The Story of Change: Revolution Begins in the Imagination
Speakers
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Filmmaker, Trilogy Films
Dawn Porter is a filmmaker, attorney, and founder of Trilogy Films, specializing in feature-length documentaries. Her directorial debut, Gideon’s Army, focused on public defenders working in the Deep South. The film premiered to critical and audience praise at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival where it won the award for Best Editing. After a successful festival run, Gideon’s Army premiered on HBO and was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award and an Emmy. Close on the heels of Gideon’s Army, her second film, Spies of Mississippi, was broadcast on Independent Lens to high ratings and critical acclaim in February of 2014. Realscreen named her one of 2012 Doc Hot Shots 15 Emerging Directors to Watch. She was awarded the San Francisco DocFest Best Director Award, and asked to give a keynote on the role of women and minorities in film at the IDA conference in the fall of 2014. Dawn is a Keppler speaker, traveling the country to address audiences on issues of judicial reform, civil rights, and indigent defense. She has appeared on The Daily Show with John Stewart, and is a returning guest on MSNBC’s Melissa Harris-Perry Show.
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Creative Director, Skylight
Pamela Yates is a Co-founder and Creative Director of Skylight, a company dedicated to creating feature length documentary films and digital media tools that advance awareness of human rights and the quest for justice by implementing multi-year outreach campaigns designed to engage, educate and activate social change.
Yates just completed Disruption a documentary that explores innovative strategies to reduce poverty through women's economic empowerment in Latin America. Disruption will be featured at a special screening at the Skoll World Forum.
Her previous film Granito: How to Nail a Dictator, for which she was awarded a Guggenheim fellowship, was used as key forensic evidence in the Ríos Montt genocide trial in Guatemala.
She is the Director of the Sundance Special Jury award winning When the Mountains Tremble; the Executive Producer of the Academy Award winning Witness to War; and the Director of State of Fear: The Truth About Terrorism, which has been translated into 47 languages and broadcast in 154 countries.
She is a member of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences, The Writers Guild of America, and the Independent Documentary Association.
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Charmian Gooch jointly led Global Witness's first campaign, exposing the trade in timber between the Khmer Rouge and Thai logging companies and their political and military backers. Subsequently, Charmian developed and launched Global Witness’s ground-breaking campaign to combat ‘blood diamonds’; Global Witness was nominated for the 2003 Nobel Peace Prize as a result of this work.
In 2014 Charmian was awarded the TED Prize, given to an ‘extraordinary individual with a creative and bold vision to spark global change’. In the same year, Charmian along with Global Witness co-founders Patrick Alley and Simon Taylor, received the Skoll Award for Social Entrepreneurship, awarded to ‘transformative leaders who are disrupting the status quo’. She was also named one of Fast Company’s 100 most creative people in business and is a Young Global Leader Alumni.
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Carne Ross founded and now runs Independent Diplomat, an award-winning international advisory group that advises democratic governments and political groups (such as the Syrian democratic opposition) on diplomatic strategy. An author of two books (most recently, “The Leaderless Revolution”), he is a frequent commentator on world affairs for the BBC, CNN, New York Times, Financial Times and other publications. He is the subject of the recent BBC4 documentary film, “Accidental Anarchist”. Carne is a former senior British diplomat and WMD expert who resigned after giving then-secret evidence to the first official inquiry into the Iraq war.
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Jess is a founder of Doc Society, which has funded and championed the work of independent documentary filmmakers around the world since 2005. Writing with Fire, I Am Softie, The Edge of Democracy, CITIZENFOUR, The Territory, The Square, Virunga etc Currently obsessed with Climate and Democracy narratives and protecting the space for independent storytelling.
Jess is also a trustee of MSI Reproductive Choices, the world's most effective family planning and abortion provider in 37 countries. Jess is also chair of UK think tank IPPR and a board member of crowdfunding innovator Kickstarter.
Jess is a big fan of the Skoll World Forum.
