Black Graduate Student Association celebrates Black History Month with screening of Fences

Looking to celebrate Black History month in a casual yet meaningful way, the Black Graduate Student Association is providing a free screening of the movie Fences.

This free screening of the film starring Denzel Washington and Viola Davis will take place February 21 at 5:30 p.m. in the Students’ Union Building Cascade room (SUB 0-49). The event is free for anyone to attend and free pizza and snacks will be provided. 

For Uchechukwu Umezurike, fourth-year English and film studies PhD student and co-vice-president (media and communications) for the Black Graduate Student Association (BGSA), Fences illustrates concerns many Black individuals can relate to. 

“It’s about Black struggle, Black resilience, Black hope, and love,” Umezurike said. “It captures the importance of appreciating the struggles people go through in life, particularly when they are in a system that tries to desecrate and undercut their agency, their ability to be human, to flourish in society.”

“We thought this kind of movie would speak to the issues people are facing in life, particularly for [Black] international students who find themselves in Canada. They struggle with the issues of identity, with issues of belonging, and the idea of not being accepted for who they are.”

With various kinds of celebrations happening around the city, Umezurike said the simple act of showing a movie serves the purpose of creating an approachable and relaxed space for the celebration of blackness.

“We didn’t want something that would be too academic — we wanted something that would be informal,” he said. “We decided that a movie night would be the most appropriate thing to do because it’s a kind of space where people can let their guards down and just enjoy the warmth of each other’s company without thinking about existential issues.”

Umezurike also said since the student group is fairly new, this event is only the beginning of the BGSA’s celebrations for Black History Month.

“Even though we are screening the movie [for those reasons], this is the first step in getting involved in these celebrations,” he said. “For now, we just want a celebration that has fun at its centre.”

Holding Black History Month celebrations on campus for Umezurike is necessary for not only a celebration of Black contributions to Canadian society, but also to validate the complex identities of Black students at the University of Alberta.

“It’s important because there are Black people who have lived in Canada for centuries and it’s important to give people a symbol, a language to foster hope,” Umezurike said. “Celebrating Black History Month on campus is important because it also captures the complexity of identities and the varied ways Black-Canadian identity expresses itself.”

“It’s important to give students, particularly international students or students that identify with blackness, something to hold on to, something to look up to. Something to re-affirm their sense of being a part of the community.”