I AM NOT YOUR NEGRO

BY: PROVOKR Editors

This 2016 documentary from filmmaker Raoul Peck and narrated by Samuel L. Jackson is based on James Baldwin‘s unfinished manuscript, Remember This House. The manuscript was a collection of notes and letters Baldwin wrote in the 1970s before his death. It is a personal account of the lives and executions of his friends, and civil rights activists, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Jr., and Medgar Evers. The documentary premiered at the 2016 Toronto International Film Festival where it won the Toronto International Film Festival People’s Choice Award: Documentaries.

With the trial of Derek Chauvin taking place over the next month, we encourage you to sit with these words. Chauvin, who placed his knee on George Floyd’s neck for 9 minutes and 29 seconds, faces murder charges. The killing sparked national outrage, and reignited the fire in the Black Lives Movement.