Jane Sloan Media Librarian jsloan@rci.rutgers.edu June 2005

Research Resources: Subject Research Guides: Media Collections:
Africa

This guide is a browsing aid to selected titles in the video/DVD collections at Rutgers Libraries. The most up-to-date, accurate, and complete information regarding the libraries' holdings is available only through IRIS, our online catalog.

The 2nd African/American summit "coming home"

Cecil Banks, a lawyer from Iowa, participates in the African/African-American Summit in Libreville, Gabon. Other participants include Cecily Tyson, Jesse Jackson, Dick Gregory, and Coretta Scott King. Summit participants work to improve economic, social, cultural and business relationships between Africa and the United States.

1 videocassette (56 min.) : 1994

DANA 720

About the United Nations Africa recovery

Africa today is a continent beset by drought, famine, war & debt. In Zambia, a news reporter examines these problems & discusses potential solutions that might be applicable to the entire continent.

1 videocassette (15 min.) : 1990

MEDIA 2-1911

Africa dreaming four short films on love from Namibia, Mozambique, Senegal, Tunisia

Sophia's homecoming / directed by Richard Pakleppa ; produced by Bridget Pickering -- Sabriya / written and directed by Abderrahmane Sissako ; produced by Dora Bouchoucha Fourati -- So be it / written, directed and produced by Joseph Gai Ramaka -- The gaze of the stars / directed by João Ribeiro ; produced by Pedro PimentaSophia's homecoming: (Namibia) "...a woman who has worked as a domestic for 12 years in the city comes home to her husband, children, and sister and to a terrible discovery. She realizes that the ruptures caused by apartheid can never be repaired."--Container. Gaze of the stars: (Mozambique) "...a story about machismo...so powerful that it drives away whatever it loves by trying to control it."--Container. So be it: (Senegal) "...based on a play by Wole Soyinka, [and] follows the destruction of a well intentioned foregin doctor confronting primal fear, rage and powerlessness in a remote Senegalese village and in himself."--Container. Sabriyah: (Tunisia) "...shows how a modern, free-spirited woman disrupts the exquisitely patterned mosaic of male Maghrebi society as represented by two Tunisian chess fanatics."--Container.

1 videocassette (104 min.) : 1997

MEDIA 2-5285

Africa in the 21st century: 1: Somalia the neglected civil war

Independent since 1960, Somalia has seen virtually constant political upheaval. Some eighty percent of the nation is under the power of guerillas and local warlords. Recently, Somalia has become a target in the post-Afghanistan "war against terrorism.".

1 videocassette (49 min.) 2002?

MEDIA 2-6522

Africa in the 21st century: 2: Mali & Senegal the power of Islam

Islam has influenced West Africa since the 11th century, but only in the last 100 years has the religion grown so rapidly in Senegal and Mali. One prominent sect, the Murid movement, has millions of followers and wealth accumulated from peanut cultivation. As a force of conservative Islam, its economic and political power must be watched by the West.

1 videocassette (49 min.) 2002?

MEDIA 2-6523

Africa in the 21st century: 3: Zimbabwe & South Africa still far from coexistence

Zimbabwe still reels from the after effects of independence. Former colonials are blamed for failing to work out compensation and land reallocation, and violence against whites is on the increase. South Africa emerged from the evils of Apartheid more than a decade ago, and today faces an expanding gap between the rich and poor, increasing interracial conflict, a rising crime rate, and an AIDS epidemic that is decimating the mostly black population.

1 videocassette (49 min.) 2002?

MEDIA 2-6524

African and African-American religions

Discusses the cultural diversity of Africa through its many religions.

1 videocassette (50 min.) : 1998

DANA 1814

African art and women artists

Elizabeth C. Orchardson-Mazrui, Kenyan weaver and painter, discusses her work and the role that women artists have in the contemporary African art scene.

1 videocassette (17 min.) : 1992

MEDIA 2-3375

African influence on early Europe

This program rethinks european history and the great influence Africa played in its development.

1 videocassette (ca. 20 min.) : 1998

DANA 1828

The Africans. Program 1, The nature of a continent [videorecording] /

Geography's influence on history is the topic of this episode which explores the roles that water, desert, and equitorial climate have played in developing African culture and civilization.

