Adams State University will host a special 30-minute screening of The Head of Joaquin Murrieta: Lynching, Legends & Love in the Wild West by filmmaker John J. Valadez. The film will examine the difficult history of Mexican-American lynchings in the Southwest. A discussion with the filmmaker will follow. The event will begin at 7 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 26, in McDaniel Hall room 101. The event is free and open to the public.
Funding for this event was provided by the History, Anthropology, Philosophy, Political Science, and Spanish Department HAPPSS), the Cultural Awareness and Student Achievement Center, and a grant to Nielsen Library sponsored by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the American Library Association.
Valadez is a Peabody Award winning filmmaker with two Emmy nominations. He has written and directed a dozen nationally broadcast documentary films for PBS and CNN over the past 18 years.
Last year two of his films War and Peace, about Latinos in World War II, and Prejudice and Pride about the Chicano movement aired as part of the landmark PBS documentary series Latino Americans. The first of these films was screened at ASU on November 11, 2015. The second will screen during Cesar Chavez Week in late March or early April.
Valadez’ films have tackled such diverse subjects as the false imprisonment of a leader of the Black Panther Party; Latino gangs in Chicago; segregation in America’s schools; the history of Latino civil rights; and the genocide of Native Americans in the Southwest. They have garnered top prizes at film festivals from San Francisco to Mumbai, have been broadcast across the United States, Canada and Europe, and have been featured at major museums and cultural institutions.
Valadez grew up in Seattle, taught photography in India, and today lives in a small New England village in upstate New York.
For more information call 719-587-7102.
