Puerto Rico, the last relic of colonization in the western hemisphere, has been a dependent territory of the USA since 1917. Los Macheteros and one of its leaders Juan Segarra have been fighting for its full independence for many decades.
In this interview, communications theorist, Gene Youngblood (b. 1942) maps out the various stages of the development of video technology and its philosophical implications for human interaction. The range of topics discussed moves beyond video to offer an extensive and rich survey of American culture from the 1960s to the present moment. In addition to discussing his canonical text, Expanded Cinema, Youngblood shares stories from his early days as a police reporter for the Los Angeles Herald Examiner, where he gained intimate knowledge of the media’s politics of representation. With the acuity of hindsight, Youngblood discusses important self-discoveries, and his life-changing decision to move from the mainstream media into the world of the underground press.
Sky Burial follows the ritual of "jha-tor", the giving of alms to birds in a northern Tibetan monastery - where the bodies of the dead are offered to the vultures as a final act of kindness to living beings. At the Drigung Monastery lamas chant to call the consciousness from the body. Juniper incense is burned to summon the vultures. Special body breakers, or "rogyapas", unwrap the bodies and cut away the flesh. The bones are crushed and mixed with tsampa, roasted barley flour. The entire body is consumed by the birds, assuring the ascent of the soul. The sky, or the universe, is where the sacred world lies. To merge with the sky after death is a holy event, one that replaces the sufferings of this world with peace.
Viracocha features mestizos and campesinos in the Andean highlands interacting within a near-subsistance economic system. Market days and fiestas provide opportunities for Spanish-speaking mestizos, alternately benign and abusive, to assert their traditional social dominance over the Aymara and Quechua campesinos.
This documentary about the early Indians of the Great Basin emphasizes the traditional culture of the last 5,000 years. The story unfolds through the words and skills of the older Piaute women of southeastern Oregon and northern Nevada. They tell us how they make cakes from berries, baskets from tulles, cord for nets…necessary daily tasks linked with an ancient heritage. The earth is ever present in the film, wildlife, rivers and marshes, sagebrush desert, all part of the story. The lifeways of the Northern Paiutes are followed through a seasonal cycle, from root-gathering in spring to building shelter in winter.
Englishman Archie Belaney rises to prominence as a notable author and lecturer after he took on the First Nations identity called Grey Owl. Adapted from the film of the same name.
The Hamat'sa (or "Cannibal Dance") is the most important-and highly represented-ceremony of the Kwakwaka'wakw (Kwakiutl) people of British Columbia. This film traces the history of anthropological depictions of the dance and, through the return of archival materials to a First Nations community, presents some of the ways in which diverse attitudes toward this history inform current performances of the Hamat'sa. With a secondary focus on the filmmaker's fieldwork experience, the film also attends specifically to the ethics of ethnographic representation and to the renegotiation of relationships between anthropologists and their research partners.
In his contribution to the On Art and Artists interview series, Nathaniel Dorsky (b.1943) begins by discussing his childhood love of the John Ford film Stagecoach and its influence upon his decision to make films while attending Antioch College. Describing the affinity he developed for work operating at the intersection of film materiality and personal language, Dorsky explains how he developed his philosophy of the “devotional film” and the “microcosmic viewer.” Dorsky likens his practice to Buddhist sculpture, referring to himself as a “Japanese poet continuing aspects of the ethos of the Marxist revolution.” In the interview, the artist describes his use of the screen as an “altarpiece for the image” and emphasizes his use of editing to create works which “harmoniously coalesce.” Interview conducted by Jeffrey Skoller in May 2000, edited in 2014.
Librarian Molly McGrew introduces birds and beasts to the wonders of reading. And in no time, they are "forsaking their niches, their nests, and their nooks, and "going wild, simply wild, about wonderful books!"
Henrika, a cow who longs to see the city, gets her wish - and- more when she rides an old raft down one of Holland's most picturesque canals - to adventure.
Quilt making has been passed down through eight generations of Soonie's family. Messages were carefully stitched into each quilt, called a Show Way, mapping the family's journey from slavery to the present day.
Banned in Cameroon, The Big Banana illustrates the poor working conditions in banana plantations and exposes the adverse impact on the people of a corporatocracy government that affords super profits for corporations at the expense of the local population. The Big Banana outlines land grabbing tactics by company Plantation du Haut Penja (PHP) and the ensuing devastation for communities: poverty, pollution, and sickness from pesticides. Bieleu, who spent two years filming residents in the remote countryside of Cameroon also features local cooperatives resisting the devastation through business alliances with fair trade organizations.
Mây, a fourteen year-old girl is being married as the third wife to a rich landowner in the late 19th century Northern Vietnam. A black & white version of The Third Wife with no dialogue and new music.
On September 11, 2001, 4 year-old Brook Peters was attending his second day of kindergarten a few blocks from the World Trade Center in New York City when two planes struck the Twin Towers. Completed when he was 14, The Second Day provides a unique and hopeful perspective on 9/11 through the eyes of young people and educators who lived through it.