Media Talk 101, founded by author, singer/songwriter, and youth speaker Phillip Telfer, provides biblical help for teaching and practicing media discernment in a media-saturated society. Articles addressing privacy issues, time wasting, desensitization, sexuality, respectful online commenting, and “101 other things to do” will stimulate conversation and thought for families and individuals who desire to honour God both on and offline.
—Angeline Schellenberg
Millions of babies are killed, neglected, or abandoned every year in India and China simply because they are girls. The result of long-standing traditions and governmental policies, this devaluation of females has led to violence against women and female “gendercide.” Upcoming documentary film It’s a Girl follows seven families, chronicling the pressures they face for having daughters in son-preferential societies. Visit www.itsagirlmovie.com to learn more, or engage the conversation on gendercide through the film’s Facebook or Twitter presence. It’s a Girl will begin screening in September 2012. —Shadowline films
Two Canadian Mennonite University (CMU) professors and a CMU Press publication were honoured at the Manitoba Book Awards. Best illustrated book of the year went to David’s Trip to Paraguay: The Land of Amazing Colours written and designed by Miriam Rudolph and published by CMU Press. Sue Sorenson, assistant professor of English, won the Eileen McTavish Sykes award for best first book for her novel A Large Harmonium. Creative writing professor Sally Ito’s poetry collection Alert to Glory (see her poem “Broken Things,” MB Herald, April 2012) was nominated for two Manitoba Book Awards and has been shortlisted for the Canadian Christian Writing Awards, sponsored by The Word Guild.
