Newly preserved by the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture, Madeline Anderson’s films Integration Report 1 (1960) and I Am Somebody (1970) bring viewers to the front lines of the fight for civil rights.

Integration Report 1 examines the struggle for Black equality in Alabama, Brooklyn and Washington, D.C., incorporating footage by documentary legends Albert Maysles and Ricky Leacock, protest songs by Maya Angelou, and a speech by Martin Luther King, Jr.

In 1969, Black female hospital workers in Charleston, South Carolina went on strike for union recognition and a wage increase, only to find themselves in a confrontation with the state government and the National Guard. Featuring Andrew Young, Charles Abernathy, and Coretta Scott King and produced by Local 1199, New York’s Drug and Hospital Union, I Am Somebody is a crucial document in the struggle for labor rights.

A testament to the courage of the workers and activists at the heart of her films as well as her own bravery, tenacity and skill, the films of Madeline Anderson are both essential historical records of activism and a vital body of cinematic work.

Description courtesy of Icarus Films.

Integration Report 1

(Madeline Anderson, US, 1960, 20 min)

I Am Somebody

(Madeline Anderson, US, 1970, 28 min)

“This film packs a tremendous punch and is deeply moving at the same time. The fact that 400 Black women were able to take on the power structure of the state of South Carolina—and win—is of decisive importance to all of us.” – Fannie Lou Hamer, Civil Rights Leader

“As the first contemporary documentary made by, for, and about Black women workers, I Am Somebody offers a unique opportunity to reconsider the intersections between feminism, union activism, and the civil rights movement in the late sixties… The film visualizes the impossibility of extracting gender from its social, political, and economic imbrications with class and race.” – Shilyh Warren, Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society