Summary: When a crypt containing 200 extraordinarily preserved bodies was discovered in 1994 in the Hungarian town of Vac, it caught the interest of a scientist fighting tuberculosis on the other side of the globe. This program presents the fascinating story of Professor Mark Spigelman, an Australian surgeon turned archaeologist who is using ancient DNA to contend with the biggest bacterial killer in...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
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Summary: The Egyptian Museum in Cairo is a world-renowned cultural center filled with some of the ancient world's most precious artifacts-including the famed burial mask of King Tutankhamun and the Royal Mummies of Luxor. The museum's collection is so large that it has traditionally shown only half of its holdings at any one time. This program documents an expanded presentation that enables viewers to...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
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Summary: After he died, Akhenaten was declared a heretic and an attempt was made to wipe out all traces of his reign. Did the Egyptian high priests also destroy the mummies of the pharaoh and Nefertiti? This fascinating program traces the discovery by Richard Lepsius in the 19th century of Akhenaten's city at Amarna, Akhet Aten, and the search for the mummies of the heretic king and queen. Could...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
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Summary: Although vital to ancient Egyptian religion, the preservation of dead animals evidently held varying shades of meaning. This program studies ways in which the Egyptians mummified a wide range of creatures, highlighting two purposes for the practice-one spiritually reverent, one blatantly commercial. Exploring the web of tunnels beneath the Saqqara pyramids, the program distinguishes between...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: This final episode describes the Cold War as a continuation of the “war of the world” in which millions died in proxy wars conducted by the two superpowers. World War II may have been the central act of an epic struggle between rival empires, but the Cold War continued the turbulence that marked the entire 20th century as the most violent period in history. The end of the Cold War led to great...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2008
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Summary: This program studies European exploration and conquest, beginning in the late Middle Ages and leading up to the emergence of the major colonial powers. Byzantium's fall in 1453 sets the narrative stage for Henry the Navigator's massive initiative to find new trade routes into Asia. Henry's nautical school at Sagres is described in detail, along with the voyages of Columbus, Gil Eannes, Vasco da...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
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Summary: In 1908, Albert Kahn and his chauffeur embarked on a global trek to observe and absorb other cultures-an early "prototype" of the many photography missions Kahn would fund over the years. This program illustrates that formative round-the-world trip as well as the 1913 journey undertaken by photographer Stephane Passet to China, Mongolia, and India. Viewers will encounter startling images of...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
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Summary: The horrors of World War II are the subject of this episode. We’ve been told all our lives that this war was our greatest triumph, the moment when the forces of light - the Western democracies and the Soviet Union - prevailed over the forces of darkness, the Nazis and the other Axis powers. It was a conflict that began in Europe in September 1939 and ended with the dropping of the atomic bomb...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2008
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Summary: This first episode posits that economic volatility, ethnic conflict and empires in crisis combined to spawn the 20th century’s bloodiest conflicts. This led to the rise of the brutal regimes of Germany, Japan and Russia, the “age of genocide” and a preoccupation with racial purity. It gives an excellent work up to the 20th century in conflict. Spanning Asia and Europe, it portrays the human...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2008
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Summary: As they built an unsurpassed visual archive of world culture, Albert Kahn and his photographers turned their attention to widely divergent locations. This program follows the maritime odyssey of Lucien Le Saint, circa 1922, as he captured on film the daily lives of Newfoundland cod fishermen, as well as expeditions into northwestern Africa. Images from Morocco and Tunisia focus on occupying...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
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Summary: In 1911, the first newsreels flickered in America's nickelodeons. In the mid-1960s, they vanished from movie theaters as nightly television newscasts came to dominate visual journalism. In between, newsreels grew into a unique 20th-century institution that informed and entertained whole generations. In this program, Bill Moyers conducts a tour of the cultural and political landscape so...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
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Summary: A peace-loving man with a decidedly global perspective, Albert Kahn spent most of his life and wealth trying to expand Western understanding of other cultures-largely through film and photography. This program delves into Kahn's origins and formative years and the launch of his Archive of the Planet project. Topics include Kahn's Jewish ancestry and Alsacian upbringing; his early success in...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
View online at AVOD
Summary: Galileo's recantation in 1633 opened a gap between Christianity and science, a separation that widened as the first great age of European exploration came to a close. This program studies the second great age ushered in during the latter half of the 18th century amidst a thickening web of French and British colonialism-an age in which maps and charts facilitated political and economic...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: By detailing key incidents ranging from the Dawson's Field hijackings to the Luxor massacre, this program charts the ever-widening holy war that is pitting Islamists against Zionists and the Arab world against the West. The Kach Party's Noam Federman; Bassam abu Sharif, founder of the Palestine Democratic Party; Abdel Aziz Rantisi and Sheikh Ahmad Yassin, operational and spiritual leaders of...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
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Summary: This video examines THC and the cannabinoids marijuana, hashish, and hash oil. Expert commentary is presented by former NFL player Charles Hunt, a pharmacist, a police officer, addiction counselors, a historian, a pastor, recovering addicts, and others. Together, they explain the history and biological effects of THC, investigating its use, abuse, and hazards, and its reputation as a gateway drug.
