Still a Brother: Inside the Negro Middle Class
Directed byWilliam Greaves
Written byWilliam B. Branch,
William Greaves
Narrated byOssie Davis
Edited byWilliam Greaves
Production
company
Release date
  • April 29, 1968 (1968-04-29) (United States)
Running time
90 min
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish

Still a Brother: Inside the Negro Middle Class is a 1968 documentary film directed by William Greaves.[1]

Development

Still a Brother was written by William B. Branch and directed by William Greaves. It was narrated by Ossie Davis.[2]

After the film was finished, Greaves encountered difficulty in convincing National Educational Television (NET) to air it, saying that "They had expected an Ebony magazine kind of film."[3]: 93  It aired on NET a few weeks after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. in April 1968.[4]

Synopsis

The documentary featured interviews from Black middle-class professionals across a wide variety of careers. It emphasizes Black dignity and achievement.[4] The film sought to contrast their experiences with the experiences of both Black radicals and white middle-class professionals; and describe a situation in which the Black middle class are reaching economic security but without social equity or equality.[4][5] The film also touches on issues with housing, the role of religion in Black nationalism, and the rise of African-American culture.[6]

Horace Wesley Morris, associate director of the New York Urban League (NYUL) is featured.[7] Also appearing in the film are John H. Johnson, president of Johnson Publishing Co; Robert E. Johnson, editor of Jet magazine; St. Clair Drake, sociologist and professor at Roosevelt University; Ralph Featherstone of SNCC; Julian Bond, Georgia legislator; Bayard Rustin, director of the A. Philip Randolph Institute; Percy Julian, a research chemist and millionaire; and Nathan Wright, organizer of the 1967 Newark Black Power Conference.[8]

Reception

Still a Brother was positively received upon release. Jack Gould, writing in The New York Times, praised the construction of the documentary but criticized the repetition of some points.[9]

The film ran 90 minutes but it was later edited down into a 60 minute piece and re-aired in 1969. In 1969, Greaves was nominated for an Emmy Award for his work Still a Brother,[1] which also won the Blue Ribbon Award at the American Film Festival.[10][11]

A few years later a television documentary film called, "To Be Black" aired on ABC, which also explored the Black middle class.[4]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 Mutima, Niamani (1976). "Hatch-Billops Archives Interviews with Playwrights". Negro American Literature Forum. 10 (2): 64–65. doi:10.2307/3041209. ISSN 0028-2480.
  2. ↑ "Still a Brother: Inside the Negro Middle Class". William Greaves. Retrieved 2023-03-09.
  3. ↑ Holloway, Jonathan Scott (2013). Jim Crow Wisdom: Memory & Identity in Black America since 1940. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. ISBN 978-1-4696-1070-2. Retrieved 2023-03-09.
  4. 1 2 3 4 Samuel, Lawrence R. (2013-07-18). The American Middle Class: A Cultural History. Routledge. p. 60. ISBN 978-1-134-62468-3.
  5. ↑ Cross, Robert (1968-05-01). "Businessmen, Professionals on NET Documentary". Chicago Tribune. p. 79. Retrieved 2023-03-21 – via Newspapers.com.
  6. ↑ Educational Films. University of Michigan Media Resources Center. 1973. p. 467.
  7. ↑ "Businessmen, Professionals on NET Documentary". Chicago Tribune. 1968-05-01. p. 79. Retrieved 2023-04-09.
  8. ↑ MacDonald, Scott; Stewart, Jacqueline Najuma (2021-06-01). William Greaves: Filmmaking as Mission. Columbia University Press. pp. 142–144. ISBN 978-0-231-55319-3.
  9. ↑ Gould, Jack (1968-04-30). "N.E.T. Program Views Negro Middle Class". The New York Times. p. 95. ProQuest 118309108. Retrieved 2023-03-09.
  10. ↑ "Making the Film: About William Greaves". pbs.org. Retrieved 2023-04-09.
  11. ↑ Nelson, Emmanuel S. (2004-10-30). African American Dramatists: An A-to-Z Guide: An A-to-Z Guide. ABC-CLIO. pp. 45–46. ISBN 978-0-313-05289-7.

Further reading

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