Black History Month
This February, explore an inspiring collection of documentaries that centre Black creativity, spotlight the fight for racial justice and share powerful stories of connection and community.
Paid in Full: The Battle for Black Music
- On-air February 4 at 8pm
For over a century, Black artists have been exploited by the music industry. This insightful series chronicles their fight for fair pay and justice, featuring stories of music legends from Nina Simone, Billie Holiday and Bessie Smith to George Clinton, Smokey Robinson and Ice T.
A Mother Apart
- On-air February 24 at 9pm
In a remarkable story of grace and forgiveness, Jamaican American poet and LGBTQ+ activist Staceyann Chin seeks out the mother who abandoned her as a child in Kingston. Meanwhile, she and her young daughter forge a new sense of home.
Carnival: They Can't Steal Our Joy
- On-air February 19 at 9pm
Ugandan Canadian filmmaker Ian Mark Kimanje explores why Carnival means so much to so many people – and why it’s still going strong today. Travelling to Toronto, London and Trinidad, it's a deep dive into this celebration of resistance, culture and community.
Black Power: A British Story of Resistance
The story of Black Power activists who in the 1960s and 70s challenged racism in the UK and helped shape a new political landscape. Past activists, many of whom are speaking for the first time, share stories that bring to life one of the key cultural revolutions in British history.
The Photograph
A photograph of his great-grandfather sends filmmaker Sherman De Jesus to New York to discover the legacy of James Van Der Zee, a Black photographer whose lens captured the people and spirit of Harlem in the period between the two world wars - a spirit that's still alive today.
Sammy Davis, Jr.: I've Gotta Be Me
- On-air February 5 at 9pm
Sammy Davis, Jr. was a uniquely gifted entertainer whose trajectory blazed across the major flashpoints of American society. This illuminating portrait traces his legendary career and a life that was both complex and contradictory.
David Harewood on Blackface
- On-air February 10 at 9pm
Actor David Harewood investigates the disturbing legacy of blackface minstrelsy, which dominated British and American popular culture from the 1830s to the mid-20th century. Todya, Black artists are reclaiming the music and its history.
Driving While Black
- On-air February 10 at 10pm
From the advent of the automobile to the civil rights era and beyond, life on the road led to new freedoms and new perils for Black Americans. This exploration of race and mobility is told in part through the stories of people who lived through it.
Subjects of Desire
- On-air February 12 at 9pm
Delving into portrayals of Black women in mass media, this film examines the cultural shift in North American beauty standards towards embracing Black female aesthetics. It deconstructs what we understand about race and the power behind beauty.
Boom for Real: The Late Teenage Years of Jean-Michel Basquiat
- On-air February 17 at 10:30pm
Sara Driver explores the pre-fame years of Jean-Michel Basquiat, and how 1970s New York, its people and the movements surrounding him formed the artist he became. Archival footage, music and anecdotes from fellow artists re-create an era defined by creativity.
Subnormal
- On-air February 24 at 10:30pm
In one of the biggest scandals in the history of British education, parents, teachers and activists banded together to expose a school system that in the 1960s and 70s was disproportionately sending Black children to schools for the so-called “educationally subnormal.”
