Indigenous Studies

Within the human struggle to live and work on a changing planet, questions of value, extraction, and adaptation echo across seemingly disparate worlds. A Common Sequence examines shifts of life and labor through a critically-endangered salamander and plant patents in the apple industry. Weaving the stories of Dominican nuns running a conservation lab, a group of fisherman attempting to live off of a depleting lake, engineers developing AI-driven harvesting machines, and an indigenous biomedical researcher resisting the commodification of human DNA, the film becomes a meditation on the shifting border between the natural and unnatural world, and the dynamics of power at play.

A five-part docu series that chronicles the Chinese Canadian experience through the lens of small-town Asian food joints and the families that run them. Ride the rails with chef and author, Jackie Kai Ellis, as she explores Canadian Chop Suey cuisine.

An immersive marvel of sonic ethnography, Expedition Content draws on audio recordings made by recent college graduate and Standard Oil heir Michael Rockefeller as part of the so-called Harvard-Peabody Expedition to Netherlands New Guinea in 1961

An oneiric journey through Alex's life as a former guerrilla leads to a reckoning with the devil inside of him. His only cure is ayahuasca,  sacred plant used by the indigenous community where he comes from. As both a perpetrator and victim, Alex exemplifies the complexity of the Colombian conflict and the difficulties of simply moving on.  

Red Chef Revival is a unique and intimate documentary that follows three trailblazing chefs on a cross country journey to redefine and reclaim Indigenous cuisine. Using food as their access point, these chefs discover a new path to reconciliation, while working with ingredients you won't find in any cookbooks, like bison heart, beaver tail, moose nose, seal and cougar. 

HÍBRIDOS, THE SPIRITS OF BRAZIL is an ethnomusicological journey into the sacred culture of Brazil, from Roman Catholic to Ubanda and candomblé--mixures of African traditions with Catholicism.

Keep Talking follows four Alaska Native women fighting to save Kodiak Alutiiq, an endangered language now spoken by less than 40 remaining fluent Native Elders.

A genre-bending portrait of globalization, we follow a Mexican Zoque shaman and his encounters with outside forces—from capitalism, to the culture of cinema, and the directors themselves.

Forcefully removed from their ancestral home by the Ugandan government to protect the endangered gorilla population, the indigenous Batwa people start a music club in hopes to preserve their culture through song and story.

Survivors Rowe documents the tragic stories of three men who were victims of Ralph Rowe, an Anglican priest who molested over 500 children, and the courageous journey they undertake to arrive at a place of healing and forgiveness.

Zipporah was a girl when her family was among the eighty Inuit to be sent to the high arctic by the Canadian government. Through haunting interviews, archival footage and experimental animation, Resolute tells a story familiar to thousands of indigenous families in Canada and beyond.

An immersive, visually stunning portrait of a childhood on the margins of society by Emmy-nominated director Aaron Schock, La Laguna documents the remarkable journey undertaken by a Mayan adolescent as he tries to navigates the changing world around him in the endangered rainforests of southern Mexico.

After decades of sold out shows and international recognition, musician Gilberto Gil embarks on a new kind of world tour. Traveling from Brazil to Australia and Africa, where he meets with local indigenous communities, Gil continues the work he began as Brazil's first black Minister of Culture - promoting the power of cultural diversity in a globalized world and sharing his vision for the future: a diverse, interconnected planet filled with hope, exchange… and of course music!

On a remote archipelago in the Pacific Northwest, an uncommon abundance of animal and vegetable life has sustained the Haida people for countless generations. Following traditional food harvesters as they gather and prepare for the winter, Survival Prayer is an intimate ethnographic portrait of an indigenous community and the conditions - environmental and man-made - that threaten their way of life.

A gorgeously filmed ethnographic portrait of an elderly Kenyan shark fisherman who has a primeval bond with the ocean and its creatures, Wavumba: They Who Smell of Fish delivers an enchanting depiction of Africa's storytelling tradition, where fantasy, dreams, belief and reality blend.

An engrossing ethnographic work, Canícula is a study of the rich cultural heritage and traditions of the Totonac people of Veracruz, Mexico, who have resided in this region for thousands of years. Beautifully photographed, this documentary features rare footage of the Totonac's "voladores" ritual ("the flying dance"), named an Intangible Cultural Heritage by UNESCO.

An extraordinary and exquisite work of anthropology, directed by acclaimed filmmaker Rolf de Heer, Twelve Canoes paints a vivid portrait of the people, history, culture and place of the Yolngu people whose homeland is the Arafura Swamp of north-central Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory, Australia.

An astounding new documentary on the first victims of global warming, The Last Days of Shishmaref travels to a small village in northwest Alaska, home to an Inupiaq Eskimo community, where homes are literally falling into the sea. The entire village is expected to disappear within 10 years.

Narrated in part by Roy Scheider, Mystic Voices tells the story of a pivotal event in the early history of the Colonial America that set the stage for the ultimate domination of Native Peoples by European settlers.