Independent Lens

I Am Not Your Negro - "The Future of the Negro" - Clip

In this excerpt from the Independent Lens film I Am Not Your Negro, writer James Baldwin speaks on 1963's “The Negro and The American Promise” about the "the future of the Negro in this country," which is "precisely as bright or as dark as the future of the country." The central question he asks is aimed at American white people, asking them to address why they created the idea of "the nigger."

I Am Not Your Negro - "The Future of the Negro" - Clip

1m 58s

  • Make Peace or Die: Honor the Fallen: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    Make Peace or Die: Honor the Fallen

    S26 E2 - 1h 25m

    Riddled with survivor's guilt after his unit lost 17 men during "Operation Enduring Freedom" in Afghanistan, Marine veteran Anthony Marquez makes it his mission to reconnect with the Gold Star families of the fallen. By carving and hand-delivering a battlefield cross for each of the families affected by loss, Anthony finds the path to heal himself.

  • All God's Children | The History of White People in America, Episode 5: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    All God's Children | The History of White People in America, Episode 5

    4m 15s

    In this moving, animated short, poet Ashley M. Jones offers a lyrical historical account of Ann Williams, an enslaved Black woman who won her freedom in the 1830s. When faced with the torturous fate of being separated from her family and sold into Southern slavery, Williams took a literal leap of faith to avoid the dreadful mandate.

  • The Diary of Afong Moy | The History of White People in America, Episode 4: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    The Diary of Afong Moy | The History of White People in America, Episode 4

    4m 52s

    Acclaimed poet Sally Wen Mao narrates the animated history of Afong Moy, America’s first recorded Chinese woman. She was brought to America by merchants and was exhibited as a circus oddity in 1830s New York City. She was eventually managed and exploited by circus showman P.T. Barnum as a sideshow attraction.

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