Free Cece (2016, 87 min.)

Free Cece (2016, 87 min.)

Jacqueline (Jac) Gares (Director)
CeCe McDonald (Activist, Prison Reform Advocate)
Lal Zimman (Linguistics, UCSB)
Wednesday, May 10, 2017/7:0o0 PM
Pollock Theater

In 2011 CeCe McDonald survived a brutal attack, only to be incarcerated for defending her life. Her story inspired an international movement advocating for her freedom, and since her release she has worked to critique the prison-industrial complex and to advocate for reforms to the criminal justice system. Featuring CeCe McDonald and Laverne Cox, documentary Free CeCe confronts the culture of violence surrounding transwomen of color.

This screening of Free CeCe will be followed by a Q&A with Director Jacqueline (Jac) Gares, who will discuss the process of making the film with Moderator Lal Zimman of the Department of Linguistics.

Jacqueline Gares is a New York-based filmmaker and freelance television producer. From 2009 to 2012, she served as series producer for “In The Life” on public television; during her tenure, the series garnered awards from NLGJA, GLAAD, and Webbys. Gares has worked as a freelance producer on television specials and documentaries for the History Channel, Food Network, and USA Networks. Her first documentary Unraveled, which concerns genetic testing and Alzheimer’s Disease,  won a Freddie Award in 2008, and her short film Remnant won a TELLY Award in 1999.  She has received awards from the Ford Foundation and the Jerome Foundations as an emerging film/video artist.

Lal is an Assistant Professor of Linguistics and Affiliated Faculty in Feminist Studies at UCSB. His research focuses on the relationship between language, identity, and the body in trans and queer communities. He takes an interdisciplinary approach to this work, which ranges from qualitative discourse analysis of coming out narratives and talk about the body to quantitative acoustic analysis of the voice. The overarching goal of his work is to highlight the powerful challenges trans people pose to the naturalization of gender and sex and the power of language to reshape gender and sexual politics.

The event is free but a reservation is recommended in order to guarantee a seat.

This event is sponsored by the Carsey-Wolf Center, the UCSB Resource Center for Gender and Sexual Diversity, and the IHC’s Community Matters series.