1 videocassette (60 min.) : 1986

MEDIA 2-1164

The Africans. Program 2, A legacy of lifestyles

What constitutes "family" in African culture? This segment examines matrilineal, patrilineal, and polygamous traditions as well as the impact of modern cities on family ties.

1 videocassette (60 min.) : 1986

MEDIA 2-1165

The Africans. Program 3, New gods

The roles of Christian missionaries, Western secularism, Muslim sects, Egyptian pharoahs, and native religions are discussed in visits to Senegal, Zaire, and Egypt.

1 videocassette (60 min.) : 1986

MEDIA 2-1166

The Africans. Program 4, Tools of exploitation

This program traces the colonial economic legacy, the development of slavery, and European control of Africa's natural resources, with special attention to the roles played by Belgium and Great Britain.

1 videocassette (60 min.) : 1986

MEDIA 2-1167

The Africans. Program 5, New conflicts

Urbanization, warrior traditions, European-created national boundaries, the Islamic jihad tradition, and nationalist movements are problems of Africa's post-colonial period, examined in this episode.

1 videocassette (60 min.) : 1986

MEDIA 2-1168

The Africans. Program 6, In search of stability

In a continent where 70 coups have taken place in the last 25 years, the question of governing effectively is critical. This segment compares African military regimes, one-party states, Marxism in Mozambique, and the styles of the presidents of Tanzania and Zaire.

1 videocassette (60 min.) : 1986

MEDIA 2-1169

The Africans. Program 7, A Garden of Eden in decay

More than 70 million Africans suffer from malnutrition while their countries export food to Europe. Economic and agricultural failures and successes are examined in Algeria, Ghana, and Zimbabwe.

1 videocassette (60 min.) : 1986

MEDIA 2-1170

The Africans. Program 8, A clash of cultures

In every area of life--dress, behavior, law, worship, and language--Africans have a triple heritage that often sends conflicting signals. The African struggle to evolve new, effective, and essentially African ways of doing things is the topic of this episode.

1 videocassette (60 min.) : 1986

MEDIA 2-1171

The Africans. Program 9, Global Africa

Africa's role in international politics and economics, from U.N. participation to cobalt production and the political crisis in South Africa, is the focus of this concluding episode. Other issues include the International Monetary Fund, food aid, and tourism. Audience: Senior high school through college students and adults.

1 videocassette (60 min.) : 1986

MEDIA 2-1172

After the whale

Documentary describing the hunting of sperm whales in Durban,South Africa, presents exhibits on whales at the Whale Research Laboratory in London and demonstrates how killer whales are being studied in California's Sea World.

1 videocassette (30 min.) : 197-

MEDIA D-105

Age of hope, 1900

The dawn of the twentieth century was forged in hope and optimism. Here interviewees from Europe, Asia and the United States recount the part they played in the century's early history. Whether fighting on the barricades of the failed Russian Revolution of 1905 or campaigning for votes for women; recalling the Paris Exposition of 1900, or President McKinley's assassination or witnessing the sinking of the Titanic, all remember the changes they lived through and the clash of forces and ideas before World War I.

1 videocassette (56 min) : 1998

MEDIA 2-4086a

Age of hope, 1900

The dawn of the twentieth century was forged in hope and optimism. Here interviewees from Europe, Asia and the United States recount the part they played in the century's early history. Whether fighting on the barricades of the failed Russian Revolution of 1905 or campaigning for votes for women; recalling the Paris Exposition of 1900, or President McKinley's assassination or witnessing the sinking of the Titanic, all remember the changes they lived through and the clash of forces and ideas before World War I.

1 videocassette (56 min) : 1998

MEDIA 2-3839

Age of hope, 1900

The dawn of the twentieth century was forged in hope and optimism. Here interviewees from Europe, Asia and the United States recount the part they played in the century's early history. Whether fighting on the barricades of the failed Russian Revolution of 1905 or campaigning for votes for women; recalling the Paris Exposition of 1900, or President McKinley's assassination or witnessing the sinking of the Titanic, all remember the changes they lived through and the clash of forces and ideas before World War I.

1 videocassette (56 min) : 1998

MEDIA 2-5620

AIDS in Africa

Health care providers and the every day people of Africa themselves discuss the effects and the spread of AIDS, primarily in central Africa.

1 videocassette (52 min.) : 1990

MEDIA 2-6029

The Bible and the gun ; This magnificent African cake

Program 5 looks at the succession of Europeans who came to Africa: explorers, missionaries, and empire builders. Program 6 deals with the 30-year "scramble to Africa" when nearly the entire continent became subject to European colonial rule.

