Documenting Justice Screening to Showcase UA Student Films

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. – The University of Alabama Center for Ethics & Social Responsibility and the department of telecommunication and film will host the third annual Documenting Justice Film Screening on Tuesday, April 28, at 7 p.m. at the Bama Theatre in downtown Tuscaloosa.

The film screening will be the culmination of a year’s work by UA students (who are not film majors) who have come together for a two-semester specialized interdisciplinary course.

The screening will consist of six short documentary films produced by 12 undergraduate and graduate students. Focusing on stories of justice and injustice in Alabama, Documenting Justice students learn how to use film to document and analyze culture and social experience and to communicate about issues of concern to the state.

“Ethical citizenship requires a strong sense of empathy and compassion,” said Stephen Black, director of the UA Center for Ethics & Social Responsibility.

“Developing such qualities requires the ability to imagine what others see, feel and experience. A central focus of CESR, therefore, is the development of courses such as Documenting Justice in which students learn the personal stories of people outside their immediate sphere and begin to explore the ever-expanding dimensions of cultural and social experience,” Black noted.

Documenting Justice is a signature initiative of CESR, which began in fall 2005 as a result of a gift from Mignon C. Smith, to establish a university-based ethics program that would support the study of ethics and develop projects to nurture social responsibility and reflective, thoughtful citizenship.

Learn more about Documenting Justice as well as the other initiatives of the center online at http://cesr.ua.edu/ or contact them at 205/348-6490.

The film screening is free and open to the public.