Documentary Screening: Capturing the Flag
A tight-knit group of friends travel to Cumberland County, North Carolina – the 2016 “poster child” for voter suppression – intent on proving that small acts of individual people can make a difference. What they find at the polls serves as both a warning and a call to action for anyone troubled by organized and often racist efforts around the country to disenfranchise voters, and anyone interested in protecting the ‘One Person, One Vote’ principle of U.S. democracy. Exploring themes that are constantly sensationalized and manipulated by the media, “Capturing The Flag” offers deeply personal, often surprising perspectives on the 2016 Presidential Election and its aftermath.
Following the screening, filmmaker Anne de Mare and Flora Davidson, Barnard College Professor of Political Science and Urban Studies, will engage in a lively discussion with the audience.
About the Speakers
Anne de Mare (Director, Capturing The Flag) is an Emmy-Award winning documentary filmmaker whose 2015 feature film exploring the realities of youth homelessness, The Homestretch (Independent Lens), received the Emmy for Outstanding Business and Economic Reporting – Long Form. Anne is a fierce believer in the power of story to affect change and worked on that film’s extensive impact campaign for over two years, personally speaking at 58 events in 23 cities and engaging everyone from senior Federal policy officials to local housing authorities to at-risk youth and high school audiences. More recently, Anne was Co-Producer on the PBS documentary Deej, winner of the prestigious 2017 Peabody Award. Her first feature, Asparagus! Stalking the American Life, explored the relationship between asparagus farmers in rural western Michigan and the changing global economy. That film was winner of the 2006 W.K. Kellogg Good Food Film Award as well as Audience Choice and Best Documentary awards at festivals across the country. In 2010 and 2011, Anne worked closely with the late, great historian Michael Nash and NYU Bobst Libraries to create an extensive filmed archive of women who worked in munitions factories during WWII, accessible online as The Real Rosie The Riveter Project. She has been a Sundance Institute Fellow, part of the U.S. State Department’s American Film Showcase program, and an Associate Artist with Chicago’s legendary Kartemquin Films. Anne has conducted workshops and spoken about documentary film at colleges and universities around the world, including Columbia University, Tufts, Harvard University Medical School, Northwestern, University of Chicago’s Chapin Hall, University of Michigan/Ann Arbor, University of San Diego, University of Texas/Austin, Brown School of Social Work at Washington University, New York University/LaPietra (Florence, Italy), and the AUBG DocClub (Blagoevgrad, Bulgaria). Her work has been supported by MacArthur Foundation, Sundance Institute, Carnegie Corporation, ITVS, Chicken & Egg Pictures, POV/American Documentary Inc., and the W.K. Kellogg Foundation.
Flora S. Davidson, Professor Emerita of Political Science and Urban Studies, who retired in June 2014, has been a member of the Barnard Political Science department since 1973. She has taught courses in American government and politics, urban politics and policy, and political leadership, and she advised political science and Urban Studies majors. Her research interests include political leadership, urban politics and policy, and New York City housing policies. She also served as the Director of the Urban Studies Program at Barnard and Columbia. Professor Davidson served as Associate Provost of Barnard College from 1995-2008, as acting Dean of the Faculty in 1994-95, and as Associate Dean of the Faculty beginning in 1990. A Barnard alumna, she earned her Ph.D. in Political Science at Columbia University and taught at New York University before returning to Barnard as a faculty member in 1973.
Details and Accessibility
This event is free and open to the public. RSVP is preferred but not required. The venue is accessible to people with mobility disabilities. Please contact BCRW for additional accessibility needs.