Sunday, March 15, 2009

Behind the Scenes with Something the Lord Made

A couple of extra goodies for you today:

There is a wonderful review of Something the Lord Made at the blog Big Media Vandalism. The author, blogger Odienator, describes himself thusly:

That bald, Black, half-blind kid sure plays a mean pinball.

His writing is engaging and intelligent. He compellingly shares his personal feelings and observations. Warning: you might not ever want to leave the site. It's awesome place to learn more about how popular culture and history are viewed by someone for whom, as I think comedian Chris Rock put it, every day is Black History Day. His irreverent use of slang and dialect threw me a bit at first, but I had to laugh at his label "Black History Mumf" and general silliness like:
"The management wishes to inform you that it is aware that the proper spelling of "colored" is "cullud," and also asks: Please, no drooling on Lena Horne."

Too funny! Read his review and tell me what you think.

There are zillions of sites with teaching ideas to discuss African American History. I found a neat one linked to the Partners of the Heart PBS site. You could spend years checking out all the links!

A video clip of interviews with Alan Rickman and Mos Def and one of the men who knew Blalock and Thomas back in the day is found by clicking here.

Because you know I am a HUGE Rickman fan, I'm compelled to share this piece - Rickman reciting the poem The Long War by Laurie Lee.



If you'd like to learn more about the poet, check this out.

We haven't really explored the issue of war in this course other than looking at the Japanese internments. Perhaps that could be the focus of another course. Are you interested? What films would you like to view and discuss? I'd love to show The Wind That Shakes The Barley, about the Irish civil war. Of course, I'd also love to have an Irish film course. Would anyone care to have me offer that?

2 comments:

TBM said...

Swoon! Alan Rickman. I think he's sitting on the stage of The New Globe theatre, too. I'm showing this to Roxi when she gets home. Thanks for posting this :-)

odienator said...

Thanks again for linking to the site! I'm glad its owner, Steven Boone, allows me to hijack it once a year to act a fool and occasionally teach a valuable lesson at the end, sort of like a much skinnier Fat Albert.