Human Skab: The Accolade Award-Winning Documentary
This film tells the poignant story of Human Skab and its front man, Travis Roberts, who led the group as a young child since 1986, accompanied by his siblings, friends, and cousin Frankie (co-director Frank Gunderson). The music that they created and recorded in the late 1980s as a result of the boy's adventures and creative explorations gathered a dedicated following in the cassette underground. After two years of making music, life caught up to young Travis. He finished school, grew up, and joined the army, serving as a soldier and contractor in Egypt, Kosovo, and Afghanistan.
'I'm not doin' this for the money, I'm on a mission,' Travis once said in a 1987 interview with SPIN magazine. 'I have a message for the world. It's not just playin' guitars good that is important. It's all the things that you do.' Rife with amazing synchronicities, Travis's music, both old and new, not only provides a powerful creative vision of American society, but offers a wealth of insight to present politics, 'outsider music,' life as a war veteran, and personal healing.
Three years in the making, our film documents Travis's story as he reconnects with the music he created as a young child in 1986. After serving in the military and then returning home, Travis decided to reconstruct the band and continue the message of his music. Human Skab held their first reunion tour in December 2009, with bassist Matt Love and drummer Bret (co-director Bret Woods). We realized rather quickly that the process of Travis's musical reunion was a story that needed to be told, so we gathered camera equipment and recorded footage throughout the entirety of our rehearsals and tour. During the tour, it became more apparent that the story was not simply a band ethnography and reunion, but a reclamation and remembrance; our film is an eye-opening narrative about a veteran's post-war experience and personal healing.
About Human Skab as both a performance group and a concept, Travis noted: "The thing that appealed to me about playing music both when I was young as well as now is that within my music I find a freedom unparalleled within the confines of everyday American life. Since pre-history music has played an integral part in the human experience. Not just listening to music but creating it. Unfortunately, capitalism has stolen this aspect of humanity from most people living behind the bars of consumerist systems. If you want music, just pop in a CD or turn on your IPOD. Let the pros make the tunes. In my house we are taking music back." Our film making approach follows this aesthetic as a mash-up of cinéma vérité and vaudeville: we follow the action as it happens; if you don't like what you see, wait thirty seconds and then you will.
Visit our website, humanskab.com, to read more about the film, the band, and the music. You can also find Human Skab and OddFreak Films on YouTube.
'Dead Man Walking' Author to speak in West Des Moines
Sister Helen Prejean, the author of Dead Man Walking: An Eyewitness Account of the Death Penalty, will make a special guest appearance next week as with Dowling Catholic High School students stage a play based on her book.
On Tuesday, she’ll make a presentation to junior class members who will have read her book, and then have lunch with the cast of the school play. That evening, she will speak at an open house for the general public, from 6 to 7:15 p.m., prior to the 7:30 p.m. Dowling production of the play.
"We are very excited to have Sr. Helen Prejean visit and present to our students and the community. She has a powerful message and life story that I believe will connect with and inspire us. Having the students read the book and then see the book acted out in the play gives power to her message. Sister's message of love and forgiveness should resonate with all," Jerry Deegan, Dowling Catholic High School president said in a news release.
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To learn more about the Annual International Social Uprising Resistance and Grassroots Encouragement (S.U.R.G.E.!) Film Festival please visit: www.WeSurge.org
Botswana court grants women the right to inherit
GABORONE, Botswana (AFP) - In a landmark ruling Botswana's High Court on Friday affirmed women's inheritance rights for the first time, up-ending a male-dominated system that had prevailed in the thriving African nation.
The court ruled that local customary laws -- giving the youngest-born son rights to inherit the family home -- are not in line with the country's constitution, which guarantees gender equality.
"It seems to me that the time has now arisen for the justices of this court to assume the role of the judicial midwife and assist in the birth of a new world struggling to be born," said Justice Key Dingake.
"Discrimination against gender has no place in our modern day society," he said, urging the government to take all discriminatory laws off the statute books.
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To learn more about the Annual International Social Uprising Resistance and Grassroots Encouragement (S.U.R.G.E.!) Film Festival please visit: www.WeSurge.org
Five reasons to eat Organic Apples
There are good reasons to eat organic and locally raised fruits and vegetables. For one, they usually taste better and are a whole lot fresher. Yet most of us can’t afford to buy all our food at the farmer’s market or natural foods store, and in many places, locally produced and organic foods are a struggle to find.
