Civil Rights Film and Discussion Series

The film series will begin on Jan. 29 with the showing of a portion of the award-winning documentary, "Eyes on the Prize. "

To extend its annual Martin Luther King Day celebration into Black History Month, the University of Hartford will continue paying tribute to the legacy of the Civil Rights Movement with a three-part film and discussion series.

The series begins on Tuesday, Jan. 29, with the showing of a portion of the documentary Eyes on the Prize. It will continue on Tuesday, Feb. 5, with a showing of Red Tails, a film about the Tuskegee Airmen. The series will conclude  on Tuesday, Feb. 12, with a showing of the documentary film Brother Outsider: The Life of Bayard Rustin.

The film series is free and open to the public. Each program will begin at 7 p.m. in Konover Campus Center. Each showing will be followed by a discussion led by a University faculty member or senior administrator. Light refreshments will be provided.

On Jan. 29, Warren Goldstein, chair of the history department in the College of Arts and Sciences and a Martin Luther King scholar, will lead the discussion following the showing of a portion of Eyes on the Prize: America’s Civil Rights Movement 1954-1985. The complete, award-winning 14-hour television series uses contemporary interviews and historical footage to cover all of the major events of the Civil Rights Movement from 1954 to 1985. The series won six Emmys and numerous other awards, as well as an Academy Award nomination. Series topics range from the Montgomery bus boycott in 1954 to the Voting Rights Act of 1965; from community power in schools to "Black Power" in the streets; from early acts of individual courage to the flowering of a mass movement and its eventual split into factions.

On Feb. 5, Roy Collins, the University’s associate general counsel, will lead a discussion following the showing of Red Tails, which stars Cuba Gooding Jr. and Terrence Howard as Tuskegee Airmen, a group of African American United States Army Air Force servicemen during World War II. Based on a true story, the film recounts the U.S. military recruiting a group of African American fighter pilots to help reclaim the skies over Europe. Discriminated against both as citizens and as soldiers, the Tuskegee Airmen take flight in planes distinguished by distinctive red tails. As a result of their bravery, the pilots emerge as heroes who prove that all men are truly created equal.

On Feb. 12, Bilal Sekou, associate professor of political science in Hillyer College, will lead a discussion following the showing of Brother Outsider: The Life of Bayard Rustin. The film chronicles Bayard Rustin's complex, 60-year career as an activist. The film contains rare archival footage, including debates between Rustin and Malcolm X as well as between Rustin and Stokely Carmichael. Rustin is best known for his work organizing the historic 1963 March on Washington, the biggest protest America had ever witnessed. As an illegitimate son, an African American, a gay man and a one-time member of the Communist Party, Rustin — the ultimate outsider — eventually became a public figure and respected political insider. He not only shaped Civil Rights Movement strategy as a longtime advisor to Martin Luther King, Jr., but was known and respected by numerous U.S. presidents and foreign leaders.

The University of Hartford presented Rustin with an Honorary Doctor of Law degree in 1979. During its 56-year history, the University has honored more than two dozen prominent African Americans with honorary degrees, from opera star Marian Anderson in 1958 to champion tennis player Arthur Ashe in 1990 to NAACP Executive Director Benjamin Hooks in 1994, as well as jazz great Dizzy Gillespie in 1982 and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright August Wilson in 1998. In addition, the University hosted Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in 1959 for an address to the residents of Greater Hartford.