WPBT2 and FIU Invite You to a Free Lecture

WPBT2 and Florida International University’s Center for Humanities in an Urban Environment present The Haitian Imprint on the Humanities on Wednesday, September 14 at 7:00pm at the Green Library, Room 220 on the FIU Modesto A. Maidique Campus. 

Gepsie Metellus, executive director of Sant La, will lead the lecture.  Metellus is a well-known community leader with a deep awareness of the diversity and complexity that characterize the Haitian community and a profound sense of the range of issues challenging all South Floridians. Her talk draws on personal experience and on the rich cultural history of the Haitian community. Her insights will be particularly welcome to all interested in seeing the humanities at work at the grass roots level, and it will also give a broad sense of how the humanities touch and enrich all of us.

The event is free and open to the public.

 

 

WPBT2 premieres National Memorial Day Concert on May 29th at 8:00 pm.

For more than two decades, PBS has been proud to honor the service and sacrifice of our men and women in uniform, their families at home and all those who have given their lives for our country with the NATIONAL MEMORIAL DAY CONCERT. The evening, that has become an American tradition, offers viewers a time to remember, to heal and bring our country together.

The multi award-winning event, broadcast live from the West Lawn of the U.S. Capitol, will be co-hosted for the sixth year by Emmy Award-winner Gary Sinise (CSI:NEW YORK) and Tony Award-winner Joe Mantegna (CRIMINAL MINDS), two acclaimed actors who have dedicated themselves to veteran’s causes and supporting our troops in active service. Joining co-hosts Sinise and Mantegna will be an all-star line-up of dignitaries, actors and musical artists in performance with the National Symphony Orchestra under the direction of top pops conductor Jack Everly. The U.S Joint Chiefs of Staff will also participate in the event along with the Armed Forces Color Guard and Service Color Teams provided by the Military District of Washington, D.C.

The 22nd annual broadcast of THE NATIONAL MEMORIAL DAY CONCERT will air live in HD before a concert audience of hundreds of thousands, millions more at home, as well as to our troops serving around the world on the American Forces Network.

 

WPBT2 premieres Independent Lens: Wasteland on Tuesday April 19th at 11:00 pm.

Filmed over nearly three years, Lucy Walker’s WASTE LAND follows renowned artist Vik Muniz as he journeys from his home base in Brooklyn to his home country of Brazil, and to Jardim Gramacho, the world’s largest garbage dump located on the outskirts of Rio de Janeiro. There Muniz photographs an eclectic band of catadores, pickers of recyclable materials, and works with them to “paint” their portraits using garbage. The resulting collaboration with these inspiring characters provides profoundly moving evidence of the transformative power of art and its impact on the human spirit.

WPBT2 will premiere a four part series, Black in Latin America, a film by Henry Louis Gates Jr. on April 19th at 8:00 pm.

Join Henry Louis Gates Jr. as he unveils the history of African presence in Haiti, Dominican Republic, Cuba, Brazil, Mexico, and Peru. In this four part series Gates witnesses the presence of the African culture through art, music, cuisine, dance, politics, and religion. He also witnesses the palpable presence of anti-black racism in the previous countries. 

Episode one:
Tuesday April 19th at 8:00 pm.
BLACK IN LATIN AMERICA: Haiti & the Dominican Republic: An Island Divided: In the Dominican Republic, Professor Gates explores how race has been socially constructed in a society whose people reflect centuries of inter-marriage, and how the country's troubled history with Haiti informs notions about racial classification. In Haiti, Professor Gates tells the story of the birth of the first-ever black republic, and finds out how the slaves's hard fought liberation over Napoleon Bonaparte's French Empire became a double-edged sword.

Episode two:
Tuesday April 26th at 8:00 pm.
BLACK IN LATIN AMERICA: Cuba: The Next Revolution: In Cuba, Professor Gates finds out how the culture, religion, politics and music of this island are inextricably linked to the huge amount of slave labor imported to produce its enormously profitable 19th century sugar industry, and how race and racism have fared since Fidel Castro's Communist revolution in 1959.

Episode three:
Tuesday May 3rd at 8:00 pm.
BLACK IN LATIN AMERICA: Brazil: A Racial Paradise?: In Brazil, Professor Gates delves behind the façade of Carnival to discover how this ‘rainbow nation’ is waking up to its legacy as the world’s largest slave economy.

Episode four:
Tuesday May 10th at 8:00 pm.
BLACK IN LATIN AMERICA: Mexico & Peru: The Black Grandma in the Closet: In Mexico and Peru,   Professor Gates explores the almost unknown history of the significant numbers of black people — the two countries together received far more slaves than did the United States —brought to these countries as early as the 16th and 17th centuries, and the worlds of culture that their descendants have created in Vera Cruz on the Gulf of Mexico, the Costa Chica region on the Pacific and in and around Lima, Peru.

 

 

When the Odds Are Against You...It Helps to Dream a Little.

Visa Dream is a touching film following a couple striving to do things the proper way so that they can visit their family in the United States. People who grew up all their lives in the US often don’t realize some of the challenges people face in order to visit this country. Close to 6 million tourist visas are issued by the US worldwide every year. This documentary shows the lifestyle, the emotions, and journey of a couple that goes through this very process.

