Press Release!!!

FREEDOM SPACE PORTLAND – BAGHDAD:  spoken word performance and music on the First Friday of February in solidarity with the Iraqi people


FREEDOM SPACE PORTLAND – BAGHDAD
Friday February 1st
7 p.m.  
North Star Café (225 Congress St.)  


Freedom Space is free and open to the public and will feature prominent poets and musicians of Portland.   An open mic portion of the evening will begin at 8:30 p.m.  



Background information:

FREEDOM SPACE: PORTLAND - BAGHDAD is inspired by cultural events taking place in Baghdad organized by an Iraqi women's rights and peace activist Yanar Mohammed.  

Mohammed, who is the founder of the Organization of Women's Freedom in Iraq, spoke at the USM Portland campus in October of 2007.  

During her talk, she described an extraordinary cultural event taking place in the midst of the war zone in Iraq called “Freedom Space.”  These poetry and spoken word events allow Iraqi youth to come together across sectarian divides in a cultural safe haven.

Freedom Space gatherings in Baghdad started with only a couple of dozen participants but now, one year later, draw hundreds to these hate-free zones.

Mohammed's description of Freedom Space during her fall lecture at USM inspired a group of students, faculty, staff and community activists to organize a similar cultural event here in Southern Maine as a gesture of solidarity with the people of Baghdad.

FREEDOM SPACE: PORTLAND - BAGHDAD will take place on Friday February 1st at 7 p.m. in the North Star Cafe (225 Congress St.).  The open mic portion of the evening will begin at 8:30 p.m.   

In an effort to link the voices of the people of Portland with those in Baghdad, the Portland Freedom Space event will be filmed and posted to YouTube for viewing in Iraq.

Freedom Space: Portland - Baghdad is co-sponsored by the USM Women & Gender Studies Program and the Office of Multicultural Student Affairs, The Meg Perry Center, Peace Action Maine, The League of Young Voters, and the Amistad Arts Collective.

FYI: www.freedomspaces.org or contact Lauren Webster at the USM Women & Gender Studies office (780-4289) <lwebster@usm.maine.edu>