The highly acclaimed film “I Am Not Your Negro” will show at 6:30 p.m. Jan. 16 in the Nebraska Union Auditorium.
An Oscar nominee for best documentary, the film examines race in America and is narrated by Samuel L. Jackson.
The free event is presented by NET, Nebraska’s PBS and NPR Stations, in partnership with university. An informal discussion will follow the screening and be moderated by Patrick Jones, a professor of history and ethnic studies.
The screening is part of the university’s MLK Week activities, which celebrate the life and legacy of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. It also begins NET’s 2018 Indie Lens Pop-Up screening and discussion series.
The film begins in 1979 when James Baldwin writes a letter to his literary agent describing his next project, which was to be a personal account of the lives and successive assassinations of three of Baldwin’s close friends — Medgar Evers, Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr. At the time of Baldwin’s death in 1987, only 30 pages of his manuscript were completed.
The film, which includes rich archival material, imagines the book Baldwin never finished.
“I Am Not Your Negro” is the first of five films to be screened in Lincoln as part of the Indie Lens Pop-Up screening and discussion series. Next up is “Tell Them We Are Rising: The Story of Black College and Universities,” which shows at 6:30 p.m., Feb. 1 in the Nebraska Union Auditorium.
“Tell Them We Are Rising” explores the pivotal role historically black colleges and universities have played in American history, culture and identity. The film reveals the power of higher education to transform lives and advance civil rights and equality in the face of injustice.
Learn more about the Indie Lens Pop-Up schedule.
NET will broadcast both films after the campus screenings. “I Am Not Your Negro” will air on NET at 10 p.m. Jan. 19, while “Tell Them We Are Rising: The Story of Black Colleges and Universities” shows at 9:30 p.m. Feb. 25.