The stakes are high. Ramon and Aurora, (the older couple applying for the visa,) have not seen their kids for 16 years. And just because they apply for a visa and have an interview, does not mean they are guaranteed the approval for it. Basically, it comes down to a “yes” or “no” from an immigration officer, as their relatives anxiously wait to hear the answer.

The film includes interviews with their family members, various visa applicants, comments from private visa consultants who work filling out paperwork on a daily basis, as well as an interview with a United States Consular Officer. A consular officer actually does the interview with foreigners desiring to obtain a visitors’ visa, to determine their eligibility.

Visa Dream airs Thursday, April 14 at 11:30pm on WPBT2.

 

WPBT2 premieres a new series, Ashes to Ashes, beginning April 14th at 9:30 pm.

Ashes to Ashes, the follow up to fan-favorite Life on Mars, sees DCI Gene Hunt and his sidekicks back on our screens. But this time, it’s the 80s calling. Alex Drake, a DCI who uses psychological profiling rather than brute force to nail her men, finds herself in a London of New Romantic pan-sexuality, Two Tone ska and rolled-up suit sleeves after a horrific car accident. And whilst she gets to grips with the self-styled Sherriff of Manchester's 'unorthodox' methods, Gene has to wrestle with the fact that not only does he have to show Alex (a bird!) some professional respect, he also sort of fancies her.

Ashes to Ashes allows us to peek behind the bluff exterior of the hugely popular DCI Hunt, whilst giving  viewers access to a very different, tumultuous world, where poll tax riots, androgynous fashion and angular pop sit side-by-side with Charles'n'Di commemorative plates.

WPBT2 Broadcasts BBC One Live Coverage of the Royal Wedding on April 29th at 3:00 am.

 

WPBT2 invites you to be a guest at one of the most eagerly anticipated events of our century, the wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton.  WPBT2 will air the live BBC One coverage of the wedding on April 29 at 3:00am.  Coverage of the wedding begins 3 hours ahead of the wedding service, which allows viewers to watch the excitement and anticipation build up around Central London as well as other key locations such as St. Andrews and Kate's home village of Bucklebury.

A team of presenters will be stationed around Westminster Abbey, Buckingham Palace, and The Mall. They will watch all the preparations as they unfold, report on all the movements and speak to members of the crowd who have traveled from all over to witness this little piece of history. Hear from guest experts, for example, Royal historians and correspondents, fashion experts and possibly some guests who are attending the wedding service.

In this transmission watch the journey of all the members of the Royal Family and the bride as they make their way to the Abbey. See the arrivals of all the key guests and watch the full coverage of the wedding service. Following the service, viewers will see the full procession back to Buckingham Palace and then reflect on how the wedding has made an impact all over the United Kingdom and possibly around the world. This programme will end just after William and Kate and close members of the Royal Family make the historic balcony appearance.

A Night of Poetry Everywhere with Liam Callanan and Campbell McGrath is hosted by the Miami Dade Public Library System on Thursday April 14 at 6:30

A Night of Poetry Everywhere is hosted by Liam Callanan, executive producer of Poetry Everywhere, and award-winning poet Campbell  McGrath. The evening is dedicated to screenings, readings and discussions about poetry. The event consists of thirty different short animated poetry films from different poets including Miami’s own Campbell McGrath to the current Santa Fe Poet Laureate Valerie Martinez. Each film features every word of every poem, both onscreen and in the soundtrack. These films are screened on public television and in buses, libraries  and classrooms. The purpose of these films is to bring poetry into public life.

A Night of Poetry Everywhere is presented in collaboration with University of Wynwood, University of Wisconsin, and the Poetry Foundation as part of O, Miami (www.omiami.org), a county-wide poetry festival inaugurating in April 2011. Its goal is for every single person in Miami-Dade County to encounter a poem during the month of April.

The event A Night of Poetry Everywhere takes place on Thursday April 14, 2011 at 6:30 till 8:30 at the Main Library Auditorium at 101 W. Flagler Street.

WPBT2’s video sharing website, uVu, will cover this special night.  If you cannot attend, take a look at the event on uvuvideo.org, keyword “Night of Poetry”

WPBT2 premieres William and Kate: A Royal Wedding on April 10th at 10 pm.

 

William and Kate: A Royal Wedding takes a look at the decade long relationship between Prince William and Kate Middleton. It shows how they first met at University and how they became too set a wedding date. It profiles the participants in this monumental relationship and how this will affect the royal family. This program celebrates and illuminates this highly anticipated and jubilant event in Britain’s royal history.

An American Presidency Through the Lens of a Camera

For 50 years, presidential photographers have covered it all: upheaval, tragedy, joy — often developing friendships with the presidents they serve. Acting as both visual historians and key links between the public and the presidents, for these photographers no day is the same — whether they are aboard Air Force One, backstage at the State of the Union or in the heart of the West Wing.

 

As the 44th president’s chief photographer, Pete Souza is never far behind President Obama. Now, in the new National Geographic Special, “The President’s Photographer: 50 Years in the Oval Office,” airing on WPBT2 on Wednesday, November 24 at 8:00 p.m, viewers get to follow Souza, and those who came before him, for a behind-the-scenes look at the everyday grit of the American presidency. It’s a chance to see what it’s like to cover the most powerful man in the world, for history.