Herskovits

Documentary Film World Premiere!
Friday, February 13, 8:00 PM
Herskovits at the Heart of Blackness
(Llewellyn Smith, 2008, U.S., 54 minutes, DVD)
Brilliant, ambitious, high-minded, manipulative, Melville Herskovits was an anthropologist who pioneered the study of Africa in the United States. Herskovits was the Chair of African Studies at Northwestern—the first such position in American academia—and his groundbreaking work detailed the influence of African cultures on African-American society. His success and authority pushed some black scholars to the margins; paradoxically, his work became a powerful tool for black liberation movements in the U.S. and abroad. Bringing together archival footage and interviews of leading scholars of race and culture, Herskovits depicts an ongoing struggle over who has the power to describe and define the contours of our cultural history. Introduced by Llewellyn Smith, the film’s director.