The thinkBIG Film Festival Continues! Topic 2: Women and HIV/AIDS

TONIGHT, Jan 15 7:00pm in building 320 room 105

Stephen Lewis - UN Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa, Co-Founder of AIDS-Free World, Co-Founder of the Stephen Lewis Foundation, and author of "Race Against Time" - hosts the documentary "Women, The Face of AIDS."


Mr. Lewis will be speaking at the thinkBIG Conference, both at the morning HIV/AIDS panel as well as in the afternoon for a Keynote Panel discussion with some of the world's leading experts in the field of women's health and human rights - don't miss it!

Film Synopses:

Abstaining from Reality provides a snapshot of the Bush administration's abstinence-only approach to HIV prevention as part of its global HIV/AIDS assistance. This short film examines how these ideologically-driven programs are actually endangering the lives of the people they're supposed to be protecting. The film urges a balanced, comprehensive approach to preventing HIV infections by providing full and accurate information and a range of services that empower individuals to make informed decisions.
Women: The Face of AIDS traces the compelling stories of five courageous HIV positive women in four countries and the extraordinary grassroots organizations that support them. Of the 24.7 million people living with HIV in sub-Saharan Africa, 59% are women.

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The thinkBIG conference aims to inspire our generation to take action and help end the injustices and inequalities facing millions of girls and women around the world. The conference will take place February 1-3, 2008. Registration is FREE for Stanford students, and for every student who attends the conference, $10 will be given to a women's organization working internationally.

For more information about the conference and to register, please visit thinkbig.stanford.edu. To learn more about this film series, contact Ciara Segura at csegura0@stanford.edu. Event co-sponsored by Dance Marathon.

"Señorita Extraviada" TONIGHT!

Our first film in the thinkBIG January film festival will be "Señorita Extraviada." The issue about which this film will help to begin the discussion is Violence Against Women.

The screening is today, January 9, at 7pm in Building 260 (the corner of the quad nearest to the clock tower) in room 113.


Synopsis:

"Señorita Extraviada, Missing Young Woman" tells the story of the hundreds of kidnapped, raped and murdered young women of Juárez, Mexico. The murders first came to light in 1993 and young women continue to "disappear" to this day (2005) without any hope of bringing the perpetrators to justice. Who are these women from all walks of life and why are they getting murdered so brutally? The documentary moves like the unsolved mystery it is, and the filmmaker poetically investigates the circumstances of the murders and the horror, fear and courage of the families whose children have been taken. Yet it is also the story of a city of the future; it is the story of the underbelly of our global economy.

—

The thinkBIG conference aims to inspire our generation to take action and help end the injustices and inequalities facing millions of girls and women around the world. The conference will take place February 1-3, 2008. Registration is FREE for Stanford students, and for every student who attends the conference, $10 will be given to a women's organization working internationally.

For more information about the conference and to register, please visit thinkbig.stanford.edu. To learn more about this film series, contact Ciara Segura at csegura0@stanford.edu. Event co-sponsored by Dance Marathon.

January Film Festival

Spend January getting ready for thinkBIG! We've collected five films that highlight the magnitude and scope of each of the four issues we're addressing in the conference. Join us for these fascinating, thought provoking films all through January! (Visit http://campus-map.stanford.edu for directions to the locations listed— the format is Building#-Room#).4 ISSUES / 5 FILMS

VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN
"Seńorita Extraviada"
January 9 at 7pm in 260-113
Seńorita Extraviada, Missing Young Woman tells the story of the hundreds of kidnapped, raped and murdered young women of Juárez, Mexico. The murders first came to light in 1993 and young women continue to "disappear" to this day (2005) without any hope of bringing the perpetrators to justice. Who are these women from all walks of life and why are they getting murdered so brutally? The documentary moves like the unsolved mystery it is, and the filmmaker poetically investigates the circumstances of the murders and the horror, fear and courage of the families whose children have been taken. Yet it is also the story of a city of the future; it is the story of the underbelly of our global economy.

HIV/AIDS
"Abstaining From Reality" and "Women: The Face of AIDS"
January 15 at 7pm in 320-105
Abstaining from Reality provides a snapshot of the Bush administration's abstinence-only approach to HIV prevention as part of its global HIV/AIDS assistance. This short film examines how these ideologically-driven programs are actually endangering the lives of the people they're supposed to be protecting. The film urges a balanced, comprehensive approach to preventing HIV infections by providing full and accurate information and a range of services that empower individuals to make informed decisions.
Women: The Face of AIDS traces the compelling stories of five courageous HIV positive women in four countries and the extraordinary grassroots organizations that support them. Of the 24.7 million people living with HIV in sub-Saharan Africa, 59% are women.

REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH
"Anonymously Yours"
January 21 at 7pm in 260-113
In Anonymously Yours, four Burmese women's strikingly different life experiences come together to reveal an institution that enslaves them and as many as forty-million women worldwide in the fastest growing industry on earth: human sales. Clandestinely shot deep in the uncharted world of Southeast Asian sex trafficking, the film chronicles the merchandising of women commonplace in a land afflicted with staggering poverty and widespread corruption.


