Join us for a day of dialogue, learning, and celebrating the struggle and legacy of black Latin American women leading the fight against statelessness, forced displacement and targeted killings. We will watch the film Hasta la Raíz (‘Down to the Root’), which chronicles the story of three women that have been denied their civil rights as Dominicans because of where their parents come from, and condemned to live in poverty. It chronicles their life in Dominican Republic where a part of society rejects them while another embraces and fights alongside them. We will join Ana Belique and Sofía Garzón, human rights activists in Dominican Republic and Colombia respectively, for a dialogue on the current status of security and dignity afro descendants in Latin America in the context of neoliberalism and the rise of right wing ideology.

Panelists:

Ana Belique: Sociologist and social activist. Ana is a founding member of the Reconoci.do movement, a group of young people fighting against the sentence 168-13 and discrimination in the Dominican Republic. She has stood out for being one of the main leaders and spokeswoman for Dominicans of Haitian descent. She is currently leading the Muñecas Negras RD initiative that seeks to empower black women from vulnerable communities in bateyes by rescuing the values of Afro identity and creating economic opportunities.

Sofía Garzón: Sofía is an Afro Colombian social leader. She is part of several local, national and international organizations. She is interested in healing actions from autonomous local experiences, which can provide public services through transformative, redistributive, and reparative economic policies.