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As the West unfolded, its legends were even bigger than life. The West was some sort of grand notion where fact and fiction freely intermingled and have all but become inseparable. The tall tales and folklore along with the beliefs and rituals of the Native Americans are as much a part of the legacy of the West as is its history. In this program historians reveal the myths and realities of these romantic and often imaginary tales.
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This episode of the Green Interview features Todd Labrador, a respected and celebrated traditional Mi’kmaq canoe builder who speaks with Silver Donald Cameron about the painstaking process involved in making the traditional birch bark canoes and how he hopes it will help to preserve the knowledge and worldview of his ancestors who lived sustainably on the east coast of Canada for millennia. Labrador is also an artist who paints and makes traditional...
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This documentary from Clash of the Gods explores the 3,000-year-old story of the woman at the heart of the Trojan War. The Greek poet Homer told the tale in The Iliad and The Odyssey, and Hollywood has presented its own versions. Now, we examine the myth of Helen. Conceived from the god Zeus' rape of her mother, she is said to be the most beautiful woman in the world and desired by every man. Modern writers including Camille Paglia and Arianna Huffington...
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This is the story of Samba and the legacy of the four braids, each representing one great truth. Captured and brought before the king, Samba resisted telling the secrets until he realized that the alternative was death. But when he revealed the last of his secrets, that a leader deserves no honor if he is not also a friend to his people, the king understood the message and made Samba his viceroy.
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This program marks the beginning of Michael Wood's quest as he ventures into the world of an exotic and mysterious woman of power. Immortalized in the Hebrew Bible, the Muslim Koran, and in many Christian traditions, the tale of the Queen's journey to meet King Solomon has been told and retold for nearly 3,000 years. Wood's fascinating voyage starts on Easter night in Jerusalem, taking him around the Red Sea to Egypt, Eritrea, and Ethiopia, and to...
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This is the first documentary about Black ASL: the unique dialect of American Sign Language (ASL) that developed within historically segregated African American Deaf communities. Black ASL today conveys an identity and sense of belonging that mirrors spoken language varieties of the African American hearing community. The program highlights the different uses of space, hand use, directional movement, and facial expression, which are ways that Black...
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Who hasn’t felt the urge to sing in the shower, to chime in on the chorus of their favourite tune or belt out an anthem at a sporting event? Melodies ring out at every important human activity – from romancing mates to soothing babies, from worshipping to mourning, celebrating to protesting. What triggers this response in humans? Are we hardwired for music? Addicted to rhythm? What power does music have over our bodies and our brains? Scientists...
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James Hilton popularized the tale of the magical hidden valley of Shangri-La in the 1930s in his novel, Lost Horizon. However, the story of a lost kingdom high in the Himalayas - a paradise free from war and suffering - is descended from a much older Indian myth. In this program, Michael Wood takes a thrilling trek through India, Nepal, and to Tibet's Mount Kailash, the sacred center of the world for all Hindus and Buddhists. After hundreds of miles...
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This episode of Ancient Mysteries brings us back more than 3,000 years to the legendary city of Troy. Scholars delve into the secrets of Troy by researching the Greek poet Homer, who related the city's history in The Iliad. Their discoveries are revealed and shed new light on the legends of the Trojan horse, Achilles, the abduction of Helen, and the fall of Troy.
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Historically, the arts in Africa were largely communal and unrecorded. But much has changed over the past century, and this program takes a look at art in sub-Saharan Africa as it exists today through profiles of Senegalese rap groups Alif and Wageble and the rap collective Fight and Forget, who use their music as a form of political activism; Senegalese sculptor Babacar Niang, whose workshop has trained artists who have found success in both the...
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Camelot's court was home to lords and ladies, knights and sorcerers. The mythic tales of King Arthur, Lancelot, and Guinevere inspired stories, books, movies, and a Broadway classic. In this episode of Ancient Mysteries, historians and archaeologists lead us throughout England and Wales in search of Camelot and the truth behind one of the Western World's most beloved legends.
14) Paperback Writer
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As the paperback book democratized reading in the 20th century, cover art became a powerful marketing tool to sell books to the masses. The cover of George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four changed over time, from its classic 1950s Penguin design to the latest artwork from Jon Gray, each iteration reflecting its respective decade's approach to selling the book to new readers. David Pelham's iconic 'cog eye' design for Anthony Burgess's A Clockwork Orange...
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In this program, Michael Wood explores the greatest of British myths: the tale of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. Traveling through the Celtic world from Cornwall and Wales to Brittany, Ireland, and Scotland, Wood uncovers the extraordinary story of how a shadowy Welsh freedom-fighter became a medieval superman, and eventually the model of a Christian hero. On the way we discover the real stories behind the Round Table, Excalibur,...
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This episode of the Green Interview features Gary Saunders, the author of the award-winning book My Life with Trees: A Sylvan Journey. In this exclusive Green Interview, he speaks with Silver Donald Cameron about how he is at home in the woods, and how that came to be, starting out in out port Newfoundland as the son of a river man. He spent most of his adult life in Nova Scotia as a forester, an artist, an educator, and a writer. His most recent...
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Spanning hundreds of years and thousands of miles, this program recounts the remarkable saga of how a nursery rhyme sung by the Gullah people of present-day Georgia was confirmed to be of African origin. When 18th-century slavers sent human cargo from Sierra Leone to America's coastal South, they also sent a trove of cultural information that had been passed from Mende mothers to their daughters for generations-including a particular song that had...
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One of the world's most fascinating museums is by far one of the oldest. But can the paintings there really be called art? This program goes inside the Lascaux cave complex to examine the richest and most beautiful collection of Paleolithic cave drawings in France. Who were the artisans who rendered those arresting images, and how exactly did they do it? Different theories are presented as the cameras capture a site that never ceases to amaze and...
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Dark mysterious creatures, tales of vampires are told in many different cultures around the world. This revealing documentary explores the fear and intrigue that these undead beings stir. Origins of the Vampire also presents the surprising truth about real-life cases through history. From Vlad the Impaler's 16th century Transylvania to Bram Stoker's stories of the 19th century to today's movies and books, the lore of the vampire always thrills.
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If writing is the beginning of history, reading is the beginning of civilization. In this program, host Alberto Manguel traces the history of literacy via the Lascaux caves of prehistoric France; ancient Mesopotamia, birthplace of cuneiform and home to the Epic of Gilgamesh; and Egypt both past and present, with its monumental libraries at Alexandria. He then addresses the powerful benefits and dangerous drawbacks of personal interpretation of religious...