By Sharon Murra-Kapon/south news editor

A documentary will open the Women’s History Month Film Festival on South Campus Friday, March 2, 2-4 p.m. in SRTA 1201.

Salt of the Earth, the first of four different videos in the series, details the process and progression of a major shift in women’s thinking and men’s feelings about a woman’s place in society. The gender issues feed into the dialogue of culture, politics, race and economics making this film a snapshot of an American experience.

The film goes back a time where the normal duty of a woman was to stay home and run the household while men worked in the mines. When men decided to fight against the dangerous conditions where they were forced to work and had no success, women took the fight, and roles were reversed.

The men were forced into domestic work and eventually respected the work that women do.

Women had little voice and power and very little freedom. Following this event, they started gaining the independence and empowerment that only men had at the time.

Nicole Vallee, instructor of English on South Campus, and the coordinator of the Film Festival, said after watching the film, the viewers will have a better understanding of how women were tentative at first, but later gained strength.

The film reveals the struggle women face with their husbands’ unwillingness to change, the unity between men and women in the face of oppression and the power of transformation in all characters.

The film is based on real events, and many actors are the actual people who lived through this experience.

Additionally, Vallee said it caused much controversy while being produced because of the events that it portrays and as a testament to the progress in the fight to achieve equality and dignity for all Americans.

Because of its pro-worker ideology, Salt of the Earth, produced in 1954, was banned in America because of the McCarthy investigations and the “red scare.”

Critics now think the film is more pro-human than anti-American.