CLASSACT NEWS

ClassACT Bridge Project JusticeAid Presents:
Songs for Lady Day, The Music of Billie Holiday

Songs for Lady Day: The Music of Billie Holiday celebrates jazz and blues legend Billie Holiday during her birthday month of April with performances by Grammy Award-winning artists Cecile McLorin Salvant, Paula Cole, and Dom Flemons, along with legendary singer-songwriter Marshall Crenshaw and contemporary star and repeat JusticeAid performer Kandace Springs. 

100% of ticket sales will benefit JusticeAid’s 2018 beneficiaries, the Civil Rights Corps and Essie Justice Group. Both of these organizations are fighting inequality in our legal system.  

Suzan E. Jenkins, Chief Executive Officer of the Arts and Humanities Council of Montgomery County, will be the emcee for the evening. Susan Shaffer and the Honorable Truman A. Morrison III will be recognized for their heroic efforts to end financial barriers to justice.

Check out JusticeAid's Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram for clips, photos and updates on the concert!

The Criminalization of Poverty: 21st Century Debtors' Prison

ClassACT bridge project JusticeAid, with Seth Waxman and WilmerHale, hosted a panel discussion on the criminalization of poverty. The panel was moderated by Vanita Gupta, President and CEO on the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights.  Ms. Gupta was joined by panelists Alec Karakatsanis of Civil Rights Corps and Gina Clayton of Essie Justice Group. 

Missed the panel? You can watch the entire thing on ClassACT's Facebook page! 

"I adore Chicago. It is the pulse of America." - Sara Bernhardt

Get ready for a weekend of learning and fun.

What's up?

The Main Event: 
Roger and Gina Myerson will host us on Saturday, April 21 from 6-8, at their home with a gorgeous view of Lake Michigan. Come and bring your spouse/partner/family member for an evening of fun and a chance to learn about ClassACT. 

What Else?

FUN exploring together with a bit of learning thrown in.

We are working on organizing the rest of the weekend and would love your input.

Our ideas so far:

• An exhibition tour at the Art Institute with classmate Andrea Kirsh as our guide
• Grooving to the blues at Buddy Guy's Legends (a quick walk from the Myersons')
• Sunday brunch at the Currency Exchange Café of the Rebuild Foundation 
• A tour and taproom visit at Metropolitan Brewing (housed in the tannery formerly owned by classmate Rick Weil's family)
• A visit to the Field Museum to look at their anthropological collections, which offer a chance to see changing museum practice over the past century
• Taking the Chicago River architectural tour

Tickets are now on sale for JusticeAid's April 24 concert, Songs for Lady Day. The concert will celebrate jazz and blues legend Billie Holiday, while honoring and supporting the work of its beneficiaries, Civil Rights Corps and Essie Justice Group. You don't want to miss this! Click here to learn more about the event and to purchase tickets. 

Friends and admirers gathered at the Harvard Kennedy School on Saturday to celebrate the life and legacy of Asma Jahangir, human rights champion. Rick Brotman '73 filmed the speakers; click on their names below to watch their tributes. 

Beena Sarwar	Yasser Kureshi
Mahmud Jafari	Shahla Haeri
Yasser Latif Hamdani	Marty Chen
Raza Rumi	Homi Bhabha
Sugata Bose	Chanta Bhan
Kashif Chaudhry	Tom Simons
Sara Sulehri	Ayesha Jalal
Amartya Sen	Sughra Raza

The 2 programs to benefit from the next Justice Aid concert proceeds (April 24 in Washington, DC)  are:

Civil Rights Corps, which brings cutting-edge class-action litigation all over the country to challenge corruption in our legal system, and they’re making a major impact. Civil Rights Corps has already has won victories over unconstitutional bail systems in jurisdictions in Texas, Georgia, Louisiana, Tennessee, and more, as well as challenging debtors' prisons all over the South. Civil Rights Corps succeeds because of their commitment to partnering with community-based organizations in each of the localities where they take action, ensuring that local solutions take shape based on local input.

and

Essie Justice Group is an Oakland, California-based organization that mobilizes women with incarcerated loved ones to take on the rampant injustices created by mass incarceration, and they are helping lead the campaign for bail reform in California. Essie's award-winning Healing to Advocacy Model brings women together to heal, build collective power, and drive social change. Essie is building a membership of fierce advocates for race and gender justice—including Black and Latinx women, formerly and currently incarcerated women, transwomen, and gender non-conforming people.

