Description
Presenter: Althea Balmes
Notes
Video Recording
- Komik (comics)
- long history of komiks in the Philippines
- many American influences on the comics
- partially due to American GIs who came to the Philippines
- made stories that by nature of the situation in the politics and economy of the Philippines, it has always been a political act — celebrating the culture and telling their stories but also criticising foreign powers
- Kwentong Bayan: Labour of Love
- literal translation: community stories
- tell stories and have political awareness
- tell stories about caregivers in a way that hasn't been told before
- empowering caregiver workers in Canada
- had to learn the ins and outs of the caregiver program
- had to challenge assumptions and biases about the program and migrant workers
- gathering of elders
- meet with caregivers and allies who will provide support and guidance on how these stories are told
- collaborate on stories being told through our lived experiences and perspectives
- reciprocal relationships, invited to and participating in each other's events
- it's not just about the subject or the researcher, but building a community with different types of people, also crossing intergenerational boundaries
- learn about issues that matter to them and to the community and the reasons why they matter – and when we can, help out
- workshops and clinics
- workshop covered
- why should they support refugees
- why is their situation as migrant workers different from someone who is coming as a refugee
- clinics
- tax clinic
- self defence class
- in partnership with Combat Science: Warrior Arts of Asia
- useful for caregivers who live with their employer and who's home/work becomes a dangerous place
- lots of power in learning about how they build community
- Advocacy and Leadership training at George Brown
- for caregivers
- helping caregivers transition to another job/career
- caregivers have a hard time getting education or getting Canadian credentials
- practical and theoretical curriculum
- Community presentations
- fun community events
- June 12 is Philippine independence day
- takes place in Earl Bales Park
- one activity is street theatre where they'll put on a skit that covers an issue that a caregivers may face
- e.g. a caregiver who paid an agency to come to Canada but had no job when they came
- Marching in the Pride parade
- Labour+Love: A Celebration of Caregivers
- provided another opportunity for caregivers to perform their street theatre to cover issues they face
- learning community history to tell the stories in the comics
- learn the stories, reflect, and collaborate on them
- understand that they aren't from the caregivers perspectives, but from the perspective of someone who has inside and outside perspectives about the caregiver program and the Filipino community
- weave facts into narrative and reflect on the consequences of leaving the country
- have learned a lot of history about caregivers in canada. This is shared through their comics.
- One of the their comics on the history of caregivers was turned into wall murals displayed at various galleries
- poster included in http://graphichistorycollective.com/projects/remember-resist-redraw
- Contributed to "Drawn to Change Graphic Histories of Working-Class Struggles"
- Balakbayan exhibit at the Workers Arts & Heritage Centre in Hamilton
- https://www.instagram.com/explore/tags/kwentongbalikbayan/
- also providing workshops for caregivers
- there's always a community engagement presentation or aspect to it
- at A Space Gallery, it became a community hub for those who wanted to use the space to hold their own events during the reception
- Part of her job as an illustrator is to show all the emotions that one would feel as the mother/caregiver or her child, and to represent all of the different actors in these stories
- Part of their work as storytelling is not judging people of their privilege, and sometimes it is hard to not have a moralistic story being told; there has to be a holistic understanding of the community
- Main work is to celebrate this Filipino-Canadian culture because of their situation here, that different things can happen in a racialised community but talk about why that happens with compassion and empathy; it is not just about statistis or the difficulties or struggles that the individual characters face, it's about everything else about it that influences it