Henry Louis Gates, Jr.
Birthday: 1950-09-16 Place of Birth: Keyser, West Virginia, USA
Synopsis
Henry Louis "Skip" Gates, Jr. is an American historian, literary critic, filmmaker and public intellectual who currently serves as the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor and Director of the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research at Harvard University.
Acting
Frederick Douglass: In Five Speeches
Acclaimed actors draw from five of Douglass’ legendary speeches, to represent a different moment in the tumultuous history of 19th century America as well as a different stage of Douglass’ long and celebrated life, while famed scholars provide context for the speeches, and remind us that Frederick Douglass’ words about racial injustice still resonate deeply today.
The Black Church: This Is Our Story, This Is Our Song
The 400-year-old story of the black church in America, the changing nature of worship spaces, and the men and women who shepherded them from the pulpit, the choir loft, and church pews.
The Black Church: This Is Our Story, This Is Our Song
The 400-year-old story of the black church in America, the changing nature of worship spaces, and the men and women who shepherded them from the pulpit, the choir loft, and church pews.
John Lewis: Good Trouble
The timely biopic focuses on John Lewis’ longstanding prominence as a civil rights champion and his continuing crusade for racial and social equality. The documentary illuminates the 80-year-old Congressman’s life as it chronicles the moments on the extraordinary journey that have shaped his place in history and make him such a galvanizing figure today as protests circle the globe. Lewis’ schedule has increased ten-fold as he has become the go-to figure for TV news shows, podcasts and newspapers and magazines from the Washington Post to Vanity Fair, commenting on and leading the way forward through today’s worldwide protests and demonstrations.
Reconstruction: America After the Civil War
Explore the transformative years following the American Civil War, when the nation struggled to rebuild itself in the face of profound loss, massive destruction, and revolutionary social change. The twelve years that composed the post-war Reconstruction era (1865-77) witnessed a seismic shift in the meaning and makeup of our democracy.
Africa's Great Civilizations
Henry Louis Gates Jr. takes a look at the history of Africa, from the birth of humankind to the dawn of the 20th century. A breathtaking and personal journey through two hundred thousand years of history, from the origins, on the African continent, of art, writing and civilization itself, through the millennia in which Africa and Africans shaped not only their own rich civilizations, but also the wider world.
13th
An in-depth look at the prison system in the United States and how it reveals the nation's history of racial inequality.
Black America Since MLK: And Still I Rise
A look at the last five decades of African American history since the major civil rights victories through the eyes of Henry Louis Gates, Jr., exploring the tremendous gains and persistent challenges of these years.
Finding Your Roots
Noted Harvard scholar Henry Louis Gates, Jr. has been helping people discover long-lost relatives hidden for generations within the branches of their family trees. Professor Gates utilizes a team of genealogists to reconstruct the paper trail left behind by our ancestors and the world’s leading geneticists to decode our DNA and help us travel thousands of years into the past to discover the origins of our earliest forebears.
Nat Turner: A Troublesome Property
In 1831, Nat Turner led a slave rebellion in the United States that resulted in the murder of local slave owners and their families, the eventual execution of 55 rebels and the retribution lynching of more than 200 innocent slaves. Nat Turner: A Troublesome Property examines how the story of Turner’s revolt has been interpreted throughout history and how it continues to raise new questions about the nature of terrorism and other forms of violent resistance to oppression. The film adopts an innovative structure by interspersing documentary footage and interviews with dramatizations of these different versions of Turner’s story. A unique collaboration between MacArthur Genius Award feature director Charles Burnett, acclaimed historian of slavery Kenneth S. Greenberg and Academy Award-nominated documentary producer Frank Christopher, Nat Turner is a compelling look at one of history’s most mysterious figures.
