Bill Bigelow noted in Rethinking Globalization:

Compare the six days of the Book of Genesis to the 4 billion years of geologic time. On that scale, one day equals about 666 million years. All day Monday until Tuesday noon Creation was busy getting the earth going. Life began on Tuesday noon and the beautiful organic wholeness developed over the next four days. At 4 pm Sunday, the big reptiles; 5 hours later when the redwoods appeared there were no more big reptiles. At three minutes before midnight man appeared. One quarter of a second before midnight Christ arrived. At 1/40 of a second before midnight, the industrial Revolution began. We are surrounded by people who think that what we have been doing for 1/40 of a second can go on indefinitely. They are considered normal. But they are stark raving mad.

These words are from the late renowned environmentalist David Brower, spoken toward the end of the film Earth and the American Dream.  Loaded with contrasting quotes about humanity’s relationship to nature, Earth and the American Dream convinces most students that since the arrival of the first European settlers — whose leaders spoke of the new land as “a hideous and desolate wilderness, full of wild beasts and wild men” — American culture has celebrated ideas and dreams that are fundamentally hostile to the environment. As the film sweeps through the decades, pairing quotes about nature with images of ecological degradation, students can’t help but be overwhelmed by the language of conquest and consumption woven into the fabric of American life. Perhaps too overwhelmed.

The film quotes are so effective in portraying a culture consumed with consuming that students may conclude that if only we “rethought” our attitudes toward the earth, we could chart a course to a more environmentally friendly future. What this notion fails to address is the way that the imperatives of the global capitalist economic system propel us toward ecological ruin. Growth, competition, and consumption are not just ideological constructs, they are systemic requirements. Ideas matter, but so do the economic structures that animate and in turn are nurtured by ideas. I wanted to create an activity in which students could experience classroom doses of the economic pressures felt by competing producers. Then when my students considered solutions to the environmental crisis, I hoped such reflection would be grounded in a fuller appreciation of the roots of that crisis.

Produced by Luna Productions.

Trailer

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Making a Killing uses once-secret corporate documents to show Philip Morris/Altria’s role in the tobacco industry’s deceptive and deadly history. The documentary shows how the corporation hooks children on tobacco and interferes with government attempts to protect public health. It exposes the aggressive advertising and promotional tactics Philip Morris/Altria uses, including footage of cigarette giveaways the corporation claimed to have stopped. Making a Killing also examines how Philip Morris/Altria used its Kraft Foods subsidiary to influence media coverage and to gain political leverage in its fight against public health regulation, and how consumers pressured the corporation through the Kraft Boycott. This hard-hitting documentary serves as a call to join the growing grassroots movement to counter corporate power and save lives.

While dated, it can be used to discuss other corporate campaigns to promote unsafe products, such as vaping.

Watch Online

View the film online at Archive.org.

Produced by Corporate Accountability International.

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Robert Shetterly explains,

I began painting this series of portraits, finding great Americans who spoke the truth and combining their images with their words, nearly three years ago as a way of to channel my anger and grief. In the process my respect and love for these people and their courage helped to transform that anger into hope and pride and allowed me to draw strength from this community of truth tellers, finding in them the courage, honesty, tolerance, generosity, wisdom, and compassion that have made our country strong.

One lesson that can be learned from all of these Americans is that the greatness of our country frequently depends not on the letter of the law, but the insistence of a single person that we adhere to the spirit of the law.

The project includes portraits of Helen Keller, Muhammad Ali, Eleanor Roosevelt, Howard Zinn, Samantha Smith, Kathy Kelly, Henry David Thoreau, Molly Ivins, Dorothea Lange, Emma Goldman, Amy Goodman, Sojourner Truth, and many more. The website features the portraits, biographies, teaching ideas, and more. Each portrait can be purchased as a poster and many are also available as greeting cards.

Video

In November of 2018, Syracuse University hosted an exhibit of all 238 portraits. Below is a video of the opening event with the artist and a number of the truth tellers.

