Jackson Wild 2022 — Impact Campaign Finalists
By Maggie Burnette Stogner
Jackson Wild is one of the most established nature, science, and climate film festival summits in the world. For the past three years, a Special Jury to recognize the important work of strategic impact campaigns. The following is a synopsis of the three 2022 finalists, with highlights of their outstanding campaigns and links to my interviews with the impact producers. The winner of this year’s Impact Campaign category is “Can You Hear Us?”. The finalists are “Manzanar Diverted” and “My Garden of a Thousand Bees”.
“Can You Hear Us?”
This campaign won the category award for best Impact Campaign with its multi-year, international, and ever-expanding strategies. The longevity and iterative evolution of this campaign is an outstanding model for us all.
The campaign is rooted in youth activist Greta Thunberg’s extraordinary efforts to raise global consciousness about the urgency of our climate crisis. This campaign’s films include “I Am Greta” a feature-length biopic with intimate, never-before-seen home movies from Swedish director Nathan Grossman. It follows her rise from “a shy schoolgirl with Asperger’s” to a major international force as she inspires climate strikes around the world and ultimately galvanizes world leaders at the UN Climate Action Summit in New York City. The impact campaign “Can You Hear Us?” is equally ambitious. Impact Producer Samuel Rubin, Chief Impact Officer of YEA!Impact defines the campaign as all about “igniting local climate action that is regenerative, intergenerational, accessible and intersectional”. The campaign includes more than 60 partners from the National Resources Defense Council to Extinction Rebellion Youth to Young Entertainment Activists. An impressive, robust interactive website includes an action map that connects people with over 300 environmental organizations globally, regionally, and locally. Can You Hear Us? “decentralizes Greta Thunberg’s voice and amplifies frontline grassroots organizations. The campaign prioritizes community-led efforts to advance co-generation in the climate space.”
What Stands Out: Navigating today’s rapidly changing media landscape is challenging. To address the increasingly trend toward short-form and social media, the campaign now includes a 7-minute animated video “Humanity Has Not Yet Failed”. This short piece highlights Greta’s climate emergency activism with an entertaining edginess and an important message of global action and hope. Diversity, equity and inclusion is a crucial focus and Impact Producer Camila Ardila, who joined the team earlier this year, is expanding the campaign in Latinx and Indigenous communities. She and Sam are also mobilizing intergenerational communities to “reframe our relationships with each other and with the planet.” For the full interview with @Samuel Ruben and @Camila Ardila , go HERE.
“MANZANAR Diverted: When Water Becomes Dust”
“Manzanar Diverted” is a feature length film that reveals an untold story of Los Angeles water politics through the lens of Native Americans, Japanese-American WWII incarcerees, and environmentalists who form an unexpected alliance to preserve Payahuunadü (Owens Valley). Using rarely seen historical archive, intergenerational interviews and exceptional footage and sound design, the film draws viewers into a community that is comes together to address 150-years of oppression and stop further land development.
Directed and Produced by Ann Kaneko, with Producer/Impact Producer Jin Yoo-Kim, the documentary and impact campaign were created over five years. The campaign, like the film, uses an intersectional, community grassroots approach to educate and engage audiences. This epic story reveals 150 years of water extraction and oppression, and the dire consequences that Owens Valley’ communities bear today. It offers some hope as communities come together to halt further land development and resource extraction. The impact campaign is integral to the film and uses multiple strategies to bring community activists together through in-person screening tours with speakers, a national broadcast on U.S. Public Television’s POV series, and educational outreach.
What Stands Out: In mid-2021, the producers launched Converging Conversations, a day of action across the United States that highlights environmental issues and stories of forced removals involving Native Americans and Japanese Americans. An interactive website identifies the locations of WWII Japanese American confinement sites and current Native American reservations with specific stories about where Japanese American, Native American, and environmental stories intersect. Our research emphasizes different ways to form alliances and partnerships and this alliance models a new approach that is both hyper local and country wide. For the full interview with @Ann Kaneko and @Jin Yoo-Kim, go HERE.
“My Garden of a Thousand Bees”
Do you know how many species of wild bees are in your backyard? Wildlife filmmaker Martin Dohrn noticed the amazing variety of bees in his urban garden in Bristol, England when he was locked down during the pandemic. For “My Garden of a Thousand Bees”, he filmed more than 60 species of bees using special cameras, lens, and mounts. HHMI Tangled Bank Studios and PBS Nature saw an opportunity to launch a massive impact campaign, #PlantWildflowers, in the United States where there are over 4,000 species of wild bees.
The campaign uses hundreds of libraries and nature centers to help engage and educate communities about pollinators. These and other campaign partners encourage “community-driven pollinator conservation” and provide citizen science opportunities, such as bioblitzes, in 48 states. One of my favorite apps, iNaturalist, as well as Discover Magazine, Public Television, and others helped promote the campaign. HHMI’s Impact Producer Alexandra Pearson continues to seek new partners to help promote the protection of local pollinators, such as bee wax product companies. There’s no doubt this campaign will be buzzing around for a long time to come.
What Stands Out: Choosing to use community hubs such as libraries and nature centers was central to providing a strong foundation upon which this campaign could grow. These existing networks already had key infrastructures in place and extensive experience with programs that bring communities together. The emphasis on empowering people to create change in their own backyard, change that they can witness and expand upon for years to come, is a powerful model. It shows how impact can continue to grow long after the media leaves the filmmakers’ hands if the right tool kits seed the process. Research shows that engaging the public in our climate crisis is most effective when stories and media are accessible and relatable to one’s own local area. For the full interview with Impact Producer @Alex Pearson, Impact EP @Jared Lipworth, and Director of Evaluation @Marjee Chmiel, go HERE.
RESOURCES: For more information about all three of these Impact Campaigns, go to: https://www.jacksonwild.org/2022-impact-campaign.html
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