American Studies

Examines the plight of a Kentucky tobacco farmer and his family in the face of uncertain government price support programs and a growing national antismoking campaign.

This expose of the plight of undocumented Mexican workers in the U.S. also provides a comprehensive overview of the complex issue of Mexican immigration, including interviews with prominent scholars, attorneys and organizers.

Particularly recommended as a teaching tool regarding issues of Latino Studies, Chicano Studies, Immigration, and Cultural Studies.

Examines the closing of three major steel plants in Youngstown, Ohio, between 1976 and 1980, showing the social and human costs of this tragedy through interviews with steelworkers, their families and friends, labor attorneys, local union leaders and community activists.

This video offers an in-depth historical examination of Connecticut's Naugatuck Valley brass industry, from its heyday to its present decline. From the mid-19th century to its peak during WWI, 'Brass Valley' produced more than half of America's brass goods, from buttons and belt buckles to auto parts, pistols and cannon shells.

This video tells the story of a hardworking, self-sufficient, fiercely independent community of fishermen and women working the waters of Virginia's Chesapeake Bay.

This video portrays the work of men who continue to earn a living by harvesting shellfish from Long Island Bay, near New York City, and selling them to local markets.

This video examines the world of New York City's hot-dog vendors, revealing their lifestyles, hopes and dreams, and the political struggle in which New York's Mayor Rudy Giuliani is attempting to restrict their access to the city's streets. It features interviews with a wide variety of vendors, and members of the city's Vendor Review Panel and Business Improvement District.

Filmmaker Bob Giges focuses on his spirited 90-year-old grandmother, Belle Demner McCoy, for an intimate portrait of one woman's struggle with the conflicts between family, religion and love.

A dramatic portrait of immigrant life in the U.S. as seen through the eyes of the sweatshop workers who made up the Jewish anarchist movement.

During the Great Depression, 120 families of Jewish garment workers from New York City moved to the New Jersey countryside to develop a government-sponsored, agro- industrial cooperative community. This film tells the story of the cooperative community through archival footage, photos and interviews with original homesteaders and their children.

Tells the story of the anti-Nazi and rescue activities of the American Jewish labor movement, including their aid to the Underground fighters of the ghettoes of East Europe, and their assistance to Holocaust survivors in refugee camps across the globe. The video features rare archival footage and photos, plus interviews with labor veterans, Holocaust survivors and scholars.

In the 1930s Jewish intellectuals who escaped Nazi Germany and immigrated to the U.S. faced an uncertain future. Confronted with anti-Semitism at American universities and a public distrust of foreigners, many sought refuge in an unlikely place-traditionally black colleges in the segregated South.

Novelist Peter Quinn hosts this documentary on Irish immigration into New York City in the mid-nineteenth century. The video visits the NYC locations described in Quinn's novel, The Banished Children of Eve, combining historical photos from the 1860's with remnants of the buildings in the 1990's.

Examines both the continuity and the changes that have affected Irish traditional music since the turn of the century. Using New York City as the focus, this video mixes historical photographs and film footage with contemporary interviews and performances.

Mary Crehan Dillon, the filmmaker's 96-year-old Irish-American grandmother, who as a 17-year-old emigrated alone to the U.S. in 1911, reminisces about her early life in Ireland, her momentous decision to emigrate, and her new life in America.

Based on the autobiography of Donegal-born Michael MacGowan, ( 1865-1948), this video is a stirring account of his life as a migrant worker and exile in America at the turn of the century.

A colorful portrait of the culture and lifestyles of the `Flower Power' era, 1968-72, including rock music, brown rice, organic gardens, astrology, communes and collectives, and assorted chemical contraband.

An incisive examination of the historical roots of the Cold War and its effects on American life.

In October 1947, screenwriter Gordon Kahn was one of those subpoenaed to appear before the House on Un-American Activities Committee which was investigating `communist subversion' of the film industry.

Tells the story of Joe Hill (1879-1915), a Swedish immigrant to America who became a songwriter, cartoonist and labor organizer for the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) and whose 1915 execution by the state of Utah for a crime he probably did not commit transformed him into a martyr for the labor movement and an international folk hero.