Man on Fire: A Texas Town and its Racist Roots

Subgroup Size

Entire group

Duration

1 hour

External Cost

Yes

Lesson Plan

Source

Fendelman, J. (Director). (2018). Man on fire [Film]. New Day Films.

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  1. User krisacheson's profile picture krisacheson 11:25 am 27 September 2019

    I haven't used this as a learning activity yet, but I watched the film with my teacher-hat on, wondering if it would be appropriate/effective for a project I am working on. Here are some impressions I had: It is a well-done documentary in terms of aesthetics. I think some interesting discussion could come from screening it, but a facilitator would need to be comfortable handling difficult dialogue and a trigger warning definitely needs to be happen, given the topic of the film. One thing that struck me as odd was that the folks interviewed in the film were really unbalanced (mostly white, with a handful of people of color). Even more strange - thematically, the white folks were evaluative (that is, they mostly talked about how they couldn't understand the motives or thought this pastor was crazy), while the people of color were descriptive (they most often described their own experiences of discrimination). I would have liked to see more storytelling of white experiences of race in this context, and more discussion of what people of color thought/felt about the pastor's act of protest. This film would have fit in really well with a course I used to teach on Silence, in the section on silence in political protests. There is phenomenal power in public and violent permanent self-silencing, but the down-side is the inability to come back into the conversation afterwards and further explain, defend, or promote your point of view - people interpret your action as they will without your further control.