Left to right, Pat Sanagan and Cheryl Kryzaniwsky, CFUW Southport; Olivia Lariviere, Chelsea O’Neil, Marissa Kahgee, Victoria Lariviere and Caprice Ricks, SDSS.
On December 6, Canadian Federation of University Women (CFUW) Southport sponsored a record crowd at their 26th annual Vigil Against Violence Against Women in Coulter Parkette. The occasion was not only to commemorate 14 women who died on the same day in 1989 at Montreal’s École Polytechnique but also to educate and take a stand against gender based violence.
Art students from Saugeen District Secondary School (SDSS) were given an opportunity to help promote the event by designing promotional posters.
See: Art students help to promote vigil aimed at honouring victims
In a December 20 presentation, the students were each given a bouquet of a wheat sheaf as well as a red rose in a symbolic nod to the fact that while we need food for our bodies, we need beauty to feed our souls. Originally, “Bread and Roses” was a poem written for the labour movement, but it has come to be associated with the work towards women’s equality in all facets of life.
“As we come marching, marching, unnumbered women dead
Go crying through our singing their ancient song of Bread;
Small art and love and beauty their drudging spirits knew --
Yes, it is bread we fight for -- but we fight for Roses, too.
As we come marching, marching, we bring the Greater Days --
The rising of the women means the rising of the race --
No more the drudge and idler -- ten that toil where one reposes --
But a sharing of life's glories: Bread and Roses, Bread and Roses.
CFUW Southport thanks the SDSS students and their Art Teacher Janice Coleman Sanagan for their support for women's issues.
