Sunday, September 18th at 7 p.m. at the Unitarian Universalist Church, 2672 E. Alluvial the film “Return of Navajo Boy” will be shown. The Return of Navajo Boy, an official selection of the Sundance Film Festival and PBS, is an internationally acclaimed documentary that reunited a Navajo family and triggered a federal investigation into uranium contamination. It tells the story of Elsie Mae Begay, whose history in pictures reveals an incredible and ongoing struggle for environmental justice. A powerful new epilogue (produced in 2008) shows how the film and Groundswell Educational Films’ outreach campaign create news and rally supporters including Congressman Henry Waxman (D-CA). The Chairman of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform mandated a clean-up plan by the five agencies that are responsible for uranium contamination.
Ironically, the US EPA’s Comprehensive Five-Year Plan did not include Ms Begay’s backyard, until she traveled with this film to Washington, DC and screened it on Capitol Hill in September, 2008. It is being co-sponsored by Fresno Center for Nonviolence and the Social Justice Coordinating Committee of the Unitarian Universalist Church. The film is open to the public and wheelchair accessible.
Discussants will be: Dr. Delores Huff, former chair of Native American Studies, CSUF, Charles and Elaine Ettner (Charles is a retired professor of linguistics at CSUF), Michael Raymond who taught in Native American Studies Dept., CSUF.
