We’re down to the next to last lecture, taking you from Nixon to Bush. (Next week, this Stanford course ends with a postmortem of Obama’s victory in 2008.) You can access Lecture 4 via Tunes U in high resolution or watch the YouTube version below. If you missed the previous lectures, grab them on iTunes here and YouTube here.
Michael Crichton has died of cancer. You know him best as the author of Jurassic Park and The Andromeda Strain. But some will remember him for the controversy that surrounded his later career. Crichton’s 2004 novel, State of Fear launched a literary assault on environmentalism and the concept of global warming. And the next thing you know, Crichton testified before the US Senate at the invitation of Senator James M. Inhofe, who called global warming “the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people.” (Inhofe also made State of Fear — a novel, mind you — required reading for the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works.) Below, we feature Crichton offering his thoughts on why environmentalism is “one of the most powerful religions in the Western world.”
Imagine The Godfather without Marlin Brando and Al Pacino. Blasphemy! Well, it almost turned out that way. You can watch more here about how Brando almost never made it. Below, we also have a clip that takes you through how Pacino nearly missed out on his career-defining role. It includes original footage from his script reading sessions, and we’ve added it to our YouTube playlist.
We’ve had some very low moments during recent years. And now the highs. The present buried the past, and the US elected its first African-American president, proving once again that America is truly the land of opportunity. This moment calls to mind the poignant quote that I heard this week. ‘Rosa sat so Martin could walk, so Obama could run, so our children can fly.’ Now watch them go. A beautiful moment.
Below, we present MLK’s full “I Have a Dream” speech from 1963, which reminds of us how far we’ve come over the past 45 years.
Stand-up comedy and Biblical creation don’t usually go together. But somehow they do for Ricky Gervais, the creator of the ever-popular television show, The Office. (Watch episodes here.) The bit runs about 10 minutes, and it’s added to our YouTube playlist.
Studs Terkel, the Pulitzer Prize-winning historian of the everyman, has passed away at the ripe old age of 96. (Get the NYTimes obit here.) Below, we have a lengthy conversation with Terkel, recorded when he was 91. As you’ll see, being a nonagenarian did little to slow him down.
The Geography of US Presidential Elections keeps rolling along. With his well-crafted lectures, Martin Lewis shows you this week how America’s political map and its political parties changed dramatically following the Civil War. In the space of 90 minutes, he takes you through the Reconstruction period, The Gilded Age, the Depression, World War II and The Cold War, up through the Vietnam War.
You can download Lecture 3 via Tunes U in high resolution or watch the YouTube version below. And, as always, you can join the ongoing conversation with the professor and other students worldwide right here.
There are still two more lectures to come, including one that will offer a postmortem of next week’s election.
Lastly, if you missed the previous lectures, you can grab them on iTunes here and YouTube here.
This week, CNN announced the winners of the iReport Film Festival, the network’s first user-generated short film competition. The festival “challenged filmmakers to document this year’s presidential campaign from their personal vantage point, whether they were volunteering for a campaign or had compelling stories about this election they wanted to document creatively.” And the Grand Jury Award went to a short film called “13th Amendment.” Here, Mike Dennis of Philadelphia, Pa., follows his 90-year-old grandmother, who is African American, on her journey to vote for the first serious black candidate for the American presidency. (And, by the way, in case you were wondering, the 13th Amendment banned slavery in the United States in 1865.) Here it goes:
I’ve spent the past several months working through The Wire on DVD. A simply brilliant show. (Here’s a recap of Season 1 in case you don’t know what you’re missing. And for even more recaps click here.) Now some members of the cast, the good guys and the bad, have rolled out a commercial encouraging North Carolina residents to get out the vote on Tuesday. It’s a good idea for all American voters, no matter who you support in this race. Thanks to Kottke for point it out. Here it goes:
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