1 videocassette (114 min.) : 1984

MEDIA 2-383

Black Athena

Explores the debate around Prof. Martin Bernal's book on the African origins of Greek culture, Black Athena. Leading classicists and Egyptologists discuss Bernal's indictment that 19th century scholars systematically denied the connections between Greece and the non-European cultures of the Eastern Mediterranean.

1 videocassette (ca. 60 min.) ; 1991

DANA. MEDIA 176 2-2100

Born musicians traditional music from the Gambia ; On the battlefield : gospel quartets in Jefferson County, Alabama

The first two films in a seven part series. The first program focuses on the professional musicians of the West African Savannah and in particular on the Mandinka music of the Gambia. The second program looks at gospel music in Alabama.

1 videocassette (120 min.) : 1984

MEDIA 2-2555

Ça twiste à Poponguine Rocking Popenguine

A comedy set during the last week before Christmas, 1964, in a remote beachside village, where the local teenagers are divided into rival cultural camps.

1 videocassette (90 min.) : 1993

MEDIA 2-5269

Caravans of gold ; Kings and cities

Program 3 traces the routes of the medieval gold trade, which reached from Africa to India and China in the east, and west-ward to the city states of Italy. Program 4 explores the ways in which the African Kingdoms functioned by visiting Kano in Nigeria, where a king still holds court in his 15th century palace.

1 videocassette (114 min.) : 1984

MEDIA 2-382

The Compulsive communicators

Naturalist David Attenborough traces the origins of homo sapiens back three million years to our origins in Africa. He also traces the development of cooperative hunting, agriculture, and animal domestication to man's unique ability to communicate.

1 videocassette (30 min.) : 1981

MEDIA 2-1939

The Creative revolution

Fifty thousand generations ago the hunter-gatherers then living in Afica began to paint, carve, talk, travel, trade, and bury their dead. Scientists continue to debate the reasons for this sudden transformation. Don Johanson sets out to retrace the migration of our ancient ancestors from Africa, to Asia, to Europe and even to Australia. Prehistoric art and cave paintings are investigated in an effort to find clues about how and when our ancestors became modern human beings.

1 videocassette (60 min.) : 1994

MEDIA 2-2417

Cry freedom

The story of the friendship between Steve Biko, a black South African activist, and Donald Woods, a white newspaper editor who escapes South Africa after Biko's death to publicize the truth about Biko and about apartheid.

1 videocassette (157 min.) : 1988

MEDIA 2-623

Cry, the beloved country

"Based on the Alan Paton controversial novel of the same name and the inspiration for Kurt Weill's musical drama entitled "Lost in the Stars," this is a sentimental film about the problems of Apartheid in South Africa. Sidney Poitier and Canada Lee turn in exceptionally good performances as preachers who are fighting the divisiveness of prejudice in their country. This is a startling and moving account of the black country minister's travels to Johannesberg to be with his son, who is to be tried for having killed a white man."--All Movie Guide.

1 videocassette (100 min.) : 1992

DANA 1419

De Bende van Rouch Rouch's gang

Follows the film crew of "Madame l'Eau" and provides a glimpse behind the scenes as director Jean Rouch and his four friends from Niger make their film. This outsider's view of "Madame l'Eau" provides insight into how Rouch approaches his films. In most of his films, Jean Rouch has used his four African friends; Damouré Zika, Lam Ibrahim Dia and Tallou Mouzourane as actors and Moussa Hamidou as sound man. Rouch has been their friend for more than forty years and this complex bond of friendship serves as the theme for this documentary.

1 videocassette (70 min.) : 1998

MEDIA 2-3868

Different but equal ; Mastering a continent

Program 1 gives the history of Africa from its origins. Program 2 examines three different African communities and how African peoples carve out an existence in an often hostile environment.

1 videocassette (114 min.) : 1984

MEDIA 2-381

Ebola chasing the virus

This program takes viewers into the heart of the African jungle to hunt down the deadly killer, ebola.

1 videocassette (52 min.) 1998

MEDIA 2-6850

Female circumcision human rites

Documents the ritual of female genital mutilation (female circumcision), practiced among some African groups. This video also explores its roots in myth and discusses movements underway to ban the practice.

