Black Studies in Video | Alexander Street
Black Studies in Video

Black Studies in Video

Black Studies in Video is an award-winning black studies portfolio that brings together seminal documentaries, powerful interviews, and previously unavailable archival footage surveying the black experience. The collection contains 500 hours of film covering African American history, politics, art and culture, family structure, gender relationships, and social and economic issues.

Exclusively from Alexander Street, Black Studies in Video features the SNCC Legacy Video Collection, a series of over fifty hours of formal addresses, panel discussions, and programs that took place at the 50th anniversary conference and reunion commemorating the founding of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee.

The collection includes documentaries on leading artists, writers, musicians, playwrights, and performers, such as Toni Morrison, Langston Hughes, Huey P. Newton, Frantz Fanon, Zora Neale Hurston, Richard Wright, Eldridge Cleaver, August Wilson, Bobby Seale, Ethel Waters, Amiri Baraka, and Robert F. Williams.

The database also draws from the Hatch-Billops Collection, a critically acclaimed archive of primary and secondary resource materials focused on black American art, drama, and literature. Additional content includes the SNCC archives, the NAACP archives, and archives from select Historically Black Colleges and Universities. The collection is further enhanced by content from key production partners, including:

  • Dr. Huey P. Newton Foundation
  • California Newsreel
  • Education Video Group
  • Filmakers Library
  • MVD Entertainment Group
  • NewsHour Productions
  • Rediscovery Productions
  • Tony Brown Productions Inc.

Functionality for scholarship and classroom use

  • The collection will feature Alexander Street’s newly enhanced video player that includes variable bit streaming up to 2.5 mbps, and expanded embedded video capability.
  • Synchronized, searchable transcripts run alongside each video.
  • Visual tables of contents let you quickly scan each film.
  • Permanent URLs let users cite and share video easily.
  • Rich playlist functionality lets users create, annotate, and organize clips and include links to relevant content.
  • Permissions for in-class, on-campus, and remote-access viewing are all included.

Publication details

Black Studies in Video is an online collection available to academic, public, and school libraries worldwide via subscription or onetime purchase of perpetual rights. No special setup or software is required—all you need is an Internet browser.


Testimonials

Alexander Street's Black Studies in Video collection fills a gap in our understanding of Black cultural production by giving scholars and students access to long-lost, politically-engaged Black media productions of the 1960s and 1970s ... collections like these make it possible to teach and research the long history of Black revolution and revolt through images.

Ellen Scott, Assistant Professor of Media History, CUNY-Queens College

Black Studies in Video would make a solid addition to any curriculum looking to incorporate in-depth video footage focused on exploring the African American experience. After evaluating and comparing this product to other steaming video platforms, I found the subject specific content and available navigation features to be vastly superior. The database contains high-quality video content, and its user-friendliness allows for a spectrum of users, from the novice to the experienced researcher, the ability to easily search for and find helpful video content.

Jamillah Scott-Branch, Head Reference Librarian, North Carolina Central University Reference Reviews