“Human Rights Film Now!” at the People to People Documentary Conference
Emma Sandon, Honorary Research Fellow at APC, and Senior Lecturer in Film and Television at Birkbeck, University of London, recently presented a session, “Human Rights Film Now!”, at the two day People To People International Documentary Conference in Durban.
The conference, which has been running since 2007 in Johannesburg, was hosted for the first time at the Durban International Film Festival (DIFF) on 21 and 22 July 2015. Organised by Arya Lalloo and Rehad Desai (director of the acclaimed film on the Marikana massacre, Miners Shot Down) from Uhuru Productions and the Human Rights Media Trust, People To People engaged both established and new filmmakers from across Africa in two days of discussion and debate about the role of documentary activism in contemporary life and politics.
Emma Sandon ran a session on human rights documentary, on behalf of the Cinema, Human Rights and Advocacy programme, of which she is Executive Director, with Professors Rod Stoneman and William Schabas, dealing with the emergence and politics of “human rights film” and festivals promoting it. She invited APC Honorary Research Fellow, Jacqueline Maingard, to contribute to this session by presenting an important South African documentary on human rights.
Sandon also contributed to the panel discussion, “Beyond Poverty Porn: Representation in Social Justice Filmmaking” alongside South African filmmakers Riaan Hendriks and Khalo Matabane, a Mozambican filmmaker, Yara Costa, and the director of iRepresent International Documentary Film Festival, Lagos. The session explored representation in films that deal with poverty and injustice, and discussed filmmaking approaches that champion human rights without compromising human dignity whilst promoting the agency of community and individuals directly involved in struggle.
The People To People International Documentary Conference provided a forum for a stimulating two days where filmmakers and activists could debate and share issues related to the politics of filmmaking in Africa today.