1 videocassette (41 min.) : 1998

MEDIA 2-5103

Fintar o destino

"Fintar o destino is the Library of African Cinema's first sports film -- but a sports film with a distinctly African twist. It is the story of the aging sport hero who holds onto his past so strongly he destroys his present. At the same time, this film explores a much broader tension, personal and political, between remaining true to one's dreams or making the best of the limited opportunities around us.".

1 videocassette (77 min.) : 1998

DANA. MEDIA 1387 2-5155

Freedom now, 1947

In 1947, 160 years of British rule came to an end as India became the world's largest democracy, inspiring the fight for freedom on another continent. This film talks with the people who witnessed and participated in the struggle for independence in India and Africa. While Mohandas Gandhi showed the world how the masses could successfully defy their imperial masters, his example spurred others on: European empires in Africa and Asia began to crumble, and in short order, Ghana, Kenya, Algeria, Mozambique, and dozens more would win their freedom.

1 videocassette (56 min) : 1998

MEDIA. MEDIA 2-3850 2-5627

Friends

The close friendship between three young South African women (a white political activist, a Black schoolteacher, and an Afrikaner archeologist) is tested when the activist sets off an airport bomb during the late '80's fight against apartheid and two innocent people are killed.

1 videocassette (105 min.) : 1994

MEDIA 2-3414

Generations of resistance

Uses archival photographs, newsreel footage, and interviews to chronicle the quest by Black South Africans for economic viability and individual freedom.

1 videocassette (52 min. 21 sec.) : 1979

MEDIA DANA 361

God gave her a Mercedes Benz produced by SFINX Film/TV ; directed by Katia Forbert Petersen ; concept and research by Ingrid Nyström

Colorful markets of Africa are often dominated by strong older women, who control prices and determine who can buy their goods. These women are affectionately referred to as Mama Benz because each one has a chauffeured driven Mercedes Benz. This film focuses on one woman who presides over the cloth market in Lomé, Togo.

1 videocassette (48 min.) : 1993?

DANA. MEDIA 569 2-3610

Gorée the door of no return

Tells the history of the slave trade: the arrival of the first Europeans in Africa, the origins of slavery in the Americas and the development of Gorée Island as the expanding center of the slave trade.

1 videocassette (30 min.) : 1992

DANA 1875

The grass is singing

The story of a successful career woman who gives up the comfort of her cosmopolitan life when she falls in love with a bush farmer. She tries to assimilate herself to her forbidding new environment. Gradually farm life begins to unnerve her, and in a gripping series of events she loses her self-control and becomes sexually involved with another man.

1 videocassette (102 min.) : 1997?

MEDIA 2-5210

The guardians of Africa the tsetse fly

The African tsetse fly carries the lethal diseases of sleeping sickness and nagana. But while nagana is fatal to cattle, local wildlife are immune. Herders stay clear of the tsetse areas, leaving the wild life habitats undisturbed, but the cattle face starvation if they remain on the parched plains. This program illustrates how these facts create a unique conundrum for the cattle herders of Kenya's southern Rift Valley: death by starvation or disease.

1 videocassette (45 min.) : 1995

MEDIA 2-3439

Gumboots

It is a celebration of song and dance, an international phenomenon that has swept across the globe like a tidal wave of soaring voices and stomping feet.

1 videocassette (133 min.) : 2000

DANA 1847

Haramuya

Through Fousseini, a Muslim firmly attached to his faith and traditions, this film draws a picture of Ouagadougou in the traps of modernism and traditionalism. Foussei tries to take care of his family according to the old precepts and the code of honor inherited from his ancestors. One of his sons is a cinema projectionist and supports all the family against the will of his wife, while the other son idles around all day, looking for girlfriends.

1 videocassette (87 min.) : 1995

MEDIA 2-5260

The Hunters

A study of life and culture of primitive African bushmen as portrayed through the experiences of four aborigines and the giraffe which they hunt on the Kalahari Desert.

1 videocassette (73 min.) : 1958

MEDIA D-42

Hyènes Hyenas

Adapted from the play, Der Besuch der alten Dame, by Friedrich Dürrenmatt. The Swiss dramatist's celebrated parable of human greed is adapted into a biting satire of today's Africa--betraying the hopes of independence for the false promises of Western maleviolence. A woman who amasses a fortune returns to her hometown upon which she will bestow a great deal of money if someone there will murder her former lover who betrayed her, forcing her out of the village and into a life of prostitution.

