Watch This: Black History in DocumentariesLike this list

20 items

• MLK/FBI

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  Based on newly declassified files, Sam Pollard's resonant film explores the US government's surveillance and harassment of Martin Luther King, Jr. Available on DVD and Blu-Ray.

• I Am Not Your Negro

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  Working from the text of James Baldwin’s unfinished final novel, director Raoul Peck creates a meditation on what it means to be Black in the United States. Available on DVD and Blu-Ray. Streamable from Kanopy and hoopla.

• Whose Streets?

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  A nonfiction account of the Ferguson uprising told by the people who lived it, this is an unflinching look at how the killing of 18-year-old Michael Brown inspired a community to fight back—and sparked a global movement. Available on DVD. Streamable…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• John Lewis

  Good Trouble

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  The film explores Georgia representative's, 60-plus years of social activism and legislative action on civil rights, voting rights, gun control, health care reform, and immigration. Available on DVD. Streamable on hoopla.

• Black America Since MLK

  and Still I Rise

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  Documentary with host Henry Louis Gates Jr. chronicles the triumphs, struggles and contradictions of the last fifty years in African American History. Available on DVD and Blu-Ray. Streamable on Kanopy and hoopla.

• Amazing Grace

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  A behind-the-scenes documentary about the recording of Aretha Franklin’s best-selling album finally sees the light of day more than four decades after the original footage was shot. Available on DVD and Blu-Ray.

• The Black Panthers

  Vanguard of the Revolution

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  This documentary tells the rise and fall of the Black Panther Party, one of the 20th century's most alluring and controversial organizations that captivated the world's attention for nearly 50 years. Available on DVD. Streamable from Kanopy and…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Maya Angelou, and Still I Rise

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  The first feature documentary about the remarkable writer, poet, actress, activist Maya Angelou. Available on DVD. Streamable from Kanopy.

• The Central Park Five

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  A documentary that examines the 1989 case of five black and Latino teenagers who were convicted of raping a white woman in Central Park. After having spent between 6 and 13 years each in prison, a serial rapist confessed to the crime. Available on…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Slavery by Another Name

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  A documentary that recounts the many ways in which American slavery persisted as a practice many decades after its supposed abolition. Streamable on Kanopy and hoopla.

• Mr. Civil Rights: Thurgood Marshall and the NAACP (2014) | Kanopy

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  Civil rights attorney Thurgood Marshall's triumph in the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision to desegregate America's public schools completed the final leg of a journey of over 20 years laying the groundwork to end legal…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Anita: Speaking Truth to Power (2013) | Kanopy

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  A profile of Anita Hill, the African-American lawyer who challenged Clarence Thomas' nomination to the US Supreme Court and thus exposed the problem of sexual harassment to the world. Streamable from Kanopy and hoopla.

• The Trials of Muhammad Ali (2013) | Kanopy

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  The legal battles of the great American boxer against being conscripted into the US military during the Vietnam War. Streamable from Kanopy and hoopla.

• Black Power Mixtape

  1967-1975

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  Footage shot by a group of Swedish journalists documenting the Black Power Movement in the United States is edited together by a contemporary Swedish filmmaker. Available on DVD.

• Jean-Michel Basquiat: The Radiant Child (2009) | Kanopy

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  Director Tamra Davis pays homage to her friend in this definitive documentary but also delves into Basquiat as an iconoclast. His dense, bebop-influenced neoexpressionist work emerged while minimalist, conceptual art was the fad; as a successful…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Jazz

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  A survey of the musical form's history and major talents. Available on DVD. Streamable from Kanopy and hoopla.

• 4 Little Girls

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  A documentary of the notorious racial terrorist bombing of an African American church during the Civil Rights Movement. Available on DVD.

• Let the Fire Burn: Tragedy in Philadelphia (2013) | Kanopy

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  A history of the conflict of the City of Philadelphia and the Black Liberation organization, MOVE, that led to the disastrously violent final confrontation in 1985. Streamable on Kanopy.

• Mumia: Long Distance Revolutionary (2012) | Kanopy

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  The film chronicles the life and revolutionary times of the former death row inmate Mumia Abu-Jamal. Streamable on Kanopy.

• Scottsboro

  An American Tragedy

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  The history of the "Scottsboro Boys," a group of African American men who were victims of a racist miscarriage of justice that became a national controversy. Available on DVD. Streamable on Kanopy.