IU BFCA commemorates Black History Month

IU’s Black Film Center Archive is doing its part to commemorate Black History month, delivering a series of film screenings every Wednesday night during February.

“Holding these kinds of programs is a great way to let people know that we’re here, to invite them in,” said Brian Graney, archivist for the Black Film Center Archive. “It gives people an idea about what kinds of programs and films fall within our scope.”

BFCA has co-sponsored with the History Department, Black Law Students Association, Indiana chapter of the National Association of Black Journalists and the department of African American and African Diocese Studies. The BFCA both coordinates and hosts the screenings.

The films, four of them this month, have also been shown at the Monroe County Library in partnership with Delta Sigma Theta Alumni Association, and with Ivy Tech Community College.

BFCA had previewed films before selecting the four for their Black History Month screenings, looking for films that unearthed a forgotten piece in history.

“As a movie, it does a really good job of vividly documenting an area of history that might not come across as forcefully in another form,” Graney said.

The topics covered in this month’s screenings have ranged from the Memphis sanitation workers strike to the history of the black press.

“These films help us to reconstruct our past,” said Michael Martin, director of the BFCA. “It’s important that they’re not forgotten.”

BFCA, located in Room 044B of the Herman B. Wells Library, is having one more screening this month, next Wednesday.

The upcoming screening, titled “Struggles in Steel,” follows the history of discrimination towards black steel workers.

“These films address important issues during the long history of race relations in this country,” Martin said. “In doing so, we both have a better appreciation of our past that also illuminates the present.”