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In partnership with the Program in African & African-American Studies, Washington University Film & Media Archive will award an undergraduate prize of $500 to an outstanding essay, or other serious research project, that makes significant use of rare or unique materials from any of the Archive's collections.
This prize honors the life and work of filmmaker William Miles, who chronicled the achievements of African Americans in documentaries such as I Remember Harlem and Men of Bronze. The Film & Media Archive houses the William Miles Collection, and is a treasure trove for scholars of history and culture. Subjects represented in the Archive's collections include the Civil Rights Movement, the Great Depression, Great Society programs, 20th- century African-American culture and arts, African Americans in the sciences, pro-democracy movements in Africa, and many other topics.
Eligibility requirements and other information
Travel reimbursement grants of up to $1000 are available to faculty, graduate students, undergraduates, and independent scholars who would like to use our collections for research. Funds may be used for transportation, food, lodging, and photocopying. Applicants must reside at least 50 miles from St. Louis. Follow the link for more information and the application form.
Application Deadline: March 15, 2012. Travel must occur between May 15, 2012 and June 30, 2013.
Grant to WUSTL Libraries supports preservation of renowned documentary and interviews on the American civil rights movement.
Washington University in St. Louis has received a four-year, $550,000 grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to preserve Henry Hampton’s award-winning civil rights documentary Eyes on the Prize: America’s Civil Rights Years, 1954-1965 as well as Hampton’s complete, unedited interviews recorded on film for the documentary. The grant is one of the largest ever received by University Libraries.
For the full press release, click here.
Eyes on the Prize is a 14-part series which was originally released in two parts in 1985 and 1988. This series, which debuted on PBS stations, is considered to be the definitive documentary on the Civil Rights Movement. Eyes on the Prize won more than twenty major awards and attracted over 20 million viewers. These interviews are part of the Henry Hampton Collection housed at the Film and Media Archive at Washington University Libraries. Each transcript represents the entire interview conducted by Blackside including sections which appeared in the final program and the outtakes. All of the interviews from Eyes on the Prize I and II are available online with full text search capability.This project is part of Washington University's Digital Gateway and was produced by Digital Library Services and the Film and Media Archive.
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The Washington University Film & Media Archive is pleased to welcome producer and documentary filmmaker Jon Else to campus this month. Else is visiting the Archive to conduct research for his forthcoming book about the Eyes on the Prize series and its creator Henry Hampton.
On Friday, Nov. 18, at 12 p.m. in Olin 142, Else will discuss his research and share his experiences working as producer and cinematographer for the Eyes series—arguably the most influential documentary series of its time.
Else has produced and directed numerous documentary films including The Day After Trinity: J. Robert Oppenheimer and the Atomic Bomb, Yosemite: The Fate of Heaven, A Job at Ford’s part of Henry Hampton’s series The Great Depression, Cadillac Desert: Water and the Transformation of Nature, Sing Faster: The Stagehands’ Ring Cycle, and Open Outcry. He has also served as cinematographer on documentaries for PBS, BBC, ABC, MTV, and HBO.
Else has received a MacArthur Fellowship as well as several Academy Award nominations. His numerous awards include four Emmys, several Alfred I. DuPont and Peabody awards, the Prix Italia, the Sundance Special Jury Prize, and the Sundance Filmmaker’s Trophy. In addition to writing and filmmaking, Else teaches at the Graduate School of Journalism at UC – Berkeley.
The Nov. 18 brown bag lunch presentation will take place in Olin 142 and is free and open to faculty, students, staff, and the public. For more information and to RSVP (preferred), contact Film and Media Archive at wufilmarchives@wumail.wustl.edu or 314-935-8679.
Washington University Libraries Film & Media Archive is sponsoring a screening of The Pruitt-Igoe Myth as part of the St. Louis International Film Festival. The Film & Media Archive previously co-sponsored a well-attended screening on September 15, 2011.
The screening will be on Sat. Nov. 12, 3:00 p.m. at Washington University’s Brown Hall. With director Chad Freidrichs and several of the film’s subjects. Please join us for a free screening of this thought-provoking documentary.
For more information, contact the Film & Media Archive. For reviews and background information on the film see the filmmaker’s website.
The Center for the Humanities and University Libraries will host independent journalist and filmmaker Brian Palmer for a presentation of his documentary film, Full Disclosure, at 7 p.m. on Oct. 12 (Wilson 214). The event is free and open to the public, with a reception in Olin Library's Ginkgo Reading Room immediately following the screening.
The film, shot by Palmer during his time as an embedded journalist with a U.S. Marine combat unit in Iraq, concentrates on the daily activities of the American troops and the effects on the troops themselves as well as Iraqi civilians. Palmer made his first trip to Iraq as journalist and photographer in 2004. Armed only with a pen and a camera, he felt that his essays and photographs did not sufficiently capture the experience. So when he returned in 2005 and 2006, he brought a video camera. "I tried to probe deeper into the stories of the Marines and the Iraqi men and women I met," Palmer says. The film also explores the filmmaker's conflicting role as an impartial journalist sometimes mistaken for a Marine.
"My presence affected everyone's behavior. Although I didn't carry a gun, I looked intimidating in my black helmet, desert camouflage bulletproof vest, and combat boots," he says. "Small children cried and ran away if I came too close."
