Race and Racism in America
Special Programming
Race Matters: America in Crisis
RACE MATTERS – AMERICA IN CRISIS focuses on the frustration pouring out onto American streets, outrage about police brutality, and America’s deep systemic racial disparities in the economy, education, criminal justice system, housing, and health care, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. The program also includes grassroots voices from around the country and a roundtable conversations with thought leaders and other newsmakers.
FRONTLINE: Policing the Police
How do you change a troubled police department? FRONTLINE goes inside the Newark Police Department — one of many forces in America ordered to reform. As the country’s debate over race, policing and civil rights continues to unfold, the New Yorker's Jelani Cobb examines allegations of police abuses in Newark, N.J. and the challenge of fixing a broken relationship with the community.
THE TALK: Race in America
This two-hour documentary is about the increasingly common conversation taking place in homes and communities across the country between parents of color and their children, especially sons, about how to behave if they are ever stopped by the police. This program originally aired in 2017.
America in Black and Blue
On this special edition of PBS NewsHour Weekend, in one week two black men killed by police and five Dallas officers were gunned down. Mourning the losses and demanding justice -- voices are raised across the country. How can we find common ground? Alison Stewart anchors this one-hour special “America in Black and Blue” from New York.
Independent Lens: Tell Them We Are Rising
Though much of its history was eclipsed by the explosiveness of the 1960s, the essential role the nation’s historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) played in shaping black life, creating a black middle class and dismantling segregation cannot be overstated.
Great Performances: Twilight: Los Angeles
In response to the national crisis in the aftermath of the murders of Ahmaud Arbery (Brunswick, GA), Breonna Taylor (Louisville, KY), and most recently George Floyd (Minneapolis, MN) THIRTEEN’s Great Performances resumes free streaming of Marc Levin’s film adaptation of Anna Deavere Smith's play "Twilight: Los Angeles." It originally aired on PBS in 2001.
Surviving Columbus
This Peabody Award-winning documentary from New Mexico PBS looks at the European arrival in the Americas from the perspective of the Pueblo Peoples.
American Masters - Maya Angelou: And Still I Rise
This unprecedented film celebrates Dr. Maya Angelou by weaving her words with rare and intimate archival photographs and videos, which paint hidden moments of her exuberant life during some of America’s most defining moments. From her upbringing in the Depression-era South to her work with Malcolm X in Ghana, the film takes us on an incredible journey through the life of a true American icon.
John Lewis - Get in the Way
Follow the journey of civil rights hero, congressman and human rights champion John Lewis. At the Selma March, Lewis came face-to-face with club-wielding troopers and exemplified non-violence.
Reconstruction: America After the Civil War
Reconstruction will explore the transformative years following the American Civil War, when the nation struggled to rebuild itself in the face of profound loss, massive destruction, and revolutionary social change.
Black America Since MLK: And I Still Rise
In his new four-hour series, BLACK AMERICA SINCE MLK: AND STILL I RISE, Henry Louis Gates, Jr. embarks on a deeply personal journey through the last fifty years of African American history. Joined by leading scholars, celebrities, and a dynamic cast of people who shaped these years, Gates travels from the victories of the civil rights movement up to today, asking profound questions about the state
The African Americans: Many Rivers to Cross
This series chronicles the full sweep of African American history, from the origins of slavery on the African continent right up to today when America remains a nation deeply divided by race.