EDUCATION
"New Directions: Women of Zimbabwe and Women of Thailand"
January 29 at 7pm in 320-105
NEW DIRETIONS is award-winning documentarian Joanne Burke's series about women's empowerment in developing countries. Each one spotlights the critical role women are playing as community based leaders: providing education, inspiration and practical assistance to other women in their countries. Women of Zimbabwe focuses on a group of five daring women who have taken up the challenge of creating their own future in the traditionally male field of carpentry. Women of Thailand follows Rotjana Phraesrithon in her work with the women and children of Klong Toey, and reveals how her innovative programs promote schooling for children and provide AIDS and health eduction.

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The thinkBIG conference aims to inspire our generation to take action and help end the injustices and inequalities facing millions of girls and women around the world. The conference will take place February 1-3, 2008 .

For more information about the conference, please visit thinkbig.stanford.edu. To learn more about this film series, contact Ciara Segura at csegura0@stanford.edu. Event co-sponsored by Dance Marathon.

Registration Now Open

Registration for the thinkBIG conference is now open! 

We are so excited about the thinkBIG conference! For the past two years, the conference has been organized by a group of seven motivated Stanford undergrads who have been inspired to hold a conference focused on educating and inspiring other students to improve the health and human rights situation of women in developing countries. But the conference cannot be a success without your help!

Register to come to the conference today! Registration is free for Stanford students, $15 for non-Stanford students, and seniors, and $25 general admission. Please look through the program and the incredible list of speakers and get excited! Tickets are limited, so don't wait.

Click to Register!

thinkBIG in the Stanford Daily

The Stanford Daily has written an article about thinkBIG in today's edition of the Daily:

Students thinkBIG for event: Group plans conference on women’s health

November 30, 2007
By Patrick K. Fitzgerald

In the fall of 2005, a group of students emerged from Human Biology Prof. Anne Firth Murray’s sophomore seminar on international women’s health and human rights stunned by what they had learned. The students had considered themselves reasonably well-informed about the issues but were “blown away” by how dire the circumstances are for some women worldwide and how little attention has been drawn to the issues.

Then they decided to do something.

Two years later, their efforts are being realized in a “BIG” way. Registration kicked off this week for the thinkBIG conference on international women’s heath and human rights, which is set to be the largest student-run conference in Stanford history and will take place Feb. 1-3.

Its organizers do not intend for the conference to preach to the choir. They are targeting students regardless of gender or academic background in an effort to raise awareness about the issues facing women in the developing world and inspire a generation to take action.

“We want to get everybody involved, from the doctor to the diplomat to the check-writers of tomorrow,” said conference chair Lee Trope ‘08.

The conference will focus on four primary issues: Education, HIV/AIDS among women, reproductive health and violence against women. Each issue will have a keynote speaker and two panelists, boasting a who’s who of activists in the field, including Mary Robinson, former president of Ireland, and Stephen Lewis, former UN Special Envoy for AIDS in Africa.

Read the article...

Stephen Lewis Confirmed HIV/AIDS Keynote

Stephen Lewis, the former UN Special Envoy on HIV/AIDS in Africa, has confirmed that he will be coming to Stanford this February as our HIV/AIDS Keynote speaker. He is the founder of the celebrated Stephen Lewis Foundation (SLF). He is also a Professor in Global Health, Faculty of Social Sciences at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, a Senior Advisor to the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University in New York, and co-Director of AIDS-Free World, a new international AIDS advocacy organization. The SLF website states, "As a politician, diplomat and international envoy for humanitarian efforts, Stephen Lewis has dedicated himself to improving the human condition." Mr. Lewis brings a long history of commitment to African and the problem of HIV/AIDS:

Stephen Lewis’ work with the United Nations spanned more than two decades. He was the UN Secretary-General’s Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa from June 2001 until the end of 2006. From 1995 to 1999, Mr. Lewis was Deputy Executive Director of UNICEF at the organization’s global headquarters in New York. From 1984 through 1988, Stephen Lewis was Canada’s Ambassador to the United Nations.

Mr. Lewis was an elected member of the Ontario Legislative Assembly from 1963 to1978.

In 1970, he became leader of the Ontario New Democratic Party, during which time he became leader of the Official Opposition.

Mr. Lewis is co-chair of the Leadership Programme Committee for the XVII International AIDS Conference, which will be held in Mexico City in August 2008. He also serves as a member of the Board of Directors of the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative.

In 2006, Stephen Lewis’ best-selling book, Race Against Time won the Canadian Booksellers Association’s Libris Award for non-fiction book of the year and Mr. Lewis was named the CBA’s Author of the Year for 2005.

Mr. Lewis holds 26 honorary degrees from Canadian universities and is a Companion of the Order of Canada, Canada’s highest honour for lifetime achievement. In 2007, the Kingdom of Lesotho (a small mountainous country in Southern Africa) invested Mr. Lewis as Knight Commander of the Most Dignified Order of Moshoeshoe. The order is named for the founder of Lesotho; the knighthood is the country’s highest honour.

We are so excited to welcome Mr. Lewis to Stanford in February. For more information on the conference, please visit http://thinkbig.stanford.edu or email thinkbig.info@gmail.com

Showcase your pictures from abroad!

Taken photos abroad?
Want your work to be showcased?

The thinkBIG conference on International Women's Health and Human Rights is looking for pictures of women from abroad to be showcased in a photo gallery during the opening event of the conference.

Please email submissions in JPG format to lat008@stanford.edu.

For more information about the conference check out our website at http://thinkbig.stanford.edu.