Documentary

Into the Light: Education and Eugenics in Southern Ontario documents an award-winning exhibition of the same name. The documentary, like the exhibition, brings one of Canada’s sinister secrets of eugenics, as well as stories of survival, out of the shadows and into the light. Eugenics was the practice of selective breeding to improve the human “race” by “breeding out” those deemed less worthy. Eugenicists held false assumptions and incomplete understandings of heredity. In Canada, eugenicists dehumanized and eliminated those who did not fit the middle-class lives of white, non-disabled bodied settlers. Eugenics targeted First Nations, Black, and other racialized populations, as well as people living in poverty, and people living with disabilities for segregation in institutions, cultural assimilation, and sterilization. Despite being condemned decades ago due to its association with Adolf Hitler and Nazi Germany, it is still practiced in many ways such as forced sterilization of First Nations women and forced assisted suicide for those deemed non-vital.

The documentary reveals over thirty years of eugenics education, including courses taught at the post-secondary level in central Canada, and highlights the efforts and stories of members of affected communities and the people who continue to work to foster social justice, including responding to Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

Elder Mona Stonefish, Peter Park, Dolleen Tisawii’ashii Manning, Evadne Kelly, Seika Boye and Sky Stonefish, co-creators and co-curators of the exhibition, work to prevent institutional brutality, colonialism, ableism, and social injustice.

The documentary captures the collaborative process of creating the exhibition Into the Light: Eugenics and Education in Southern Ontario through to the exhibition’s opening.

During the documentary, the creators and rights activists share stories about the exhibition process, discoveries through research, and interpretation of findings through the lens of diverse lived experiences.

Into the Light includes content that some viewers may find challenging and/or traumatizing. The documentary aims to provide safe spaces for the sharing and understanding of all histories and lived experiences.

Into the Light: Eugenics and Education in Southern Ontario was co-presented by Guelph Museums, Bodies in Translation: Activist Art, Technology and Access to Life, Re•Vision: The Centre for Art and Social Justice, and Respecting Rights, ARCH Disability Law.

About the Documentary Team

Elder Mona Stonefish (Creative Direction, Exhibition Co-creator) is an Anishinaabe artist, Traditional Knowledge Keeper, Windsor Art Gallery board member, disability activist, and recipient of the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee award.

Peter Park (Creative Direction, Exhibition Co-creator) is co-founder of Respecting Rights, founder of People First, and recipient of the June Callwood Award.

Dolleen Tisawii’ashii Manning (Exhibition Co-creator) is an Anishinaabe contemporary artist and Assistant Professor at Queen’s University.

Evadne Kelly (Producer, Creative Direction, Exhibition Co-creator) is a modern dancer, and Artist-Researcher at Re•Vision Centre for Art and Social Justice, University of Guelph.

Seika Boye (Creative Direction, Exhibition Co-creator) is a scholar, writer, educator and consultant, whose practices revolve around dance and movement. She is an Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, at the Centre for Drama, Theatre and Performance Studies, University of Toronto.

Sky Stonefish (Creative Direction, Exhibition Co-creator) is an Anishinaabe jingle dress dancer, photographer, and beadworker. Sky is a trailblazer in many arenas: from her modelling for Shandra Spears Bombay to her activism confronting discrimination and tearing down barriers. Sky’s magnetic leadership brings people together everywhere she goes.

Dante Jemmott (Voice Actor) is a Toronto theatre-based actor and recording artist. His latest release "Strength of a Flower" sheds light on the issues we have been seeing for years around the plight of black individuals in North America, while also reminding us of the strength we have within ourselves and the possibilities for a brighter future.

Angus McLellan (Cinematographer, Video Production and Original Score) is an Ontario-based filmmaker who works mainly in independent documentary and fiction film production as a Director, Editor and Cinematographer. His projects frequently centre around social issues, as well as perceived social and personal boundaries within western culture and how they affect the way we interact with one another.

Tracy Tidgwell (Producer, Creative Direction) is a community organizer and cultural producer who works in the folds of Toronto’s queer arts communities in performance, video, analog photography, and writing. She explores process, connection, love, queerness and the body in all of her work and is dedicated to the resilience and liberation of all people. Tracy is a core member of Fat Rose, a Fat liberation cross-movement incubator, and she was the Research Project Manager for Bodies in Translation: Activist Art, Technology and Access to Life at Re•Vision: The Centre for Art & Social Justice at the University of Guelph.

Dawn Owen (Creative Direction) is Curator of Guelph Museums. She leads the museum’s collections, exhibitions and educational programming. Owen is committed to co-creative and accessible programming, which are core to her work toward decolonization and contemporary collecting at the museum.

Carla Rice (Executive Producer, Creative Direction) is Canada Research Chair and Professor in the College of Social and Applied Human Sciences, Founding Director of Re•Vision: The Centre for Art and Social Justice at the University of Guelph, and Principal Investigator and Co-Director (with Eliza Chandler) of Bodies in Translation: Activist Art, Technology, and Access to Life. She specializes in disability and embodiment studies and in arts-based research methodologies with a focus on changing systems and fostering social well-being and justice.

Further Teaching and Learning Opportunities

Into the Light has great pedagogical value and potential for social justice-oriented faculty and students and the documentary may be integrated into courses. The exhibition extends to studies in disability, decolonizing, social and political dimensions of bodies, difference, sexuality, archives, museum studies, history of sociology, psychology and anthropology, history of public health, education, and domestic science, Canadian history and the history of science, race and racism, equity, human rights law and policy, and more.

For access to the Into the Light documentary for private in-class viewing, please contact Research Project Manager, Bodies in Translation: Activist Art, Technology and Access to Life at Re•Vision: The Centre for Art and Social Justice, University of Guelph at revision@uoguelph.ca.