Juneteenth Research Guide: Videos

An adaptation of Alex Haley's "Roots", chronicling the history of an African man sold to slavery in America, and his descendants. one word series title. The gripping story is told through four generations, from the capture of Kunta Kinte in Africa to his transport to Colonial America in brutal conditions through successive generations fighting to win their freedom in the Civil War.

Prince Among Slaves tells the story of Abdul Rahman, trilingual, a military general and heir to a West African nation the size of Great Britain, who did not return to Africa for 40 years. In that time, he toiled on Foster's plantation. He married a fellow slave, Isabella, and they had nine children. Gradually, he also became the most famous African in America, attracting the support of President John Quincy Adams and Secretary of State Henry Clay. Throughout a life of Shakespearean dimensions, Abdul Rahman maintained his dignity and hope for the freedom of his people.

This series documents the history of American slavery from its beginnings in the British colonies to its end in the Southern states, and through the years of Reconstruction. The series examines the integral role slavery played in shaping the new country's development, challenging the long held notion that it was exclusively a Southern enterprise. Through remarkable stories, Slavery and the Making of America offers fresh perspectives on the slave experience and testifies to the active role that Africans and African Americans took in surviving their bondage and shaping their own lives.

Kentucky’s Underground Railroad—Passage to Freedom illustrates the influence of Kentucky geography, history, economy, politics, and culture in the context of a much larger social, political and moral struggle in American history. By hearing interviews with real people telling their family stories, viewers realize that history lessons are not always found in books. They will also realize the importance of corroboration when history was not recorded and activities were conducted secretly.

Based on the novel by Ernest J. Gaines, The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman depicts the struggles of African Americans as seen through the eyes of the narrator. She tells of the major events of her life from the time she was a young slave girl in the American South at the end of the Civil War to the civil rights movement in the 1960s.

A self-absorbed Black American fashion model on a photo shoot in Africa is spiritually transported back to a plantation in the West Indies where she experiences first-hand the physical and psychic horrors of chattel slavery, and eventually the redemptive power of community and rebellion as she becomes a member of a freedom-seeking Maroon colony.

Ken Burns' Emmy Award-winning documentary brings to life America's most destructive and defining conflict. The Civil War is the saga of celebrated generals and ordinary soldiers, a heroic and transcendent president and a country that had to divide itself in two in order to become one.

This film presents historical reenactments of African American lives during the antebellum period in the United States, and portrays slaves rendering both military and non-combat service in the Civil War. It also depicts the skills of African Americans as artisans, craftsmen, and inventors making contributions to the early settlement and development of the country.

First released in 1915, D.W. Griffith's Birth of a nation ignited worldwide controversy with its graphic depictions of racism and white supremacy in the post-Civil War South. Nearly 100 years later, Paul D. Miller also known as conceptual artist/musician/writer DJ Spooky That Subliminal Kid, creates a daring 'remix' of Griffith's epic to expose the film's true meaning and relates it to the socio-political conflicts of America today.

Based on the true story of Solomon Northup. It is 1841, and Northup, an accomplished, free citizen of New York, is kidnapped and sold into slavery. Stripped of his identity and deprived of all dignity, Northup is ultimately purchased by ruthless plantation owner Edwin Epps and must find the strength within to survive. Filled with powerful performances by an astonishing cast including Chiwetel Ejiofor, Michael Fassbender, Benedict Cumberbatch, Brad Pitt, and newcomer Lupita Nyong'o, 12 Years a Slave is both an unflinching account of slavery in American history and a celebration of the indomitable power of hope.

Challenges one of America's most cherished assumptions, the belief that slavery in the United States ended with Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation, by telling the harrowing story of how, in the South, a new system of involuntary servitude took its place with shocking force.

From 1860 to 1920 hundreds of US counties expelled all of their African American inhabitants. "Banished" visits three of these still all white towns today. Meanwhile the descendants of those displaced and disinherited seek redress. Banished vividly recovers the too-quickly forgotten history of racial cleansing in America when thousands of African Americans were driven from their homes and communities by violent, racist mobs. The film places these events in the context of present day race relations by following three concrete cases where black and white citizens warily explore if there is common ground for reconciliation over these expulsions.