Bill Ayers

One of the speakers was educator Bill Ayers, who commented about the exhibit:

As I walked from person to person, portrait to portrait — the entire “Americans Who Tell the Truth” collection gathered for the first time at Syracuse University, the portraits stretching from room to room as far as the eye could see, speaking to each other and to all of us — I slowly realized that Robert Shetterly has, in effect, brought to life a growing  community of people who are collectively citizens of a country that does not yet exist, a country that could be but is not yet.

Each person, vivid and powerful in Rob’s hands, looks directly out at the viewer, and each portrait includes a short comment by the subject etched across the painting.

Rob is the cartographer of this aspirational country — a place built on justice and peace, powered by love — and the words are a challenging and inspiring frame for the hopes and aspirations of that new country.

In his talk (starts at about the 23 minute mark in the video above), Ayers says:

I, too, am deeply, deeply honored to be on this wall with both mentors of mine like Grace Lee Boggs and Quentin Young and friends of mine like Kathy Kelly, Medea Benjamin, and James Bell. . . .

I’ve not only had the privilege of working with Rob, but I’ve had the privilege of speaking with him on several occasions to classes of students and to gatherings. . . I think the last time I heard you speak was at the state capitol in Maine at the Women’s March. They had one token man giving a talk and it was Robert.

One of the things I think that is so extraordinary is what he’s accomplished here is very much what Howard Zinn has accomplished, which is to introduce a whole new generation of people to a truer history of what our country is about. Rather than the great men and the great conquests and the great occupations, [Robert features the] people who struggled for more peace, more justice, more democracy, more sustainability and the little people who stood up.

When I hear him speak, I learn all kinds of new things about people I thought I knew about. So, this is a history project. This is an educational project. And it’s something of extraordinary value. I’m just thrilled that Syracuse has decided to take it in and bring it to life in this way.

Very quickly, my life work has been education. Education in the street as well as education in schools. And the big battle for me for decades has been between the idea that education is a product to be bought and sold at the marketplace like a laptop or a refrigerator versus a deeper idea which is education is a human right encoded in Article 26 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which states every child has a right to an education which shall be directed to the full development of human personality.

We’re far from that, but that’s the goal that we have to fight for. I work mostly in cities. I work mostly with kids who are from communities that have traditionally been marginalized and oppressed in various ways.

One of the things that we bring to that work is the idea that it’s not enough to be able to answer questions. You have to be able to interrogate the universe. You need no one’s permission to interrogate the universe. You have a right to be here. You have a right to ask questions. And you have a right to pursue those questions to the furthest limits.

This project of Rob’s helps kids on that journey. I can’t thank you enough. Thanks very much.

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Cover of the album that features the song “Something in the Rain.”

This song can be used to teach about the dangerous working conditions of farmworkers.

Mom and dad have worked the fields, I don’t know how many years
I’m just a boy but I know how, and go to school when work is slow
We have seen our country’s road, Bakersfield from Illinois
And when troubles come our way, oh yeah, I’ve seen my daddy pray.
There’s something wrong with little sister, I hear her cryin’ by my side
Mama’s shaking as she holds her; we try to hold her through the night
And mom says close you eyes mijito, dream of someplace far from here
Like the pictures in your schoolbooks, someday you can take us there

Continue reading song lyrics.

About the Musician

Leticia (“Tish”) Hinojosa was born December 6, 1955 in San Antonio, Texas, Hinojosa is a folksinger, recording in both Spanish and English. Hinojosa’s parents were Mexican immigrants. Hinojosa’s 1992 album Culture Swing won the NAIRD Indie Folk Album of the Year.

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The Story of Stuff has been viewed millions of times by people throughout the world. There is a growing series of related films including the Story of Electronics, the Story of Bottled Water, the Story of Cosmetics, the Story of Broke, and more.

Watch

Here is a description of the Story of Stuff film from the website:

From its extraction through sale, use and disposal, all the stuff in our lives affects communities at home and abroad, yet most of this is hidden from view. The Story of Stuff is a 20-minute, fast-paced, fact-filled look at the underside of our production and consumption patterns. The Story of Stuff exposes the connections between a huge number of environmental and social issues, and calls us together to create a more sustainable and just world. It’ll teach you something, it’ll make you laugh, and it just may change the way you look at all the stuff in your life forever.