So if you can only buy a few organic fruits and vegetables – which should should it be? Which single piece of produce could have the greatest impact on agriculture, the environment and your family’s health, all at once?
The data says: apples
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To learn more about the Annual International Social Uprising Resistance and Grassroots Encouragement (S.U.R.G.E.!) Film Festival please visit: www.WeSurge.org
BullyingCanada may close after November
An anti-bullying organization says it will cease to operate next month unless it receives donations from the public.
BullyingCanada, a nationally-registered charitable organization based in Fredericton, currently provides a 24/7 telephone support network, anti-bullying workshops and a scholarship program for youth.
“Without the financial support of citizens across Canada, we simply will not be able to keep up operations," co-founder and co-executive director Rob Frenette stated in a release.
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To learn more about the Annual International Social Uprising Resistance and Grassroots Encouragement (S.U.R.G.E.!) Film Festival please visit: www.WeSurge.org
Pakistani Child Rights Icon injured by Taliban Attack
The Taliban has claimed responsibility for an attack against a Pakistani schoolgirl who gained international fame for writing diaries about Taliban atrocities and attending school despite hard-line threats.
Malala Yousafzai is in critical condition after one or more attackers opened fire on her school van.
Essa Khankhel, a local journalist, told RFE/RL's Radio Mashaal that Yousafzai was targeted on October 9 while returning home from school in Saidu Sharif, the capital of the northwestern Swat district.
Reports suggest one assailant asked which child was Yousafzai before opening fire.
In claiming responsibility, the Taliban called Yousafzai's work "obscenity."
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To learn more about the Annual International Social Uprising Resistance and Grassroots Encouragement (S.U.R.G.E.!) Film Festival please visit: www.WeSurge.org
Organic Solar Cells hold high potential with portable electronics
A new breakthrough in solar technology means portable electronic devices such as e-book readers could soon be re-charged on the move in low light levels and partial shading. Scientists from the University of Warwick, in collaboration with spin-out company Molecular Solar, have created an organic solar cell that generates a sufficiently high voltage to recharge a lithium-ion battery directly, without the need to connect multiple individual cells in series. Modules of these high voltage cells perform well in different light conditions including partial shade making them well matched to consumer electronic devices such as e-book readers, cameras and some mobile phones.
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To learn more about the Annual International Social Uprising Resistance and Grassroots Encouragement (S.U.R.G.E.!) Film Festival please visit: www.WeSurge.org
Winner of 'Face of Tertiary' pageant embarks on anti-child labor campaign
Beautiful winner of 2012 edition of Face of Tertiary pageant, Esinam Amegbanu, is embarking on an anti-child labour campaign to help curb the menace of child labour in Ghanaian communities.
The campaign is dubbed ‘Save A Child TV Documentary’, and it will be in the form of a TV documentary.
It will be shown twice every week within 15 minutes on some of Ghana’s popular TV stations. There are 26 episodes.
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To learn more about the Annual International Social Uprising Resistance and Grassroots Encouragement (S.U.R.G.E.!) Film Festival please visit: www.WeSurge.org
Man searches for stories behind faces of child labor photos
Photographer Lewis Hine is well known for his iconic pictures of workers high atop the Empire State Building. But before becoming famous for snapping pictures above the streets of New York, Hine worked as an anti-child labor investigator.
Between 1908 and 1924, Hine worked for a private advocacy organization, The National Child Labor Committee. Over the course of 16 years, he took more than 5,000 pictures of children working, often illegally, in mills and mines across the United States.
The photos were meant to shock Americans into reforming child labor laws. Almost 75 years after labor reform was enacted though, one man is still haunted by the photos.
To learn more about the Annual International Social Uprising Resistance and Grassroots Encouragement (S.U.R.G.E.!) Film Festival please visit: www.WeSurge.org
Matthew Shepard - The 14th Annversary
Just past midnight on October 7, 1998, one of the most horrific anti-gay hate crimes in American history took place in Laramie, Wyoming. Matthew Shepard, a 21-year-old college student, was abducted by two men, tied to a fence, beaten with the butt of a pistol and left to die. A bicyclist found his body 18 hours later and on October 12 at 12:53 a.m. Shepard died in a hospital with his family beside him.
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To learn more about the Annual International Social Uprising Resistance and Grassroots Encouragement (S.U.R.G.E.!) Film Festival please visit: www.WeSurge.org
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