In this award-winning PBS documentary, archival footage and photographs are skillfully juxtaposed with interviews with editors, photographers and reporters from African-American newspapers, who toiled on the front lines to give voice to a culture disenfranchised by white media. Stanley Nelson's film sheds light on the courageous progenitors of the black press in America and examines the historic contributions and long-lasting legacy these papers have had on our society.

This series challenges one of our most fundamental beliefs: that humans come divided into a few distinct biological groups, telling an eye-opening tale of how what we assume to be normal, commonsense, even scientific, is actually shaped by our history, social institutions and cultural beliefs.

On June 4, 1844, John W. Jones and four of his companions headed north. They were fugitive slaves who escaped bondage in Leesburg, Virginia. 300 Miles to Freedom chronicles John W Jones' journey to freedom on the Underground Railroad and his remarkable life as a free man in Elmira, New York. When John arrived in Elmira, he was a twenty-seven-year-old illiterate with $1.46 in his pocket. He died in 1900, a wealthy, literate, respected member of the community. The filmmakers traveled Jones' route to freedom, and tell his story through the voices they meet along the way -- historians, ferryboat captains, ministers, farmers and gas station owners. 300 Miles to Freedom celebrates the courage and tenacity of fugitive slaves like John W Jones. The film also celebrates those who quietly stood up to injustice by helping slaves escape on the Underground Railroad and by fighting for their freedom through the Abolitionist Movement.

In the feature documentary Traces of the Trade: A Story from the Deep North, filmmaker Katrina Browne discovers that her New England ancestors were the largest slave-trading family in U.S. history. She and nine cousins retrace the Triangle Trade and gain powerful new perspectives on the black/white divide.

Nat Turner's slave rebellion is a watershed event in America's long and troubled history of slavery and racial conflict. This program deftly weaves academic commentary with dramatizations to examine that violent confrontation and the multiple, conflicting ways its story has been told. The earliest source of Turner imagery, The Confessions of Nat Turner, was based on jail cell interviews by a white lawyer and was the first to raise the question that continued to be asked for the next two centuries: Was Nat Turner a brilliant religious leader or a deluded fanatic leading slaves to their doom? With Henry Louis Gates Jr., Vincent Harding, Alvin Poussaint, Ossie Davis, and others. Some content may be objectionable. (60 minutes) A streaming videorecording.

This is the poignant story of two women who discover they share two halves of a common past in the painful lineage of slave and slave holder. Carmelita Robertson, a black graduate student who worked at a museum of natural history and her co-worker, Dr. Ruth Holmes Whitehead, a white ethnologist, met for a professional lunch. First they discovered their joint interest in genealogy, then their roots in South Carolina, and then, to their dismay, a strange common thread. Almost certainly, one of Ruth's ancestors owned one of Carmelita's as a slave. As a result of this discovery, the pair decide to travel to South Carolina to unravel their linked heritage. We witness their journey through pain, resentment, embarrassment and ultimately acceptance, as each woman, in her own way, comes to terms with their shared history. A landmark film for African-American studies, women s history, and Southern history.

EYES ON THE PRIZE recounts the fight to end decades of discrimination and segregation. It is the story of the people -- young and old, male and female, northern and southern -- who, compelled by a meeting of conscience and circumstance, worked to eradicate a world where whites and blacks could not go to the same school, ride the same bus, vote in the same election, or participate equally in society. It was a world in which peaceful demonstrators were met with resistance and brutality -- in short, a reality that is now nearly incomprehensible to many young Americans. Through contemporary interviews and historical footage, EYES ON THE PRIZE traces the civil rights movement from the Montgomery bus boycott to the Voting Rights Act; from early acts of individual courage through the flowering of a mass movement and its eventual split into factions. Julian Bond, political leader and civil rights activist, narrates.