The Roundtable Discussion is round three of a three-part symposium entitled "Roger Casement: Whistleblower! Champion of Global Human Rights"
Round 1: “Segredos de Putumayo” (2022)
7:30pm | Browning Cinema
Brazilian documentary filmmaker, Aurélio Michiles, Yeda Oliveira, Director Imagem Ceuvagem Productions, and political activist Vanda Witoto in attendance for Q&A following the film.
Moderator: Professor Marcio Bahia
Round 2: Visual Advocacy
3:30-5:00pm | 300 O’Shaughnessy Hall, The Sojourner Truth Commons
Workshop on documentary filmmaking & Social Change with Aurélio Michiles, Yeda Oliveira and Vanda Witoto.
Refreshments will be served.
Round 3: Roundtable
4:30-6:00pm | 1030 Jenkins Nanovic Hall
A round table on Roger Casement and his legacy to contemporary Environmental Rights activism in the Amazon and beyond.
Roundtable participants will include Brazilian documentary filmmaker Aurélio Michiles, Yeda Oliveira, Director Imagem Ceuvagem Productions, political activist Vanda Witoto, and Roger Casement historian, Professor Angus Mitchell.
Reception to follow
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The Symposium's Participants:
Aurélio Michiles, born in Manaus, (December 27, 1952) is a Brazilian film director, specialized in documentaries. His work in cinema and television focuses on the Amazon region and people. He studied at the Institute of Arts and Architecture of the University of Brasília in 1973, and performed at the School of Visual Arts of Parque Lage, in Rio de Janeiro, between 1977 and 1978. He has directed award-winning films, such as Que viva Glauber (1991), A Agonia do Mogno (1992), Lina Bo Bardi (1993), Davi contra Golias, Brasil Caim, (which received the Margarida de Prata award), O Filmer da selva (1997), Teatro Amazonas (2002) and Tudo por amor ao cinema (2014), and, Segredos de Putumayo, (2020).
Indicative of his body of work as a documentarian and proponent of Amazonian land, politics and human rights struggles, Michiles first short feature film, O sangue da terra, 1982-1984, addresses the legal battle fought by the Sateré Mawé indigenous people against the French oil company Elf Aquitaine in Brazil’s Amazonas, in 1982 and 1983. The film highlights the shutting down and the overpowering of indigenous peoples, and raises a primordial question: the importance of video to their struggles. The author was shooting another documentary when the Sateré Mawé approached him with a request to document their battle against the foreign giant. The natives understood that in a world mediated by images and television, the most effective struggle is that of the media, that which employs the white man’s weapon.
Prior to the release of Segredos de Putumayo, Michiles’s award winning film, Tudo Amor ao Cinema (2014), portrays the life of Cosme Alves Netto, one of the most important figures in Brazilian cinema, responsible for the conservation and restoration of several national works when the junta attempted to destroy the bulk of Brazil’s cinematic archives. He was the curator of the Cinemateca do Museu de Arte Moderna do Rio de Janeiro for more than two decades. And, for all this, he was arrested and tortured during the Military Dictatorship. Michiles currently lives and works in São Paulo, Brazil.
Segredos de Putumayo is narrated from British General Counsel to Rio de Janeiro, Irish whistleblower Roger Casement’s journals, recounting the horrific treatment he uncovered there: an industrial-extractive system based on killings and slave labour in the midst of the Amazon jungle, "a real green hell." Segredos was awarded the 2023 ABC Trophy of cinematography, The São Paulo Art Critics Association Award for the Best film of the year of 2023, the SESC (Servíço Social do Comércio) award for Best Documentary film that year.
Angus Mitchell Angus Mitchell is a historian and publisher. His work on Roger Casement has contributed to a critical re- evaluation of Casement’s place in the deep history of human rights and the environmental crisis. Mitchell’s published editions include: The Amazon Journal of Roger Casement (1997) Sir Roger Casement’s Heart of Darkness: The 1911 Documents (2003) and One Bold Deed of Open Treason: The Berlin Diary of Roger Casement (2016).
In recent years, Mitchell’s interests have gravitated towards consideration of broader networks of Irish activism and pacifism. Presently, he is working on other intellectuals involved in Ireland’s Cultural Revival, notably Alice Stopford Green, Bulmer Hobson and Nannie Dryhurst.
He received his PhD. in History about the subject at hand: Roger Casement in Africa: an archaeology of resistance to the Acts of Berlin and Brussels and the origins of the Congo Reform Association 1884-1904. Mary Immaculate College, University of Limerick. Supervisor: Dr. Deirdre McMahon. 2001- 2004.
Yeda Oliveira de Souza Carvalho Partner | Director of Institutional Relations SOMMOS Brazilian Art and Culture | SOMMOS AMAZÔNIA Culture and Environment Partner | Director Imagem Ceuvagem Art and Entertainment 2022 – present Partner | Director of Institutional Relations - SOMMOS Arte Brasileira | WE ARE AMAZÔNIA Culture and Environment 2015 – present Producer/Co Director - Imagem Ceuvagem - Cinematographic Productions, Representative at Government of Amazonas, Former Secretary of State at Government of Amazonas, Former Undersecretary of State at Government of Amazonas, Former Undersecretary of State at Government of Amazonas.
Yeda graduated in Law from Universidade Presbiteriana Mackenzie in São Paulo, with a specialization in public management, represented for more than two decades the institutional interests of the government of the State of Amazonas, developing projects and actions throughout Brazil and abroad to disseminate the potential of the Amazon region and coordinating the capture of investments in several areas, especially for the Industrial Hub of the Manaus Free Trade Zone, for tourism, the environment, creative economy, arts and cultural heritage. She brings her experience to join the partnership of SOMMOS Arte e Cultura Brasileira, a company specialized in developing strategies and solutions for the digital distribution of cultural content, and Director of International Relations of SOMMOS AMAZÔNIA, a digital platform with global reach, dedicated to the cultural distribution of content produced in/about the Amazon - with a focus on Audiovisual, Music, Literature, Visual Arts and Food - and to the dissemination of information and knowledge about the region, with an emphasis on Amazonian production.
Vanda Witoto Represented her community at the 2022 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP27), in Sharm El-Sheikh, South Sinai, Vanda Witoto was one of several indigenous people from different parts around the globe who came to Sharm El-Sheikh calling for just and direct finance for their communities to mitigate and adapt to climate change impacts, as their communities are the most vulnerable to climate risks. Vanda, who represents her ethnic group “Witoto”, which is associated with the spirit of the ant, is one of Brazil’s indigenous female influencers in the Amazon, where she and her community stand defiant against climate change.
The 35-year-old woman bears the indigenous name Derequine, which means “Wild Ant”. Her clan’s traditions and habits are inspired by the life of ants as an indication of cooperation, hard work and community life, according to her official website. Vanda Witoto is a nursing technician and was the first person vaccinated against the COVID-19 pandemic in the state of Amazonas. She provided medical assistance to the community of 700 families in her area, aka Parque das Tribos, which was neglected by the authorities, according to Outras Palavras. Vanda argues for her community’s ongoing suffering from climate change impacts and how they lack basic needs and are deprived of rights to health, education and food, although they are the real safeguards of the earth. To learn more visit the following links: Little talk of rainforest protection in the Brazilian Amazon; https://vandawitoto.com.br/
Originally published at raceandresilience.nd.edu.