CiTR Documentaries

For this Doc series, CiTR producers used digitized audio from our reel-to-reel and cassette tape archive to make documentaries about UBC and CiTR's history. The fourth in our series, this is "Waiting for Godiva, Conversations about Sexism at UBC 1980-2013", produced by Eleanor Wearing.

Throughout history, the university campus has served as a major site of controversy and discussion on topics of sexism. At UBC, student media such as CiTR Radio and the Ubyssey newspaper have provided essential coverage of these issues. This documentary uses this coverage to investigate how conversations about sexism and sexual violence have changed at UBC in the past thirty years, from 1980-2015. The first half of the documentary explores the history of the UBC Engineers’ “Lady Godiva Ride” in the 1980s, using historical audio from CiTR’s archives and interviews with UBC alumni. Following this, the documentary examines the Sauder frosh chant incident that happened at UBC in 2013, drawing on perspectives of UBC students, the AMS Sexual Assault Support Centre (SASC), and archives from the student newspaper the Ubyssey.

For this Doc series, CiTR producers used digitized audio from our reel-to-reel and cassette tape archive to make documentaries about UBC and CiTR's history. The third in our series, this is "Queer Decade", produced by Heather Kitching.

1995-2005 is the story of the queer rights movement in Vancouver, during the era when queers finally started winning their rights. From the 1995 Supreme Court of Canada decision that ruled that lesbians, gays and bisexuals were entitled to equality under the law to the 2005 House of Commons vote to legalize same sex marriage nationwide, Queer Decade touches on key events in B.C.’s queer activist history, such as the Little Sister’s court case and the Surrey School Board book ban. It also comments on the queer community’s growth from a relatively white, middle class movement, to a more diverse and spiritually mature collective. The documentary features interviews with key activists and politicians who helped move queer rights forward. It also includes queer anthems from the era, and archived recordings from CiTR’s Queer FM, including tape from British Columbia’s first legal same-sex wedding.

After the production of her documentary Queer Decade (aired on January 28th at 4pm), Madeline Taylor and Heather had a conversation about her experience of documenting this time in Canadian queer politics.

Before airing his documentary "Grunge", we got Roger Allen on the phone to talk about what the Vancouver grunge scene of the early 90's meant to him. We chatted about what the term grunge means, how the scene impacted him as youth, and why it is important to tell this story now.

For this Doc series, CiTR producers used digitized audio from our reel-to-reel and cassette tape archive to make documentaries about UBC and CiTR's history. This is the second in our series:

Grunge was identified as a mixing of heavy metal and punk to create a slower and more complicated sound than earlier versions of punk but retained the same lyrical themes. Vancouver in the early to mid-eighties was hugely influential with bands like D.O.A. and the Young Canadians. By the early nineties the focus had shifted to the new Seattle grunge scene. Vancouver punks and non punks identified with grunge, experiencing a city is similar to Seattle in geography, climate and size. CiTR presented many big concerts in Vancouver. The digitized promos and interviews in the CiTR archive for grunge bands tell the story of Vancouver during this influential period.

For this Doc series, CiTR producers used digitized tape from our reel-to-reel and cassette tape archive to make documentaries about UBC and CiTR's history. We are making 10, this is first one to air: The Peace Movement, by Christine Kim.

The peace movement was an active campaign promoting total nuclear disarmament during a period in history where the two most powerful nations in the world seemed to be just one step away from blowing each other up, and subsequently the rest of the world. In the last decade of the Cold War, during the 1980s, the peace movement in Vancouver, BC, gained an unprecedented amount of traction. However, support for the movement was short-lived as peace activists dwindled in numbers moving into the 1990s and beyond. In fact, sentiments ferociously opposed to the existence of nuclear weapons today are far and few between. What were the factors that caused the peace movement in Vancouver to fail? Is the legacy it leaves behind one that supports the value of political activism as a powerful agent for change?