Free Speech TV has been showing some incredible programs from Appalshop, a multimedia arts center serving communities in the Appalachian Mountains. They work with people to create films, videos, theatre, music, radio, and spoken word. We have shown their films Sludge, Buffalo Creek Flood, and Buffalo Creek Revisited dealing with the destructive behavior of coal mining companies and militant community resistance.
I just saw the film Stranger With a Camera that has shown on PBS via ITVS. The film tells the story of a communities response to a local man who shot a Canadian documentary filmmaker who trespassed on his land. It deals with questions of representation: who has the right; what is the right approach; what is fair subject matter? It also deals with questions of self-defense from the external world's profitable objectification and exploitation of poor subjects.
All of these films create a compelling portrait of the people of the Appalachian Mountain's struggle to keep their culture intact and to keep it from being exploited.
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