories of rape victims, The Invisible War is a moving indictment of the systemic cover-up of military sex crimes, chronicling the women’s struggles to rebuild their lives and fight for justice. It also features hard-hitting interviews with high-ranking military officials and members of Congress that reveal the perfect storm of conditions that exist for rape in the military, its long-hidden history, and what can be done to bring about much-needed change.

Sponsored by: Memorial Library;  APAC: Voice for Sexual Health; Health Department;  Cultural and Intellectual Climate Committee; Sexual Assault Awareness and Prevention Committee.

Monday, April 14 @ 4:30PM Jacobus Lounge

Joseph Bruchac, an Abenaki storyteller and author from the Adirondack mountain foothills, will read from his books and discuss his views on the Native American oral traditions. 

Joseph Bruchac lives in the Adirondack mountain foothills town of Greenfield Center, New York, in the same house where his maternal grandparents raised him. Much of his writing draws on that land and his Abenaki ancestry. Although his American Indian heritage is only one part of an ethnic background that includes Slovak and English blood, those Native roots are the ones by which he has been most nourished.

He holds a B.A. from Cornell University, an M.A. in Literature and Creative Writing from Syracuse and a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from the Union Institute of Ohio. His work as a educator includes eight years of directing a college program for Skidmore College inside a maximum security prison.

He has been a storyteller-in-residence for Native American organizations and schools throughout the continent, including the Institute of Alaska Native Arts and the Onondaga Nation School. He discusses Native culture and his books and does storytelling programs at dozens of elementary and secondary schools each year as a visiting author.

Presented by the Cultural and Intellectual Climate Committee, the event is free and open to the public.

Come and walk inside a life-size replica of a solitary confinement prison cell at the library! This Tuesday, March 18th, at noon, there will be an opening reception and panel discussion about the ethics of solitary confinement with Mecke Nagel of the Philosophy Department and Ute Ritz-Deutch of the History Department.

The event is free and open to the public. Display will be in the Library until March 21st.

The purpose of having a life-size solitary confinement cell on display is to raise awareness about issues related to solitary confinement, which is widely used in the United States. We want our students and the wider community to get a sense of how small these spaces are and to imagine what it might be like to live in such a cell 23 hours a day. We therefore invite everyone to step inside. Just recently the UN Rapporteur on Torture issued a statement saying that solitary confinement that lasts more than 15 days is considered torture. It is important for us to recognize the legal and ethical implications as well as the social costs of keeping tens of thousands of people imprisoned this way every day.

Sponsored by the Philosophy Department, the Center for Ethics, Peace and Social Justice, the Center for Gender and Intercultural Studies, the Criminology Club, and the SUNY Cortland Amnesty International Student Group.

More info contact Ute Ritz-Deutch at uteritzdeutch@gmail.com or call (607) 351-8033.