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UIC Social Justice Initiative

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UIC Social Justice Initiative

The Social Justice Initiative (SJI) at UIC is a campus-wide project that began in 2010.

The Social Justice Initiative reflects UIC's mission to "create knowledge that transforms our views of the world and through sharing and application, transforms the world." Housed in the Office of the Provost, SJI seeks to build upon and foreground a critically important part of UIC’s mission as a public research university in a diverse global city. Our work is focused on promoting a greater good,

serving the under-served, and improving lives through scholarship, teaching and community engagement. Through the work of its faculty advisory committee, staff, student affiliates and community partners SJI has four ongoing program areas: the Pop Up JUST Art (PUJA) gallery, the Pipeline to Justice Scholarship and Mentoring Program for Undergraduates, and public programs and special events. We also support and collaborate with the Social Justice Minor, housed in the Gender and Women’s Studies Program in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.

05/12/2026

Join us on June 13 in asking, what blooms when ICE melts? 🌸

It's On Us: A Day of Art and Action, is a celebration of Chicago freedom struggles with performances and art programming by Jamila Woods, Taína Asili, Damon Williams, Kristiana Rae Colón, and Maria Gaspar. There will be workshops, soapbox speeches, and a free concert from 4:00-8:00 PM.

This festival asks "What blooms when ICE melts?" It's on us to manifest our response. Instead of desensitizing ourselves during times of repression, this festival instead invites you to engage the senses and imagine with us how freedom might look, feel, sound, smell, and taste.

RSVP using the link in our bio to attend the day's free activities.

More details and location to be announced soon.

We are grateful to our arts organizing committee and to and for designing our promo materials 💚

05/05/2026

Join us on 5/27 for a free screening of Academy Award-winning documentary No Other Land at the Chicago Justice Gallery.

RSVP at go.uic.edu/NoOtherLand

04/10/2026

Join us on 5/6 for a double feature: "Expanding Sanctuary" & "The Search"--exploring themes of immigration, state repression and disappearance, & grassroots justice struggles. Plus panel discussion with director Marina Tupa, Dr. Xóchitl Bada, & Dr. Patrisia Macías.

RSVP: go.uic.edu/Sanctuary_Search

04/01/2026

Join us on Tuesday, 4/28 for a screening of "Special Circumstances," a film about journalist and torture survivor Hector Salgado's return to Chile to examine the legacy of the Pinochet dictatorship. Plus, panel discussion with Margaret Power & Michael Zapata!

RSVP: go.uic.edu/SpecialCircumstances

03/23/2026

Join the UIC Social Justice Initiative, Black Studies, and New Day Films on Wednesday, April 15 for a special screening of "Massacre River: The Woman without a Country," a documentary film about race, statelessness, and the Dominican-Hatian borderlands.

Kindly rsvp: go.uic.edu/MassacreRiver

03/04/2026

Join SJI and Gender and Women's Studies at UIC for DISAPPEARING ACTS, a gallery activation featuring experimental sound performers Regina Martinez, Jared Brown, A.J. McClenon, and Carissa Lee.

📅 Thursday, March 12, 2026
⏰ 7:00 - 9:30 PM
📍Chicago Justice Gallery (1344 S. Halsted St.)
♿️ Wheelchair accessible

This powerful sound performance will activate and respond to Soledad Fátima Muñoz’s solo exhibition, We’re Not All Here / No Estamos Todes.

Through live sonic interventions, sound artists Regina Martinez, Jared Brown, A.J. McClenon, & Carissa Lee engage with themes of political erasure, memory, and resistance, amplifying the silent traumas left in the wake of state-sanctioned violence and civil neglect.

Free and open to the public. We hope to see you there!

Accessibility notes: The gallery is wheelchair accessible. Masking is suggested.

To RSVP, visit go.uic.edu/DisappearingActs

02/26/2026

Join the UIC Institute for the Humanities, the Social Justice Initiative, the Arab American Cultural Center, and Global Middle East Studies for a special screening of "The Encampments," a documentary film about the student movement to cut university ties to the war on Gaza.

📅 Tuesday, March 10, 2026
⏰ 3:00 - 5:00 PM
📍UIC Student Center East, Room 301 (750 S. Halsted St.)
♿️ Wheelchair accessible

This film traces mobilizations that spread to hundreds of campuses across the U.S., where students organized encampments to make their voices heard.