Produced by Annie Leonard and Free Range Studios.

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Over five minutes long, the film explores the bottled water industry’s attacks on tap water and its use of seductive, environmental-themed advertising to cover up the mountains of plastic waste it produces. The film concludes with a call to take back the tap, not only by making a personal commitment to avoid bottled water, but by supporting investments in clean, available tap water for all.

Watch

The production partners on the bottled water film include five leading sustainability groups: Corporate Accountability International, Environmental Working Group, Food & Water Watch, Pacific Institute, and the Polaris Institute.

View more films by Annie Leonard and Free Range Studios including:

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The dangers at Marsh Fork are manifold: a 2.8 billion-gallon lake of toxic coal slurry sits above the school, held back by an earthen dam; coal dust from a nearby coal processing plant coats the playground and sidewalks around the school; the community’s water is poisoned by mountaintop removal coal mining in the region and the “cleaning” of the coal in preparation for its shipment to coal-fired power plants; mountaintop removal explosions are nerve-jarring and put the earthen dam at continuous risk.

But On Coal River is not just an exposition of the problems associated with mountaintop removal: We learn about the breadth of the problems through the work of the activists who tenaciously challenge the coal industry. One of the “stars” of On Coal River is Judy Bonds, the passionate organizer who became one of the most outspoken mountaintop removal opponents; she died recently at age 58. The film is long and may be too slow for some classes. But in its attention to the details of one struggle in one small community, it tells a gigantic story.

Late in the film, it dawns on one of the community activists, Bo Webb, that “we’re on a mission to save the planet.” It’s no exaggeration. Struggles like On Coal River allow us to explore with students how local environmental justice work connects to the fight for planetary survival.

Trailer

Produced by Downriver Media.

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The juxtaposition of coal- mine-induced tragedy and the coal industry’s lesson plan propaganda makes for jarring reading. Coal mining “is a job for living people working in hell,” says the sister-in-law of a miner killed in a coal mine gas explosion. Meanwhile the coal industry curriculum manipulates students to see the world from the standpoint of owners. “Was making a profit easier or harder than expected?” the American Coal Foundation tells teachers to ask students in a lesson plan that uses chocolate chip cookies to simulate coal mining.

Coal Mountain Elementary is an odd but brilliant critique of curriculum that ignores the working people who produce all wealth. [Description from Rethinking Schools.]

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The novel is so beautifully written that the fact that Laneesha and her Mama Ya-Ya can see ghosts seems quite natural — and is an effective way of showing how the power of ancestors and history helped Ninth Ward residents survive.

It is also made crystal clear that the cause of the massive destruction was not the natural storm but the Army Corps of Engineer’s levees. (This point is also made in the documentary film The Big Uneasy by Harry Shearer of The Simpsons. While too long for classroom use, excerpts of the whistleblower from the Army Corps of Engineers can raise questions about public safety beyond New Orleans.)

After reading Ninth Ward, students will want to know more about New Orleans and will hope that Rhodes writes more young adult novels.

ISBN: 9780316043076 | Little Brown

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Heroes of the Environment features environmental activists taking on mountain-top removal, electronic waste, solar power, wetlands, and more. Written by Children’s Book Press founder Harriet Rohmer, Heroes of the Environment includes twelve activists of all ages in the United States and one in Mexico, including:

• Debby Tewa, Solar Electrician, Hopi Indian Reservation, Arizona
• Barry Guillot, Middle School Science Teacher, Destrehan, Louisiana
• Judy Bonds, Community Activist, Coal River Mountain Watch, Whitesville, West Virginia
• Erica Fernandez, Student and Environmental Activist, Oxnard, California
• Will Allen, Founder, Growing Power Community Food Center, Milwaukee, Wisconsin
• Sarah James, Spokesperson, Gwich’in Indian People of Alaska and Canada, Arctic Village, Alaska
• and more.

ISBN: 9780811867795 | Chronicle Books

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