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The California
Newsreel is celebrating its 36th year of distributing cutting edge
social interest documentaries to universities, high schools and public
libraries. Currently they are a leading resource center for the study
of race and diversity, African American life and history and African feature
films and documentaries. Click on the topics below to learn more.
Available for the first time on DVD... Ralph Ellison: An
American Journey and The Road to
Brown! Ralph Ellison: An
American Journey , broadcast on PBS, is the first documentary on
this central figure in contemporary literature. This documentary
establishes Ellison as a central figure in contemporary debates over art,
politics, race and nationhood. The film explores the many ways one of our most
important writers and thinkers grappled with the question: "What does it mean to
be an American?" This richly symbolic, ironic, and often surreal novel describes
a quest much like Ellison’s own to invent an identity independent of that
imposed by society. Winner of the 1953 National Book Award, Invisible Man
thrust Ellison not only into prominence but also into the vortex of the battles
raging over the role of literature and art in politics, and specifically over
Ellison's rejection of the "protest novel."
Commemorate the 50th
anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education (May 2004). The Road to
Brown tells the story of the Brown v.
Board of Education ruling as the culmination of a brilliant legal assault on
segregation that launched the Civil Rights movement. It is also a moving and
long overdue tribute to a visionary but little known black lawyer, Charles
Hamilton Houston, "the man who killed Jim Crow." Moving from slavery to civil
rights, The Road to
Brown provides a concise history of how African-Americans finally
won full legal equality under the Constitution. It opens up a discussion of the
true significance of Brown on the path towards racial equality. The example
of Charles Houston's persistence and determination will inspire today's students
to take America further down the long road to social justice.
The Rise and Fall of Jim
Crow is a
distinguished four-part series that offers the first comprehensive look at race
relations in America between the Civil War and the Civil Rights Movement.
This documentary shows that Emancipation ended slavery but only to replace
it with segregation, an American form of apartheid. The Jim Crow years that
followed were an era of segregation, violence, and disenfranchisement of African
Americans. This award winning four-part series constitutes a major cinematic
achievement covering the years between Reconstruction and Civil Rights, between
Ken Burns' >Civil War and Henry Hampton's >Eyes on the Prize.
Quality lesson plans help use this film to teach
American literature such as Invisible Man, The Color Purple, To Kill A
Mockingbird, etc.
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