Invitation to Dance: SYRFILMFEST'11 WORK IN PROGRESS SCREENING

SYRFILMFEST'11 WORK IN PROGRESS SCREENING

WORK-IN-PROGRESS SCREENING

and Q&A with the Filmmakers

Saturday, October 15th

1:00pm – 3:00pm

Syracuse University -

Watson Auditorium

316 Waverly Avenue

After reading My Body Politic, filmmaker Christian von Tippelskirch saw the potential for a film that would reveal the meaning of disability in contemporary America. Simi and Christian joined forces to create a feature-length documentary that traces Simi’s life over the last 40 years: INVITATION TO DANCE. In 1971, Simi Linton was injured while hitchhiking to Washington to protest the war in Vietnam. Suddenly a wheelchair-riding young college student, she confronted forms of discrimination she couldn't have imagined before. She joined forces with a vibrant disability community committed to “Equality, justice, and a place on the dance floor!” In time she realized that activism, sexuality and dance could once again be central to her life.

More on "Invitation to Dance"

Simi Linton, a wheelchair-riding social activist, takes us out dancing with the avant-garde of disabled artists and radical thinkers - unstoppable in their quest for “equality, justice, and a place on the dance floor!”

At age 23, Simi was injured in a car accident while hitchhiking to Washington, DC to protest the war in Vietnam. Suddenly a young disabled college student, she confronted insidious forms of discrimination she couldn't have imagined before. In time, she realized that political activism and a vibrant social life could once again be hers.

During the 1980’s and ‘90’s Simi grew into a life as a writer, professor, and activist when the disability rights movement emerged, and became a leading figure in shaping this new era. Yet, it was her first reluctant foray onto the dance floor at a party which ultimately liberated her from the shame she felt as a young disabled woman, and launched her on the path that led to making this film.

INVITATION TO DANCE is a never-before-told coming out story. Interviews with academics, activists and artists of all stripes bring disability out of the closet, into the light and onto the dance floor.