1 videocassette (107 min.) : 1993?

MEDIA 2-3376

Iindawo Zikathixo in God's places

Examines the history and cultural legacy of the Khoisan (Bushman) of south-eastern Africa focusing on the aspects of their music, dance, rock art, oral history, and traditional rituals which have survived suppression and genocide. Filmed in the remote hills and valleys of the southern Drakensberg.

1 videocassette (52 min.) : 1997

MEDIA 2-3872

In and out of Africa

Story about Gabai Baaré, a merchant who brings wood carvings from West Africa to sell in the United States.

1 videocassette (59 min.) : 1992

DANA 1695

Jericho

A soldier flees from an unjust criminal conviction and is chased across Africa.

1 videocassette (75 min.) : 1997

MEDIA 2-3445

John Henrik Clarke a great and mighty walk

John Henrik Clarke discusses the history of Afro-Americans, placing it within the context of the history of Africa and Africans and their relationship with non-African civilizations such as Greek, Roman, European, Christian, and Islamic.

1 videocassette (94 min.) : 1996

DANA 1298

Justice pursued

Rwanda, Argentina, East Germany and Bosnia have been the locus for the most heinous acts of the last 20 years. Details torture and murder of thousands of men and women and shows how people are looking for justice for victims.

1 videocassette (50 min.) : 1998

MEDIA 2-5580

Keïta! l'héritage du griot = The heritage of the griot

The film presents a dramatization of one of the most important works of African oral tradition, the Sundjata Epic, framed in the story of a djéliba, a master griot or bard, who arrives at the home of a young boy to teach him "the meaning of his name." The legend of the boy's distant ancestor, Sundjata Keïta, who rose from unpromising beginnings to found the great of Milian trading empire of the 13th cent., initiates the boy into the traditions his family has rejected.

1 videocassette (97 min.) : 1995

DANA. MEDIA 1296 2-2888

Legacy of the spirits

Describes the religion of voodooism and gives an account of its history in Africa, the Caribbean, and the United States. Filmed in New York, the work contains interviews with participants and depictions of ceremonies.

1 videocassette (52 min.) : 199

DANA. DANA 700 700

The life and times of Sara Baartman "The Hottentot Venus"

A documentary film on the life of a Khoi Khoi woman who was taken from South Africa in 1810 and exhibited as a freak across Britain. The image and ideas for "The Hottentot Venus" (particularly the interest in her sexual anatomy) swept through British popular culture. A court battle waged by abolitionists to free her from her exhibitors failed. In 1814, a year before her death, she was taken to France and became the object of scientific research that formed the bedrock of European ideas about black female sexuality.

1 videocassette (52 min.) : 1998

MEDIA 2-5019

The lost warriors a bride's story

This segment provides an introduction to the Afar by recording two major life events: the arranged marriage of a most reluctant bride and the initiation of a nervous would-be warrior.

1 videocassette (54 min.) : 2001

MEDIA 2-1814

Mama Africa

Uno's world / written and directed by Bridget Pickering ; co-produced by Onland Productions and Namibian Broadcasting Corporation ; a Zimmedia & Ice Media Production -- Hangtime / written and directed by Ngozi Onwurah ; produced by Simon Onwurah ; produced in association with YLE/TVI Co-Productions ; a Zimmedia & Non-Aligned Production -- Raya / directed by Zulfah Otto-Sallies ; produced by Steven Markowitz & Platon Trakoshis ; written by Zulfan Otto-Sallies, Henrietta Rose-Innes and Brian Tilley ; produced in association with VLE/TVI Co-Productions ; Canal Horizon ; a Big World Cinema Production for ZimmediaUno's world: Young girl learns that dressing up in fancy clothes does not make her a woman. Hangtime: Young boy tries to have it all through basketball. Raya: A young woman learns to leave her past behind, change her life and do it right.

1 videocassette (87 min.) : 2001

MEDIA 2-5750

Masks from many cultures

"Masks from different regions of the world and from diverse cultures are presented in this program. This overview includes images of over 100 masks which are combined with sequences of dances and festivals where masks are worn...Among the masks presented are examples from New Guinea, Bali, China, Tibet, Japan, Korea, Africa, Mexico, Guatemala, Bolivia, as well as a variety of masks by North American Indians."--Container.

