EYES ON THE PRIZE: Special screenings
January 12, 2010 to January 15, 2010 - 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM
Narrated by Julian Bond.
TUESDAY: January 12th, 7pm
Awakenings (1954-1956): Covers two events that helped to focus the nation’s attention on the rights of black Americans: the 1955 lynching in Mississippi of 14-year-old Emmett Till and the 1955-56 Montgomery, Ala. boycott. Also shows southern race relations at mid-century and witnesses the awakening of individuals to their own courage and power.
Fighting back (1957-1962): Covers stories detailing the confrontation between state and federal governments over enforcement of the law of equality, which marked an escalation in the struggle for civil rights from which there was no turning back.
WEDNESDAY: January 13th, 7pm
Ain’t scared of your jails (1960-1961): Covers lunch counter sit-ins and their impact on the Kennedy and Nixon presidential race of 1960, the formation of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, and the freedom rides of 1961.
No easy walk (1961-1963): Visits the cities where the tactics of nonviolent protest met both success and failure. Also covers the high point of those emotional times, the 1963 March on Washington, and the violence that followed.
THURSDAY: January 14th, 7pm
Mississippi : is this America? (1962-1964): Focuses on the right to vote. Tells how the black citizens who had been denied the right to vote stepped forward and demanded a place in the political process. Medgar Evers, Michael Schwerner, Andrew Goodman, James Chaney, and others, died trying to help them. Shows the formation of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party to challenge the 1964 Democratic Party Convention.
Bridge to freedom (1965): When civil rights protesters marching from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama were assaulted by police, national outrage over the brutality led to President Johnson providing the protection of federal troops, and ultimately to the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
FRIDAY: January 15th, 7pm
The time has come (1964-1966): Malcolm X…Stokely Carmichael…”Black Power”. After a decade-long cry for justice, a new sound is on the horizon: the insistent call for power.
Two societies (1965-1968): Chicago…Detroit…the Kerner Commission. Examine the color lines outside of the south with rarely seen, personal testimony by Jesse Jackson, Andrew Young, and others who survived the times.