2012 African American Perspectives Discount Offer

California Newsreel is kicking off 2012 with the largest discount offer in our 44-year history – a great chance to update and expand your institution’s African American video holdings.

University, Colleges, Government - up to 75% OFF - only $49.95
High School, Public Libraries, HBCUs, Qualifying Community Organizations - 50% OFF - $24.95
(Offer expires 9/1/12)

Choose from over 60 documentaries on African American history, literature, and racial justice themes,  including such landmark films as,Race – The Power of an  Illusion, Ethnic Notions, Richard Wright: Black Boy, and The Complete Blue Eyed.

Streaming Licenses Now Available

Streaming licenses are now available for over 60 titles including such classics as The Road to Brown and Zora Neale Hurston: Jump at the Sun.   Discounts apply for licenses of 5 or more titles.  Click here for more information.

SNCC Video Legacy - Now With In-Perpetuity Streaming Rights
At No Extra Cost!

Formed in 1960, the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee was the vanguard organization of the Civil Rights Movement. Julian Bond says that "there is no parallel DVD collection examining the Movement. It offers the opportunity for students to study and research this vital and exciting history told by the people who made it." The Southern Poverty Law Center just released a report on the dismal state of Civil Rights history education in the nation's schools. The SNCC collection provides educators a tool with which to fill this gap.

UNNATURAL CAUSES Wins Top Science Communications Honor

Unnatural Causes: Is Inequality Making Us Sick? added to its awards by winning the prize for Best Film / Radio / TV Program of 2009 from the National Academies of Sciences and the Institute of Medicine. More than 25,000 community and campus dialogues, policy forums, trainings and other events addressing health inequities built around the series have already been convened since its DVD release.

Check out our DVD collection on HEALTH & SOCIAL JUSTICE for a complete listing of other films and videos exploring global health inequities.

Blacking Up: Hip-Hop's Remix of Race and Identity

Blacking Up, winner of the American Library Association's 2011 Notable Videos for Adults Award, offers a provocative look at the popularity of Hip-Hop among America's white youth. It explores whether white identification is rooted in admiration and a desire to transcend race or is merely a new chapter in the long continuum of stereotyping, mimicry and cultural appropriation.

African American Perspectives DVD Catalog

Newsreel's collection of DVDs on African American history, culture, icons and social movements is available electronically and in print. The catalog features an array of films and videos including classics from the African American Perspectives DVD Collection. Download your copy today.

Race - The Power of an Illusion
and Racial Wealth Gaps

The Pew Research Center recently released an important report on the increase in racial wealth gaps in the United States. "The House We Live In," the third episode of Race - The Power of an Illusion, details how institutional discrimination has contributed to disparities in wealth between African American and white households. Click here to view the Pew report.

Money-Driven Medicine - and health care reform

Money-Driven Medicine provides the first and only look on film at the forces underlying - and undermining - healthcare and so provides Americans the framework they need to address the unmet challenges of healthcare reform in the years ahead. The acclaimed film has been showcased on Nightline, Bill Moyers' Journal, and Terry Gross's Fresh Air. It features Dr. Donald Berwick, the pioneer health reformer who led Medicare and Medicaid for the last year.

70 African Film Classics now $24.95 per DVD

In an effort to make North America's largest collection of African films more widely available, we are now offering these African feature films and documentaries at the greatly reduced price of $24.95 per DVD! California Newsreel's Library of African Cinema was launched in 1981 with 8 films from 5 different countries to provide film resources to educators and build an appreciation for African cinema. The collection has since grown to more than 70 DVDs from 25 countries, including classic feature films by by internationally renowned master filmmakers like Ousmane Sembene (Faat Kine) and Djibril Diop Mambety (La petite vendeuse de Soleil, Le Franc).
Read an article in the Statesman about this uniquely "valuable collection" here.

California Newsreel Releases the Results of Its Two Needs Assessments

In the second half of 2010, California Newsreel surveyed its film users and stakeholders on how they presently use media, how they would like to use media and what new media they would like to be able to use. We targeted the two constituencies Newsreel is currently focused on: health equity and racial justice. 500+ Newsreel stakeholders filled out detailed online questionnaires or participated in in-depth interviews.

To view a summary of the sometimes surprising findings, click here.  The results of this ascertainment process will guide Newsreel’s future production and acquisition activity, thus increasing our accountability to our film users’ actual needs. In addition, they will be shared with social justice media producers and funding agencies in the hope they will also inform their production decisions.

Producer’s Guide to Digital Rights Management

The pace of change in digital distribution has become so frenzied that Newsreel has had to revise and expand this Producers' Guide To Digital Rights Management just nine months after it was first issued. Today, we are involved in a change, not just in how moving image content is delivered but in how viewers engage it and why. Click the link for your copy of the revised document.