Professor Shigematsu’s lecture examines the life and legacy of Fusako Shigenobu (1945-) a revolutionary, author, mother, poet and arguably the most famous political prisoner in Japan’s history. Through an intertextual reading of Shigenobu’s writings, poetry, letters from prison, interviews, and Koji Wakamatsu and Masao Adachi’s film, Red Army PFLP Declaration of World War, this presentation illuminates the significance of more than fifty years of Japanese solidarity with Palestinian liberation.
Setsu Shigematsu is an Associate Professor of Media and Cultural Studies at the University of California, Riverside. Professor Shigematsu is the author of Scream from the Shadows: The Women’s Liberation Movement in Japan and an abolitionist filmmaker who directed Visions of Abolition (2011/2021) and Ghosts of Adelanto and The Rise of Abolish ICE (2023).