The Peacefulness of the Long Distance Revolutionary: A Film Review by Eric Mann

The Peacefulness of the Long Distance Revolutionary: A Film Review by Eric Mann

December 2012 Long Distance Revolutionary: a Journey with Mumia Abu-Jamal, is a compelling documentary about a riveting historical figure—a passionate, partisan, and persuasive intervention in the not at all “free marketplace of ideas.” Mumia Abu Jamal is the most famous...

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Lincoln’s White Blind Spot: The Slaves Were the Leading Actors in Their Own Emancipation – A Film Review by Eric Mann

Lincoln’s White Blind Spot: The Slaves Were the Leading Actors in Their Own Emancipation – A Film Review by Eric Mann

Preface to the review which follows below: My work on Stephen Spielberg's film, Lincoln has been transformative. I have gone back to read W. E. B. Dubois’ Black Reconstruction in America, Doris Kearns Goodman’s Band of Rivals, and Fawn Brodie’s...

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Steven Spielberg’s Lincoln: Where are Frederick Douglass and the 200,000 armed runaway slaves?

Steven Spielberg’s Lincoln: Where are Frederick Douglass and the 200,000 armed runaway slaves?

My thesis is that the film does a great historical disservice by portraying the Civil War as a debate among white people about Black people, who, in the film, hardly exist. I am especially disappointed and baffled by the decisions...

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