This group of select NFB films examines various aspects of the history and experiences of Black, African and Caribbean Canadians. Students will explore anti-Black racism, Black Canadian activism, intersectionality, community, resistance and activism, and filmmaking as documenting Black Canadian history.
Study Guide: Exploring Black Communities in Canada Through Film [PDF]
Our PD session (professional development session) is a learning opportunity open to all Canadian teachers. They will be presented as a YouTube webinar with a live Q&A discussion in the chat. Come prepared to ask questions and share your comments. Each session will highlight an educational theme alongside NFB film(s) and resource(s).
Black Communities in Canada
While this selection can only scratch the surface of such a rich social record, the films cover a wealth of topics while portraying the multi-layered experiences of Canada’s diverse Black communities.
Focus on Black Filmmakers
Celebrate Canadian perspectives from Black filmmakers with the NFB. Explore our free collection of titles from Black filmmakers across Canada, showcasing an extensive selection of stories told from Black perspectives.
Mini-Lesson for Stateless
Stateless is a documentary that follows lawyer and community leader Rosa Iris’s fight against an unjust law that stripped Dominicans of Haitian descent of their citizenship, retroactive to 1929, in 2013. Iris risks the lives of her loved ones, as well as her own, as she campaigns in the Dominican federal election. Standing firmly by her beliefs in equality, she hopes to achieve victory by promising Dominican-born children of Haitian migrants that she will fight to uphold their citizenship. Demonstrating her love and good intentions, she sets out on a journey on which she will face many challenges.
Mini-Lesson for the Ninth Floor
Ninth Floor is a documentary about the protests and riot that took place at Sir George Williams University in Montreal, Quebec, in 1969. Six Caribbean students accused a professor of racial discrimination, which led to the mobilization of hundreds of students who protested the broader institutional racism they claimed existed at the university. Using powerful metaphors, evocative imagery, archival film and recently recorded interviews, director Mina Shum tries to help the viewer make sense of these events.
I am Gay
After working abroad for five years, filmmaker Ajahnis Charley returns home with a mission to share some deep personal truths. Surprising conversations ensue with his mother and three siblings creating, in this humorous and heart-wrenching story about our need to seek love and acceptance within our own families.
Black Soul
Enjoy this short by Haitian-Canadian filmmaker Martine Chartrand that uses paint-on-glass animation and music to capture defining moments of Black history.
