Pauline Silvia, left, a scientist at the Nevada Test Site, and Emiko Okada, a Hiroshima survivor, are holding hands (A scene from “Atomic Mom”)
Symposium
Beyond Hiroshima and Nagasaki: Future of Anti-nuclear Weapons Movement
Monday, May 17, 2010, 1 – 5 pm
Faculty Center, Hacienda Room
UCLA
Free and open to UCLA faculty, stuff and students and invited guests.
Parking $10 at Lot 2
For more information, contact Prof. Mariko Tamanoi at (310) 206-8399 or email mtamanoi@ucla.edu.
A symposium discusses atomic legacy and future of anti-nuclear movement through the personal story of a filmmaker and her atomic veteran mother
On May 17, 2010 the UCLA Paul I. and Hisako Terasaki Center For Japanese Studies holds a symposium on the concerns of nuclear weapons global legacy called: “Beyond Hiroshima and Nagasaki: Future of Anti-nuclear Weapons Movement.”
Organized by Prof. Mariko Tamanoi, the event includes a sneak preview of Atomic Mom, a documentary about an American and a Japanese women and their opposite experience with the atomic bomb, and a presentation by Steven Leeper, chairman of the Hiroshima Peace Culture Foundation, and by Atomic Mom’s director, M.T. Silvia.
The symposium takes place at the UCLA Faculty Center, 480 Charles Young Dr. East, in the Hacienda Room between 1- 5 pm.
Admission by free for UCLA faculty, students and staff and by invitation for outside guests.
To request an invitation, email bird@international.ucla.edu or call 310-825-8681.
Inquired regarding the reason why she decided to organize this symposium, Mariko Tamanoi, professor at the UCLA Anthropology Department, states: “Before we fear our future, we have to look at the present. The victims of radiation are not only in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but everywhere in the world, among atomic soldiers, uranium miners, nuclear weapon industrial workers, and the victims of depleted uranium munitions. These people, single individuals, need our attention now.”
On the subject of necessity of eliminating nuclear weapons, Steve Leeper of the Hiroshima Peace Culture Foundation adds: “in the next two or three years, nothing is more important than abolishing nuclear weapons. Nukes are the prerequisite test of our ability to cooperate. If we fail this relatively simple test, how will we reduce CO2 emissions or the gap between rich and poor? We have an excellent chance right now to eliminate nuclear weapons, but if we fail, they will eliminate us.”
For the very reason of giving voices to all atomic veterans and creating awareness of the dangers related to nuclear power, Prof. Tamanoi decided to show Atomic Mom, a piece that combines the intimate portrait of a troubled mother-daughter relationship and the recollection of an obscure part of American history.
Pauline Silvia, the filmmaker’s mother, was exposed to five detonations when she was a scientist at the Nevada Test Site. After decades of silence, Pauline, in a crisis of consciousness, reveals some of the grim and dark secrets of the U.S. atomic testing program.
In the attempt to reconcile with her own mother’s past, M.T. Silvia travels to Japan where she meets Emiko Okada, a Hiroshima survivor. After knowing Pauline’s story, Emiko folds an origami peace crane to donate to her. This gift encloses a beautiful and potent offer of peace.
Atomic Mom invites viewers to confront American Nuclear History in a new way.
This story of an American scientist and a Hiroshima survivor finding peace decades after the bombing empowers individuals and communities to work toward global peace.
It inspires dialogue to overcome family and global secrets and it endorses universal human rights in the age of post-nuclear genocide.
Steve Leeper was born in 1947 in Illinois, U.S. Since moving to Hiroshima in 1984, he has interpreted A-bomb survivor testimonies and translated many documents for the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum. In 2002, he started as North American Coordinator of Mayors for Peace. Having served as an executive advisor of the Hiroshima Peace Culture Foundation since 2003, he was appointed Chairman of the Board of the Hiroshima Peace Culture Foundation in April 2007.
M.T. Silvia is an independent filmmaker. Her first documentary Picardy Drive (2002, Documentary, 57min) aired on KQED’s ImageMaker series, FreeSpeechTV and is available on home video. She has worked professionally as an engineer in the film industry for over twenty years at both Skywalker Sound and Pixar Animation Studios. Among many mainstream film credits, she has also worked as a recording engineer on Wild at Heart (1990, Drama, 124min)
Mariko Tamanoi received her doctorate in anthropology from Northwestern University. She is author of Under the Shadow of Nationalism: Politics and Poetics of Rural Japanese Women (1998) and Memory Maps: The State and Manchuria in Postwar Japan (2009) as well as editor of Crossed Histories: Manchuria in the Age of Empire, which has been translated to Japanese. Her publications also include articles in the Journal of Asian Studies, Ethnology, Annual Review of Anthropology, Comparative Studies in Society and History, Critical Asian Studies, Japan Focus, and American Ethnologist.