This film is part of a symposium on Carceral Liberalism in an Age of Fascism.

Accessibility notes: SCE room 301 is wheelchair accessible. Masking is suggested.

To RSVP, visit go.uic.edu/Encampments

01/28/2026

**EVENT POSTPONED**
This event has been postponed and will be rescheduled for a future date. We will share updates on the new date shortly.

Mark your calendars for this engaging artist talk with Soledad Muñoz, in conversation with curator Lola Ayisha Ogbara!

📅 Wednesday, February 4, 2026
⏰ 6:00 - 8:00 PM
📍Chicago Justice Gallery (1344 S. Halsted St.)
♿️ Wheelchair accessible

Join the Social Justice Initiative for an intimate conversation with artist Soledad Fátima Muñoz as she discusses her solo exhibition, We’re Not All Here / No Estamos Todes, confronting the violence of state-sponsored disappearance and abandonment.

Through sound, installation, and poetic disruption, Muñoz explores the fragile tension between absence and presence, memory and forgetting, resistance and erasure. In this talk, she will delve into the personal and political currents that shape her practice, and the urgency of creating spaces for collective remembrance and dissent.

The artist will join us via Zoom.

Accessibility notes: Gallery and its bathroom are wheelchair accessible. Automated captioning for the speaker may be available. This event will be in-person with the speaker on screen. Masking is suggested.

To RSVP, visit go.uic.edu/Munoz

12/08/2025

Join the Social Justice Initiative for the first film of our Justice Lens Film Series 2026: Our Disappeared/Nuestros Desaparecidos, featuring discussion with director Juan Mandelbaum.

📅 Wednesday, January 21, 2026
⏰ 6:00 - 8:30 PM
📍Chicago Justice Gallery (1344 S. Halsted St.)
♿️ Wheelchair accessible

Our Disappeared/Nuestros Desaparecidos traces the journey of director Juan Mandelbaum, who finds out that Patricia, a long-lost girlfriend from Argentina, is among the thousands who were kidnapped, tortured, and then "disappeared" by the military during the 1976-1983 dictatorship.

Accessibility notes: Gallery and its bathroom are wheelchair accessible. Automated captioning for the speaker may be available. This event will be in-person with the speaker on screen. Masking is suggested.

To RSVP, visit go.uic.edu/OurDisappeared

09/17/2025

**español abajo**

Join the Social Justice Initiative for the opening reception of our latest exhibition in the Chicago Justice Gallery, We’re Not All Here / No Estamos Todes, by Canadian-Chilean artist Soledad Muñoz, curated by Lola Ayisha Ogbara.

📅 Friday, September 26, 2025
⏰ 6:00 - 8:30 PM
📍Chicago Justice Gallery (1344 S. Halsted St.)
♿️ Wheelchair accessible
RSVP: go.uic.edu/WNAH

Muñoz weaves together stories of loss and memory as resistance across different geographies in this exhibition of cotton and copper woven portraits, a sound installation, video documentary, photos, and elaborate maps. Her work explores the human costs of state violence and abandonment, from Chile to Palestine to the state of Illinois.

Únase a la Social Justice Initiative para la recepción de apertura de nuestra exposición en la Chicago Justice Gallery, No estamos todes / We’re Not All Here, de la artista canadiense-chilena Soledad Muñoz, organizada por Lola Ayisha Ogbara.

📅 Viernes 26 de septiembre de 2025
⏰ 6:00 - 8:30 PM
📍Chicago Justice Gallery (1344 S. Halsted St.)
♿️ Accesible para sillas de ruedas
RSVP: go.uic.edu/WNAH

Muñoz entrelaza historias de pérdida y memoria como resistencia a través de diferentes geografías en esta exposición de retratos tejidos en algodón y cobre, una instalación de sonido, un video documental, fotos y mapas elaborados. Su obra explora el costo humano de la violencia y el abandono estatal, de Chile a Palestina al estado de Illinois.

Address

1253 S Halsted Street
Chicago, IL
60607

Opening Hours

Monday	9am - 5pm
Tuesday	9am - 5pm
Wednesday	9am - 5pm
Thursday	9am - 5pm
Friday	9am - 5pm

Telephone

+13123555922

Website

https://linktr.ee/SJIUIC

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