Palmer has written for Mother Jones, The Huffington Post, Pixel Press.org, and ColorLines, among others, and produced video projects for various outlets including PBS and MTV. He is a Fellow at NYU's Center on Law and Security and the recipient of a Nation Institute grant for reporting in Bangladesh in 2010. Palmer received a Ford Foundation Knowledge, Creativity, and Freedom grant in 2008 to complete Full Disclosure. He is an instructor at The School of Visual Arts in New York City and an adjunct instructor at Baruch College, City University of New York.
In conjunction with the screening, an exhibition of Palmer's photography and journal excerpts will be featured in the Grand Staircase Lobby in Olin Library. Also on display will be war-related materials from the Libraries' Department of Special Collections. For more information, contact the Libraries' Film & Media Archive at 314-935-6154.
Washington University Film & Media Archive hosts the annual Home Movie Day, an international event that invites the public to share their Regular 8mm, Super 8mm, and 16mm home movies, on Saturday, October 15, 2011.
The event will be held at the West Campus Conference Center from noon to 3 p.m. In addition to screening home movies, the event provides an opportunity to learn how to care for home movies. We also encourage people to bring home movies on video or DVD, in addition to film.
Contact the Film & Media Archive (wufilmarchives@wumail.wustl.edu or 314-935-8679) for information about including your home movies in the program.
The Film and Media Archive is pleased to announce that the winner of the 2011 Miles Prize is the essay "A Coincidental Cup of Kenyan Coffee: SNCC and Malcolm X Recast the Struggle in Nairobi" by Howard Rudnick. The essay investigates the influence of various African freedom struggles on the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, a major organization in the American Civil Rights Movement.
Howard is a Washington University Graduate who majored in history and economics. His research was directed by Dr. Jean Allman. We offer our congratulations to him on an insightful and well-researched essay.
Sponsored by the Program in African and African-American Studies and by the Film and Media Archive, the Miles Prize honors the life and work of African-American filmmaker William Miles. Essays submitted for the contest must make significant use of materials held by the Film and Media Archive.
Talk by Celia James, Film and Media Archive Travel Grant recipient, on the impact of images in film on the Civil Rights Movement.
Celia James is a doctoral student in the History Department at the University of South Carolina, where she received her master's in public history and museum education in 2009. She is interested in how visual images are understood by civil rights activists across the 20th century. Her master's thesis examined a 1934 documentary for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, A Study of Educational Inequalities, that compared black and white segregated schools in South Carolina. She is expanding this research further into the 20th century using Washington University's Eyes on the Prize materials.
Join HEC-TV and the Film and Media Archive for the premiere of Dana Brown's Life on Safari.
Thursday, December 9
6:30 pm: Documentary Premiere
8 pm: Reception and Meet the Producer
Washington University
Steinberg Auditorium in Steinberg Hall
At the corner of Skinker and Forsyth on the Southeast side of campus.
"This is Safari Land and I am Dana Brown."
With those famous words, coffee entrepreneur and big game hunter Dana Brown invited St. Louis audiences to join him on adventures deep in the African and Asian wilds. Each commercial ran like a mini-documentary, teaching viewers about the animals and the people of faraway places, but always ending with a pitch for coffee. Who is the man behind the bold and adventurous public persona? Join HEC-TV as we premiere Dana Brown's Life on Safari and find out.
View the invitation. (pdf)
Washington University Film & Media Archive hosts the annual Home Movie Day, an international event that invites the public to share their Regular 8mm, Super 8mm, and 16mm home movies, on Saturday, October 16, 2010. The event will be held at the West Campus Conference Center from noon to 4 p.m. In addition to screening home movies, the event provides an opportunity to learn how to care for home movies.
Contact the Film & Media Archive (wufilmarchives@wumail.wustl.edu or 314-935-8679) for information about including your home movies in the program.
You are invited to a lecture and book signing by Rhodes Scholar and Navy Seal, Eric Greitens, in conjunction with the opening of a special exhibition of a selection of images from Eric's award-winning book, Strength & Compassion. For more information about Eric Greitens and his book, combining international humanitarian photography work with a striking series of essays, see http://www.ericgreitens.com
Date: Tuesday, November 3, 2009
Time: 5:30 - 7:30 pm
Location:
Olin Library
Lecture: Room 142
Exhibition and book signing: Ginkgo Reading Room
The exhibition seeks to educate communities about the impact of genocide and demonstrates what we can learn from survivors who have lived through some of the world's most horrific circumstances.
This event is free and open to the public; copies of the book will be available for purchase.
You are invited to the William Miles Prize Reception on Friday, May 1st at 5 pm in the Room 142, Olin Library. The William Miles Prize honors student essays that draw upon materials from the Film and Media Archive.
This prize honors the life and work of filmmaker William Miles, who chronicled the achievements of African Americans in documentaries such as I Remember Harlem and Men of Bronze. The Washington University Film and Media Archive houses the William Miles Collection. In partnership with the African & African American Studies Program, the Archive will award a graduate prize of $500 and an undergraduate prize of $500 to outstanding essays, or other serious research projects, that make significant use of rare or unique materials from the archive.
For Contest Details click here. (pdf)
The prize in both categories is $500.
Deadline: April 1, 2009
Co-sponsored by the Film and Media Archive and the African American Studies Program.
The Film and Media Archive has created a YouTube Channel. Click the link to view selected videos.
The Film and Media Archive has created a new blog, Out of the Archive. Entries will cover news, activities, and information about materials in the Film Archive.