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: Some people suffer chronic pain long after an injury has healed, while others can jump from a two-story building and not feel a thing. This film reveals the physiological foundations of both scenarios as it examines the mechanics of pain perception. Viewers meet a family whose unique genetic code has lent insight into the sensation of pain, while a man who cut off his own arm to save his life...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
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Summary: When Worlds Collide is a highly imaginative exploration of one of the most intriguing epochs in human history when the “Old World” first encountered the “New World.” This film travels from the city of Granada in Spain, which was conquered by Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand; to the spiritual retreat of Machu Picchu, built by the Incas in Peru; and from the Cerro del Tepeyac of Our Lady of...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: While the doughboys were fighting the war "over there," Americans at home were busy supporting it. This program looks at the domestic issues facing the United States during its involvement in World War I. Included are discussions of the changing industrial workforce, the growth of the women's suffrage movement, African-American migration to the North and the racial tensions that followed,...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: This program, devoted to the 17th century, explains how the St. Mark's sound was first rescued and then enhanced by Claudio Monteverdi, and covers the art of the madrigal, the rise of women composers, and why the world's first public opera house was built in Venice. Live performances in San Nicolo dei Mendicoli and the Ducal Palace.
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2008
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Summary: To comprehend the holy and inspire the believer, the world's religions have always incorporated music as a form of prayer. This award-winning documentary takes an ecumenical look at a diverse selection of these traditions as performed at the Festival of World Sacred Music held in Fez, Morocco. Along with commentary from festival director Dr. Faouzi Skali and music anthropologist David Lynch,...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
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Summary: Revolution in Berlin at end of World War I. Brandenburg Gate, mass demonstration; group of Americans pose victoriously; defeated German solders on parade; a young boy goosesteps alongside the column (a great foreshadowing of how Germany's defeat will give
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 1918
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Summary: The first installment in the PBS series Jerusalem: Center of the World covers the historical beginnings of the city; its role as the hub of ancient Israel's religion and culture; information on major Old Testament leaders in the context of Jerusalem; the Assyrian conquest of Israel and the Babylonian Exile; post-Exile Jerusalem; and the ministry of Jesus.
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
View online at AVOD
Summary: Poverty, emigration, declining birth rates, and ethnic divisions weakened many European countries as the 20th century began. From France to the Balkans, leaders prescribed nationalism and military buildup as the only solutions. This program studies the continent's march to war as depicted in the photographic record commissioned by French banker Albert Kahn. Early color images and film footage...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
View online at AVOD
Summary: Throughout history, one type of individual has instinctively grasped art's power to persuade and manipulate-and indeed, images have become at least as deadly as swords or guns in the hands of political and military leaders. This program revolves around a basic question: when did art mutate from a vehicle of the imagination into a tool of the ruler? Beginning in Britain, the program looks at the...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009