This weekend marks the long-anticipated Los Angeles Social Forum, a unique opportunity where students, activists, local media-makers, and other Los Angelenos will converge upon the USC campus to learn from each other and build together in regards to local and global social justice issues.

Over 70 workshops on topics from local media to healthcare to electoral reform to prison reform to local immigration issues to global issues will be presented by an amazing array of local organizations and leaders. More than 50 local organizations from the Los Angeles area have sponsored the social forum, and folks are driving in from all over Southern California to listen, learn, participate. The events begin at 6pm on Friday, June 27th and end on Sunday, June 29th.

The theme of social forums around the world is simple and beautiful: "Another World is Possible". The first ever World Social Forum was held in Porto Alegre, Brazil, in January 2001. A whopping 20,000 people attended it. The most recent World Social Forum was held in Nairobi, Kenya, with an attendance of over 70,000. Most recently, a United States Social Forum took place in Atlanta, Georgia in 2007, and local state and city-wide social forums have been organized in various locations around the United States in 2007 and 2008.

Photos from World Social Forum (Nairobi) and US Social Forum (Atlanta, Georgia) by Anjali Taneja (aka Los Anjalis) on Flickr