Critics on today's society
Books
We the media
Grassroots Journalism by the People, for the People", by Dan Gillmor. The main focus of “We the Media” is the ongoing revolution in journalism, but it is much broader than that. It is about media and communication in general. It is a report in mid-2004 on many of the predictions that Marshall
McLuhan? made in the 1960s and 70s about how technology will change the way we communicate for good and ill.
jaco.cc: “We the Media is Gillmor’s heroic effort to bridge the tech-obsessed polyannas like me and the skeptical grownups whose hardened attitutudes won’t admit of this stuff. He’s done us all a service by writing it for us.”
read online
Movies
Life and debt
Documentary that looks at the effects of globalization on Jamaican industry and agriculture. Utilizing excerpts from the award-winning non-fiction text
A Smal Place by Jamaica Kincaid,
Life and Debt is a woven tapestry of sequences focusing on the stories of individual jamaicans whose strategies for survival and parameters of day-to-day existence are determined by the US and other foreign economic agendas.
By combining traditional documentary telling with a stylised narrative framework, director Stephanie Black ensures that the complexity of international lending, structural adjustment policies and free trade is elegantly contextualised with the day-to-day realities of the people whos lives they impact. As such, the film emerges as an authoritative and moving tribute to the ingenuity and strength of the people who defy the odds of survival whilst also informing of the impact of US foreign poliocies on foreign countries. A look at a beautiful, tropical land robbed of its numerous natural resources;
Life and Debt is provactive, intelligent and illuminating fare.
Mandatory viewing for anyone interested in globalisation. And of course some nice reggae tunes from Bob Marley, Harry Belafonte, Anthony B and more.
Orwell Rolls in his Grave
Orwell rolls in his grave proves beyond a reasonable doubt that the oft-used BuzzFlash claim that we have entered into an Orwellian parallel universe, with the arrival of the radical right wing Republican Party in full power, is true and accurate. This is a must see, a wake-up call to America that we have already entered an Orwellian world when history, context, and language are redefined daily by the government, as the media broadcasts the new version of the truth without question. Every news cycle starts with a clean slate for the White House “Ministry of Truth” to write on.
The View From Here: The Corporation
Must-see documentary on the history and nature of corporations. This is the 6-part TV mini series. The Corporation engages us in a darkly amusing account of the corporation's birth as a legal 'person' whose prime directive is to produce ever-increasing profit for its shareholders, regardless of the cost to anyone, or anything else. This documentary examines the legal status of the corporation, and judges the actions of several of the biggest companies against psychological checklists.
Distorted Morality
by Noam Chomsky
Fahrenheit 9/11
by Michael Moore
Outfoxed
Documentary on reported Conservative bias of the Rupert Murdoch-owned Fox News Channel (FNC), which promotes itself as "Fair and Balanced". Material includes interviews with former FNC employees and the inter-office memos they provided.
La Society du Spectacle
by Guy Debord
