We Are The Roots

Wednesday, December 12, 2018 @ 7:00 PM
Glenbow Museum - 130 - 9th Avenue SE, Calgary, Alberta
FREE Admission SOLD OUT (Waitlist Only)

UPDATE: Event is sold out! We have a waiting list on our Eventbrite page. If you no longer think you can make it, please cancel your tickets so people on the list can go.

The Faculty of Social Work’s Positive Disruption Series, continues Wednesday Dec. 12 with a special (sorry sold-out) screening of multiple award-winning documentary We Are The Roots: Black Settlers and their Experiences of Discrimination on the Canadian Prairies, Wednesday, Dec. 12. Doors open at 7 p.m. program begins at 7:30 p.m. in the Glenbow Theatre inside the Glenbow Museum (130-9 Ave. S.E.)

We are the Roots tells a Canadian story not often told: The story of a group of more than 1,000 courageous African American pioneers who came to Alberta from Oklahoma, Missouri and Texas between 1905 and 1912. Fleeing growing systemic racism, they were lured to Alberta and Saskatchewan by the promise of nearly free land and a better life. They found themselves scraping out an existence in places like Amber Valley, Campsie, Breton and Maidstone. They didn’t find Eden, but they did find a new life laying down roots and contributing a great deal to the communities where they settled.

The film which is a collaboration between University of Calgary Faculty of Social Work professor Dr. David Este, oral history researcher and film maker, Dr. Jenna Bailey from the University of Lethbridge, and Deborah Dobbins, president of Edmonton’s Shiloh Centre for Multicultural Roots (SCMR), who initiated the project.

The film project has been recognized with four major awards including the Governor General's History Award for Excellence in Community Programming, the Heritage Awareness Awardfrom the Alberta Historical Resources Foundation and two awards from the Oral History Association (OHA), North America’s most important oral history association. The film won OHA’s most prestigious award, the Elizabeth B. Mason Major Award, and the OHA’s award for Oral History in Non-Print Format.

The evening will feature a screening of We are the Roots followed by a panel discussion featuring Dr. David Este, Dr. Jenna Bailey and Deborah Dobbin. The night kicks-off with a performance by poet Wakefield Brewster and members of Edmonton’s Shiloh Baptist Church choir. Coffee, tea and pastries from Café Rosso will also be served. We are the Roots was produced by Dr. Jenna Bailey and Soda Films.

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