All Events
Music Performance
A UCSB MultiCultural Center Concert: Small Island Big Song
Small Island Big Song
MCC Theater
REGISTRATION ON SHORELINE IS REQUIRED
Drawing on a roster of respected first nation islander artists, the concert features musicians performing irresistible oceanic grooves to soulful island ballads engaging audiences from huge festival stages to intimate theaters. Combining music, spoken word and live cinema with AV projections featuring footage collected during a 3-year film trip across 16 countries guided by the artists on their homelands.
Small Island Big Song explores the cultural connections between the descendants of the seafarers of the Pacific and Indian Oceans through the Austronesian migration. Working with artists who have made a choice to maintain the cultural voice of their people, to sing in the language, and to play the instruments of their land. These unique lineages mixed with their diverse contemporary styles - roots-reggae, beats, grunge, RnB, folk & spoken-word, establishing a contemporary musical dialogue between cultures as far afield as Madagascar, Aotearoa (New Zealand), Taiwan, Mauritius, Marshall Islands, Papua New Guinea, Tahiti and Rapa Nui (Easter Island), creating "One coherent jaw dropping piece" as described by Rob Schwartz - Billboard.
Co-sponsors: The Center for Taiwan Studies, Theater and Dance, and the Center for the Interdisciplinary Study of Music
Conscious Conversations Series
Abolition and the UC: A Discussion with Organizers
Online
"Abolitionist struggle seeks to release the hold that the racial and racist carceral state has on our lives, both inside and outside the prison walls." – Steve Wilson
PLEASE NOTE NEW EVENT TIME AT 4PM
Most universities in other countries do not have their own police forces. Yet, in the US, university police forces are the norm. Why is this the case, and how are students and staff organizing against it? Abolitionist formations have expanded and deepened at universities and schools across the US in the past decade in response to police killings. As student workers and staff have organized against anti-Black racism and police violence, they have also articulated the relationship between policing and the neoliberalization of higher education, and the university's role in tuition hikes, rising student debt, militarization, gentrification, and settler occupation. What does the project of police and prison abolition have to do with the project of the university and public institutions of higher education? How has the UC system been historically complicit in the expansion of mass incarceration, anti-Black policing, and the suppression of student protest? This panel features student and faculty organizers from the California Cops off Campus coalition. Join us as we discuss how university campaigns connected to broader struggles for abolition, and to learn more about the Cops off Campus campaign and how to get involved.
Cup of Culture
All in my Family
Online
All in My Family is a 2019 American short documentary film directed by Hao Wu. The film follows a traditional family where the son is a gay Chinese man who has chosen to have kids via surrogates. 39m
To uphold our weekly film screenings and discussions, we will be transforming our cup of culture series into a virtual setting. Every Wednesday, we will watch a Netflix documentary or movie as a collective and we will have a post-film discussion afterwards.
Zoom Link for watching and discussions
An Evening of AFRO-HYPNO-SONIC: Jojo Abot
MCC Theater
Hypnotic, sultry, vulnerable, and empowering—these words come to mind when first experiencing the music of Jojo Abot, the Ghanaian singer-songwriter who is poised to capture the ears of discerning listeners worldwide with her experimental blend of electronica, afrobeat, jazz, neo-soul, house and reggae. However, the raw emotion at the heart of the four-track project which centers on a woman’s right to choose comes from the generational ties that bind the women in her family together.
Listen to the music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WHI98ANJUmM
Tickets: $5 UCSB Students and Children under 12 / $15 General. Purchase tickets online or call the A.S. Ticket Office (805) 893-2064.
