Join BosNOMA, Open Architecture Collaborative Boston, and the BSA Equity Roundtable for a screening of the short film, Sista in the Brotherhood.

Sista in the Brotherhood is a 20-minute, narrative, short film about a black tradeswoman who faces discrimination on a new job site and who must choose between making a stand or keeping her job.

The story follows apprentice carpenter (Sidony O’Neal) who struggles to prove herself on her first day at a new job site. An outlier in a white, male-dominated workforce, she’s forced to navigate the crew’s reactions to her. When tensions arise, she receives inspiration from a surprising source to help her decide to either make a stand or risk never being recognized as the skilled worker she has become. Sista has won multiple awards after screening at over 30 festivals around the country and now is being used as a training tool to help educate about the tradeswoman experience.

The film was inspired by the doctoral thesis of co-Executive Producer, Dr. Roberta Hunte and partly based on the experience of Latina Director Dawn Jones Redstone's experience as a union carpenter/longtime tradeswomen instructor at Oregon Tradeswomen, Inc. The original script was written by Dawn Jones Redstone and Kjerstin Johnson. Sista was made with an almost-all female crew, including 50 percent women of color.

Following the screening, in collaboration with The Policy Group on Tradeswomen’s Issues and the Boston Building Trades Unions, there will be a panel discussion focusing on the perspectives of women and minorities in construction and design.

All are welcome to join this meeting for an exchange of thoughts on inclusion, managing issues that arise in the workplace, and advocating for equity within the building industry.

RSVP

Moderator
Susan Moir
Director of Research
Labor Resource Center, University of Massachusetts Boston

Panelists
Kenell Broomstein
Representative
International Women's Committee, International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW)

Janet Butler
President and Owner
Federal Concrete

Lauren Perdue
Vice President
Human Resources, Shepley Bulfinch

Michelle Wright
4A Apprentice Carpenter

This is a program of BosNOMA, Open Architecture Collaborative, and the BSA Equity Roundtable in collaboration with The Policy Group on Tradeswomen’s Issues and the Boston Building Trades Unions, co-sponsored by Perkins+Will and ARC/Architectural Resources Cambridge.