Vancouver

FEB 1-14: 20th Annual Womens Memorial March for Missing and Murdered Women

Events through the first two weeks of February

Monday February 14 2011 (All day)

2011: 20th Annual Feb 14th Womens Memorial March for Missing and Murdered
Women

~ 20th- year commemoration events from Feb 1 – 14. Details to be
confirmed.
~ Annual Women’s Memorial March on Monday, February 14 2010, begins at 12pm.

* Tues Feb 1 – Community Exhibit and Display, Carnegie Centre (Main and
Hastings) 3 pm
* Wed Feb 2 - Women's Talking Circle at DEWC (302 Columbia) 5 - 8 pm.
Dinner served at 5pm. Open to all self-identified women residents of the
DTES.
* Thurs Feb 3 - Art Auction Fundraiser at Interurban (1 E. Hastings) 6 - 9 pm
* Fri Feb 4 - Craft Night at WISH Drop-in 6 pm. Open to members of WISH
Drop-in.
* Sat Feb 5 - “Honouring Our Women”: Poetry Night, Carnegie Centre (Main
and Hastings). 7 pm
* Tues Feb 8 - BWSS Women's Craft Night at DEWC (302 Columbia) 5 - 8 pm.
Dinner served at 5pm. Open to all self-identified women residents of the
DTES.
* Wed Feb 9 - "Struggle Survival Strength": Launch of the DTES Power of
Women movie and speakers from the Downtown Eastside, followed by screening
of “Finding Dawn”. Vivo Media Arts Centre (1965 Main Street). Doors at
6pm, Screening at 6:30 pm.
* Thurs Feb 10 – Fundraiser at Langara College with Film Screenings
including “Finding Dawn”.
* Fri Feb 11 – “Their Spirits Live Within Us” Night of Music at W2 (151
W.Cordova). Doors at 7pm, performances at 8pm with Bitterly Divine, Murray
Porter, Faith Nolan, Little Hawk, Dalannah Bowen & more.
* Mon Feb 14 - 20th Annual Womens Memorial March. Noon at Carnegie (Main
and Hastings)

The first women’s memorial march was held in 1991 in response to the
murder of a woman on Powell Street in Vancouver. Her name is not spoken
today out of respect for the wishes of her family. Out of this sense of
hopelessness and anger came an annual march on Valentine’s Day to express
compassion, community, and caring for all women in Vancouver’s Downtown
Eastside, Coast Salish Territories. Twenty years later, the women’s
memorial march continues to honour the lives of missing and murdered
women.

In its twentieth year, we are hosting a series of events leading up to the
memorial march from Feb 1- Feb 14. These events will include film
screenings, educational events, art installations, DTES women’s poetry, a
music night, and more to honour the voices of women and women’s leadership
in the Downtown Eastside. Details, as they become available, will be
posted to http://womensmemorialmarch.wordpress.com/ and
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=179000328797540

On Feb 14th, we will gather at the Carnegie Community Centre Theatre, 401
Main Street (corner Hastings, Vancouver) where family members speak in
remembrance. At 1 pm, the march takes to the streets and proceeds through
the Downtown Eastside, with stops to commemorate where women were last
seen or found; speeches by community activists at the police station; a
healing circle at Oppenheimer Park around 3 pm; and finally a community
feast at the Japanese Language Hall. This event is organized and led by
women in the DTES because women, especially Indigenous women, face
physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual violence on a daily basis.

Increasing deaths of many vulnerable women from the DTES still leaves
family, friends, loved ones, and community members with an overwhelming
sense of grief and loss. Over 3000 women are known to have gone missing or
been murdered in Canada since the 1970s. Two years ago, the United Nations
Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women issued this
statement: “Hundreds of cases involving aboriginal women who have gone
missing or been murdered in the past two decades have neither been fully
investigated nor attracted priority attention.” The February 14th Women’s
Memorial March is an opportunity to come together to grieve the loss of
our beloved sisters, remember the women who are still missing, and to
dedicate ourselves to justice.

* SUPPORT THE WOMEN’S MEMORIAL MARCH
There are many ways to support the Annual Women’s Memorial March:

1)    Join us. Please join us (all genders welcome) to our events and to the
Feb 14th march. We respectfully ask that you please do not bring your
banners, flags, or leaflets as the Women’s Memorial March carries five
banners only to honour the women.

2)    Plan a memorial march in your community. We encourage women in other
cities and communities to journey and heal together by organizing
memorials on this day because women face violence on a daily basis. Last
year, memorial marches were held in approximately ten other cities and
communities. If you are organizing a memorial march please email us the
details at marlene.george@vancouver.ca so we can maintain communication,
compile the information on our website, and build strength in our
coordinated efforts.

3)    Organize an event. If you are a community centre, youth association,
union, women’s group, educational institution, Indigenous organization,
social justice collective, or artist space in the Lower Mainland and want
to host an event during Feb 1-Feb 14, we encourage you to do so and to
contact us. We can provide suggestions for speakers or films for your
event, and we support a wide spectrum of individuals and groups raising
awareness about the issue of missing and murdered women. We are compiling
events on our website, so please email us details of your event at
hwalia8@gmail.com.

4)    Please donate. The February 14th Women’s Memorial March is made
possible by organizations and individuals like you. Each year the Memorial
March committee must raise funds to pay for such things as hall rental,
sound system, food, red & yellow roses, memorial brochures, blankets,
posters, candles, tobacco and other expenses. Please make cheques payable
to the Downtown Eastside Women’s Centre, and include Women’s Memorial
March on the memo line. Mail cheques to the Downtown Eastside Women’s
Centre, 302 Columbia St. Vancouver, BC V6A 4J1. All donations over $10
will be gratefully acknowledged with a tax deductible receipt.

Violence against women is always unacceptable; every life is precious and
we must continue to honour and work for justice for murdered and missing
women.

Thank you all for your support and commitment,
Women’s Memorial March Committee

Website: http://womensmemorialmarch.wordpress.com/
Phone: 604 665 3005
Email: marlene.george@vancouver.ca (Committee Chair Marlene George)
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=264380380945 or search
“FEBRUARY 14 WOMEN'S MEMORIAL MARCH DTES VANCOUVER”