1 videocassette (21 min.) : 1992

DANA 729

Master Harold ... and the boys

A young white man's frustration with the return home of his alcoholic, handicapped father turns into racist viciousness against the two black men who work for the family.

1 videocassette (90 min.) : 1986

DANA. MEDIA 17 2-1332

Miss Goodall and the wild chimpanzees

Describes the background of Jane Goodall and her studies as she observes and records the activities of wild chimpanzees in Africa.

1 videocassette (52 min.) : 1965

MEDIA 2-1673

Mon coeur est témoin

Dramatization of correspondence and interviews with women from Africa and the Middle East about the condition of women in their countries.

1 videocassette (56 min.) : MEDIA. MEDIA 2-3906 2-5584

The mountain gorilla

Documents an intensive year-long study of the mountain gorilla in its natural habitat in Central Africa. Focuses on environment, behavior, and social organization.

1 videocassette (16 min. ) : 1959

MEDIA D-185

Muslims

Misconceptions and lack of understanding dominate America's perception of Islam, the world's second largest and fastest growing religion. Muslims takes an in-depth look at what it means to be a Muslim in the 21st century. Filmed in Egypt, Mayaysia, Iran, Turkey, Nigeria and the United States, Muslims explores the influence of culture and politics on religion, and provides a deeper understanding of the political forces at work among Muslims around the world. The film emphasizes Islam's kinship with Christianity and Judaism and looks at diverse interpretations of Islam among the Muslim people.

1 videocassette (118 min.) : 2003

DANA 1891

Ndebele women & the rituals of rebellion

This video explores the Ndebele rituals. We see their fertility rites, a celebration that bonds them to their ancestral tradition. The Ndebele performance art shows how traditional forms of expression can become a vehicle for political empowerment.

1 videocassette (60 min.) : 1995

MEDIA 2-3856

Neria

Patrick and Neria, through shared hard work and resourcefulness, built a comfortable home, a good life and family in the city. But when their loving and equal partnership suddenly ends with the tragic death of Patrick, Neria's nightmare begins.

1 videocassette (103 min.) : 1992

MEDIA 2-3819

The Nile

In this breathtaking travelogue, The Nile, the Cousteaus embark on a daring ten-month expedition along the entire course of the world's largest river, capturing on film the nile's astonishing natural beauties, menacing dangers and primative cultures and animal sanctuaries. Treasure troves of natural wonders are unearthed by the expedition as it moves from Uganda to Khartoum to Egypt, before concluding at the man-made wonders of the Nile, the Jonglei Canal and the Aswan High Dam. Emphasises some of the negative results of the building of dams and irrigation channels.

1 videocassette (116 min.) : 1986

MEDIA 2-1392

Les noms n'habitent nulle part Names live nowhere

Experiences of Senegalese living in Brussels, with commentary on African expatriates by a griot.

1 videocassette (76 min.) : 1994

MEDIA 2-5279

The one, the only, the original Dizzy Gillespie a night in Chicago

Swing low, sweet Cadillac -- Fiesta mojo -- Embraceable you -- A night in Tunisia -- Nature boy -- Dizzy's scat -- 'Round midnight1 videocassette (53 min.) : 1993

JAZZ. MUSIC 209 227

Pain, passion and profit

Anita Roddick of Body Shop International interviews several women in Africa who have successfully developed small-scale business enterprises in their own communities. She poses questions about how the role and status of women affects their enterprises and how those enterprises provide a means of community and economic development for women.

1 videocassette (49 min.) : 1992

MEDIA 2-3914

Le Pari de Bintou Bintou in Paris

This video provides a basis for discussion about the complex traditional, social, and familial context in which African parents decide whether or not to excise their daughters.

1 videocassette (17 min.) : 1994

MEDIA 2-3871

Princess Tam Tam

An exotic Pygmalion-like musical comedy about a French author who goes to North Africa to write a novel but becomes distracted--then entranced--by a native girl whom he transforms into a "princess.".

1 videocassette (80 min.) : 1989

DANA. MEDIA 305 2-1293

Race against time the HIV/AIDS pandemic in Africa

This film is about the inspiring work of Canadian Stephen Lewis, the United Nations Special Envoy on AIDS/HIV in Africa, as he searches for solutions to the pandemic ravaging the continent.