We are gathering to celebrate and remember our dear friend and comrade, our hero Asma Jahangir:

Saturday Feb 17, 2018, 4-6 pm
Wiener Auditorium, Taubman Building, Harvard Kennedy School. 
Address: 79 JFK St., Cambridge, 02138 (Directions at: https://www.hks.harvard.edu/more/about-us/maps-directions)

Fierce upholder of the democratic political process and rule of law, Asma Jahangir defended the rights of women, children and religious and ethnic minorities, workers, peasants and journalists, not just as a lawyer in Pakistan but in her capacity as a UN Special Rapporteur, most recently on Iran. She co-founded the Women's Action Forum, the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, the Pakistan India People’s Forum for Peace and Democracy, and South Asians for Human Rights. She spoke out against the narrow nationalism that pits South Asian countries against each other, for the rights of minorities in India, human rights in Kashmir and Baluchistan and elsewhere in the region. She passed away in Lahore on February 11, 2018, her funeral attended by thousands, including women who broke tradition by going to the graveyard and saying funeral prayers alongside men. Her life will continue to inspire and give meaning to our own always.

Asma Jahangir's last public event was a lecture that she gave at Lady Margaret Hall at Oxford on February 5. The lecture was entitled "Remembering Benazir Bhutto" and the audience included her sister Sanam (Harvard '78), her close Oxford friend Victoria Schofield and Nobel laureate Malala Yousafzai. 

Confirmed speakers include Amartya Sen, Ayesha Jalal, Martha Chen, Sugata Bose, Homi Bhabha, Raza Rumi, and Sugata Bose among others. 

Organised by Asma's friends, activists and admirers.

Co-sponsors: The Lakshmi Mittal South Asia Institute, Harvard University; HKS South Asia Engagement Forum; Alliance for a Secular and Democratic South Asia; South Asia Center Boston; Harvard Pakistan Students Group; HKS Pakistan Caucus; Coalition for a Democratic India; The Benazir Bhutto Leadership Program of ClassACT HR73; Harvard University Asia Center

As ClassACT gears up for JusticeAid's April panel and concert, we are finding Thomas Lennon's Oscar-nominated documentary Knife Skills particularly well timed. Any film that describes itself as being about "the healing power of good food" sounds appealing; but this film is about so much more than a Cleveland restaurant bringing world-class French food to its community. This film brings to its audiences inspiring stories of human resiliency in the face of the American justice system, as it follows the restaurant's staff through their journey of reentry into society after being released from prison. 

Check out Knife Skills on its website, facebook, and twitter. View the film on Itunes. 

Andrea Barnet's forthcoming book was highlighted in Entertainment Weekly on a short list of Books to Read for the Anniversary of the Women's March. Visionary Women: How Rachel Carson, Jane Jacobs, Jane Goodall and Alice Waters Changed Our World explores how these four women made the modern progressive movement possible. Andy is married to our classmate Kit White.

Classmate Jonathan Quick's new book The End of Epidemics: The Looming Threat to Humanity and How to Stop It is now available. "There seems little doubt that humanity is heading into a century of epidemics and pandemics," he writes.  "We're moving too slowly with too few resources to have a flicker of hope to out run the 'big one,' nor to adequately protect against regional and migrating Ebola, Zika, yellow fever and other epidemic threats.  Scientists and public health professionals know what's needed.  But they need our help to build a movement that can achieve large-scale, widespread, lasting progress toward ending devastating epidemics and pandemics.  As a family physician who's seen the agony of avoidable death in faces of those left behind, and as a father of three grown daughters, I would like nothing better than for us to bring this movement to life!"

Two pieces related to the book were published last week: Wall Street Journal, An Action Plan for Averting the Next Flu Pandemic, and TIME Magazine: Our Complacency About the Flu is Killing Us.  An updated version of the TIME piece appeared in yesterday's print version.

Check out Dr. Quick's website to see his speaking schedule and to learn more about his book.  Visit the Take Action page to learn how to make epidemic awareness a priority in your home, workplace and community.