The 'Bring Your Boomers' party to engender dialogue between the young people of the 1960s and '70s and the young people of today.
Gen Why Media Project event attempts to bridge the generational gap between ol'ies like Ken Lum and babies like Leigh Christie
The phrase “party with your parents” may call to mind memories of family barbecues and awkward reunions, but Tara Mahoney and Fiona Rayher have an event that you and your mom can both enjoy without any lingering trauma.
Bring Your Boomers Party
Saturday, March 12, 2011
7 p.m.
VIVO Media Arts Centre
1965 Main St, Vancouver
The founders of Gen Why Media Project are hosting the 'Bring Your Boomers' party on March 12, 2011, to foster dialogue between the generation of the post-Second World War era and those born to them in the age of the Internet.
Gen Why a community-building exercise in storytelling
“The Gen Why Media Project tries to articulate a positive generational narrative around civic engagement,” explains Mahoney. Using public art, workshops, events and media, “we pull people out into the community to get engaged.”
Gen Why invites participation and collaboration on community projects, harnessing the capacity to connect and communicate through constantly evolving networks and media that is unique to youth born in the 1980s and ‘90s.
The first Gen Why event, the Why We Do It Party, featured innovative artists and entrepreneurs talking about their creative and civic passions to a sold-out crowd.
“That party was a huge success,” Mahoney says, “But there were only two Baby Boomers there. Afterward, they both said we had to be careful it didn’t become a self-congratulatory Gen Y event. We get that from time to time—people say that mass social change needs more than one generation.”
Post-WWII babies meet the Twitter kids
Gen Why's second event, the Bring Your Boomers Party, was a natural next step: an intergenerational exchange of ideas between innovators in the fields of art and human rights from both generations.
“We've always been fascinated and based our research for the project on the political movements that happened in the 1960s and ‘70s. We have so much to learn from one another,” says Mahoney.
“The Boomers have money and power, and our generation has ideas and energy—but we need money and influence to realise those ideas.”
The largest, most well-educated, most connected generation in history
“Young people are more sophisticated, more knowledgeable, more worldly, more globalized,” says Kathleen Mahoney, a lawyer and educator at the University of Calgary and an advocate for human rights—as well as Tara’s mother.
“And I think that's largely due to their access to information, which is so much larger and deeper than ours was… And in some ways, it’s coming back to what it was like in the ‘60s: the people protesting in the streets, that activism is largely young people.”
Artist Ken Lum and artist-engineer Leigh Christie, among others, lead discussion on Saturday
The Bring Your Boomers Party pairs iconic Vancouver artist Ken Lum with eatART cofounder Leigh Christie, Kathleen Mahoney and law student Caleb Behn (exchanging ideas on human rights), and documentary filmmakers Nettie Wild (FIX: Story of an Addicted City) and Nimisha Mukerji (65_RedRoses).
The evening starts at 7 p.m. at the VIVO Media Arts Centre; in addition to speakers, there will be live music, DIY screen-printing and snacks. Tickets are $10 in advance and $12 at the door.
Granville Online is a proud co-sponsor of this event.