1 videocassette (48 min.) : 2002

MEDIA 2-6046

The return of Sarah Bartman

Chronicles the return of the remains of Sara Baartman, a Black woman who had been exhibited as a freak in early nineteenth-century Europe.

1 videocassette (52 min.) 2003

MEDIA 2-6540

The Rift valley

The Rift Valley was created when the land mass that is now the Arabian Peninsula and East Africa were torn apart. This program examines the geological formations, the unique flora and fauna, and the people who inhabit the longest valley in the world.

1 videocassette (44 min.) : 1991

MEDIA 2-1811

Rights of passage four stories of survival

Puberty is one of teh mnost vulnerable times in a girl's life. For young women around the world it is a time of transition, but in societies where women are not valued, puberty can be the beginning of a life of abuse and even early death. Filmed in Nicaragua, India, Jamaica and Burkina Faso, four adolescent girls speak for themselves about the personal cost of the coming of age transition.

1 videocassette (27 min.) : 1995?

MEDIA 2-3855

Sanders of the river

Commissioner Sanders, representative of the British Crown, puts down a bloody rebellion and re-establishes harmony for the pro-British river people in this tale of adventure in West Africa.

1 videocassette (85 min.) : 199

DANA 816

Sangoma

In South Africa, traditional healers have always been regarded with suspicion by practitioners of Western medicine. New efforts to integrate traditional healers into primary health care, nutritional education, and AIDS work holds some promise for a public health system under siege.

1 videocassette (54 min.) : 1996

MEDIA 2-3939

Sankofa

"Sankofa, an Akan word meaning 'one must return to the past in order to move forward,' is the story about the transformation of Mona, a self-possessed African-American woman sent on a spiritual journey in time to experience the pain of slavery and the discovery of her African identity"--Container.

1 videocassette (125 min.) : 1993

DANA. MEDIA 586 2-2598

Sisters of the screen African women in the cinema

Interviews of thirty-five women filmmakers from Africa and the African diaspora, interspersed with clips from their films.

1 videocassette (73 min.) 2002

MEDIA 2-6646

Sizwe Bansi is dead

Discusses stylization, avant-gardism, black theatre, and realism using Athol Fugard's play Sizwe Bansi is dead.

1 videocassette (60 min.) : 1978

DANA. MEDIA 558 2-1762

Slave ship 1998

Dramatic re-creations and interviews are used to tell the story of Cinque, a young man, who, in 1839, was kidnapped in his native Africa, sold into slavery and while being transported on the merchant schooner "Amistad", led a mutiny which saved him and the other imprisoned Africans from slavery.

1 videocassette (ca. 52 min.) :

158124163. DANA 1094

Something of value

The friendship of two young men is tested as violence and terror erupt amid racial strife in British East Africa.

1 videocassette (113 min.) : 1986

MEDIA 2-695

Song of freedom

Paul Robeson plays a stevedore-turned-concert singer who journeys to Africa in search of his roots.

1 videocassette (80 min.) : 1986

MEDIA 2-1303

Surviving in Africa

Paleoanthropologist Don Johanson sets out to disprove that early man's larger brain and reliance on technology are the by-products of the ability to hunt. He embarks on a journey across the Serengeti savanna of East Africa to attempt to reconstruct early man's survival behaviors. He finds food not by hunting but by scavenging off the leftovers of lions and leopards.

1 videocassette (60 min.) : 1994

MEDIA 2-2416

These girls are missing

"... in many African countries, fewer than 20% of girls ever enter a classroom, and across the continent, only one woman in three learns to read." "These girls are missing offers small sets of stories, sharp glimpses into a few intimate relationships layered to mirror the complex reality ..."--Container.

1 videocassette (60 min.) : 199

MEDIA 2-3852

Tilaï

Saga returns to his village to find that his fiancée Nogma is now his father's second wife. Saga can do nothing about the marriage within the law of the tribe. Saga and Nogma still love each other. The village views their relationship as incest. The couple leave the village to live outside the law.

1 videocassette (81 min.) : 1995

DANA. MEDIA 857 2-6114

La Vie est belle

Tells the rags to riches story of Kourou, a poor rural musician who realizes that to succeed in today's music world he must go to the city and break into radio and television. In Kinshasa he uses his wit and talent to win a beautiful wife, trick his greedy boss and succeed in singing his "theme song" on national television. Although the film is primarily entertainment, it reveals much about class divisions, male-female relations, the desires of the urban poor, and the economic and social problems confronting rural immigrants to the cities of Zaire.

