On Friday, October 26th, at 4 PM, visiting scholar Jacqueline Stewart will present the 2012 James Naremore Lecture at IU Cinema, “The Films of Spencer Williams: A Comic History of Race Movies.” Stewart, an Associate Professor of Radio/Film/Television and African American Studies at Northwestern University, and author of the award-winning Migrating to the Movies: Cinema… Read more »
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Home Movie Day 2012 at Indiana University
Home Movie Day is back at Indiana University, and it’s going to be great. On Saturday, October 20th, starting at 3pm, the IU Cinema will screen home movies that members of the public bring in. The event, which supports films in 8mm, Super8, 16mm, VHS or DVD formats, will include discussion with home movie owners,… Read more »
Weekend Watch: The Burma Boy
This weekend, checkout The Burma Boy, a 45-minute documentary from Al Jazeera on Nigerian soldiers who fought in the Burmese campaign of WWII. Many African soldiers fought in WWII, and the subject is almost as forgotten as it is fascinating and perplexing, with all of its juxtapositions: fighting with (for?) imperialists against imperialists, fighting for… Read more »
Film Africa 2012 Announced; Includes Cane/Cain by Jordache Ellapen
Film Africa – the UK’s premiere African film festival – has announced their lineup for the 2012 festival in London, which includes Cane/Cain by the BFC/A’s own Jordache Ellapen. The festival will feature over 70 films (with 35 filmmakers present for Q&A sessions) between November 1st and 11th, in venues across London. This year, in… Read more »
The Visual Imprint of James Meredith
When James Meredith enrolled at the University of Mississippi 50 years ago on October 1st, 1962 (it was his second attempt; on his first, 11 days prior and sans U.S. Marshalls, the governor of Mississippi turned him back), rioting set off all over campus. Members of the media were attacked (among the two deaths from… Read more »
BFC/A Receives Grant to Preserve Rainbow Black: Poet Sarah W. Fabio
The Black Film Center/Archive at Indiana University has been awarded a Preservation Grant from the National Film Preservation Foundation to preserve the 1976 documentary film Rainbow Black: Poet Sarah W. Fabio. Sarah Webster Fabio (1928-1979) established herself as a major figure in the black art and cultural consciousness movements of the 1960s and 1970s through… Read more »
The Pulse: When White Writes Black & the Politics of Narrative Ownership
Sometimes, stepping outside of the world of film allows us to bring fresher perspectives back to it. So, how about Michael Chabon’s Telegraph Avenue, the eighth novel from the Pullitzer Prize winner, about a black couple and a white couple who live in the Bay Area (here’s a digestable NPR synopsis/interview)? Among generally positive reviews,… Read more »
The Migrant, the Immigration Narrative, and ‘La Puerta de No Retorno’
Santiago Zannou was born in Spain to a Spanish mother and a father from Benin. In The Door of No Return (La Puerta De No Retorno)[1], he tells the story of his father, Alphonse: Santiago A. Zannou takes his father Alphonse to Benin, his homeland, 40 years after he left, to confront him to his… Read more »
Solomon Sir Jones Collection Digitized and Publicly Available
An extensive collection of 1920s era home film, made by Baptist minister Solomon Sir Jones, has been made available online thanks to the Beinecke Library at Yale University. Jones was was a well-connected businessman and minister in the Baptist Church from Oklahoma who was born to former slaves in Tennessee in 1869. Jones traveled around… Read more »
‘Exhibiting Blackness: African Americans and the American Art Museum’ with Bridget R. Cooks at the IU Art Museum
On Friday, September 14th, 2012, at 5 pm (with a book signing and reception at 6pm) Professor Bridget Cooks will present at the IU Art Museum on her new book Exhibiting Blackness: African Americans and the American Art Museum. The book “analyzes the curatorial strategies, challenges, and critical reception of the most significant museum exhibitions… Read more »