1 videocassette (83 min.) : 1991

DANA. MEDIA 859 2-3615

Visages de femmes Faces of women

Two politically and stylistically adventurous films exploring the links between feminism, economics and tradition in modern-day Africa. In these intriguing stories about women in today's Africa, the first film centers on a young woman who is unhappily married and is attracted to her visiting brother-in-law. The second story centers around a successful businesswoman who tries to open a new restaurant, but runs into difficulties that only her daughter's traditional wiles can solve.

1 videocassette (103 min.) : 1995

MEDIA 2-5042

Voices of Sarafina!

Interviews with the young Black South African cast members of the Broadway production of Sarafina!, interspersed with scenes from that musical about the 1976 student uprising at a Soweto high school.

1 videocassette (85 min.) : 1991

MEDIA 2-2477

Warrior marks

A documentary on, and a protest of, female genital mutilation and sexual blinding of women and girls in Africa.

1 videocassette (54 min.) : 1993

DANA. MEDIA 709 2-3881

Wênd K uuni Le don de Dieu

A mute, memoryless child is raised in an African village by a weaver and his family. In gratitude they rename him Wênd K uuni, or "God's gift." In a series of flashbacks, we learn how bigotry and cruelty ironically drove Wênd K uuni to discover the compassion of his adopted village.

1 videocassette (70 min.) : 1982

MEDIA 2-5326

When we were kings

The untold story of the Rumble in the Jungle. This film offers a ringside seat to witness every breath and drop of sweat between two all-time heavyweight champions, Muhammad Ali and George Foreman.

1 videocassette (ca. 94 min.) : 1997

DANA. MEDIA 1060 2-3437

Who's gonna take the weight? a video dialog featuring these & other 16-19 year olds

Interviews with African-American and African youth on topics like politics, education, the importance of things, relationships and music.

1 videocassette (56 min.) 1997

MEDIA 2-6499

Wonders of the African world

[Cassette 1.] Black kingdoms of the Nile / director, Nicola Colton ; The Swahili coast / director, Nick Godwin -- [cassette 2.] The slave kingdoms / director, Nicola Colton ; The holy land / director, Nick Godwin -- [cassette 3.] The road to Timbuktu / director, Nick Godwin ; Lost cities of the South / director, Nick GodwinDocumentary film presents Henry Louis Gates, Jr. on the journey from Zanzibar to Timbuktu, the Nile River Valley to Great Zimbabwe, the slave coast of Guinea to the medieval monasteries of Ethiopia in search of the lost wonders of the African world.

3 videocassettes (ca. 360 mins.) : 2000

DANA. DANA. DANA 1787 cassette 1 1787 cassette 2 1787 cassette 3

Wonders of the African world with Henry Louis Gates, Jr

[Cassette 1]. Black kingdoms of the Nile; The Swahili coast -- [cassette 2]. The slave kingdoms; The holy land -- [cassette 3]. The road to Timbuktu; Lost cities of the SouthDocumentary film presents Henry Louis Gates, Jr. on the journey from Zanzibar to Timbuktu, the Nile River Valley to Great Zimbabwe, the slave coast of Guinea to the medieval monasteries of Ethiopia in search of the lost wonders of the African world.

3 videocassettes (ca. 360 mins.) : 1999

MEDIA. MEDIA. MEDIA 2-5253 cassette 1 2-5254 cassette 2 2-5255 cassette 3

Yaaba 1989

An old woman pariah is befriended by a young boy. During a brawl, the boy's friend is cut by a rusty knife and she contracts a fever. The local witch doctor claims the old woman's evil spirit has entered the girl. The old woman seeks the assistance of an old medicine man who provides a cure.

1 videocassette (90 min.) :

DANA 1218

Yeelen Brightness

A film adaptation of one of the great oral epics of the Bambara people, set during the powerful Mali Empire of the 13th century. Tells the story of Nianankoro, a young Bambara warrior destined to destroy a corrupt older society, the secret Komo cult, and with it his father, and, inevitably, himself. The climactic flash of light which floods the screen at the film's end ushers in a new purified world order and captures the Bambara belief in time as circular, not linear, always returning to that initial "brightness" which created the world.

3 film reels (105 min.) : 1987

MEDIA DANA 5-789 reel 1 5-790 reel 2 5-791 reel 3 357