November is Hip Hop History Month

November is Hip Hop History Month and Third World Newsreel celebrates with the release of Living the Hiplife, a music documentary about the influence of hip hop in the music scene in Accra, Ghana.

IF YOU ARE INTERESTED IN SCREENING THIS COPY AT AN UPCOMING FILM FESTIVAL CONTACT THIRD WORLD NEWSREEL AT twn@twn.com or call 212-947-9277

NEW Living the Hiplife Available on DVD

This film is a musical portrait of street life in urban West Africa. It follows the birth of Hiplife music, a mix of various African musical forms and American hip hop, in Accra, Ghana. Archival footage and hip hop music videos are remixed with interviews and the daily lives of rap artists. We follow Reggie Rockstone, the Godfather of Hiplife in the founding of the musical movement, as well as the Mobile Boys a group of aspiring rap artists as they try to make it in the music business. With humor and personality these characters move across the political and musical landscape of urban Ghana.

"...cleverly portrays contemporary West African expressive culture. It is especially important because it shows the importance of Pan-Africanism and African Diasporic artistic and political connections to people in Africa."--Chinua Achebe, Nigerian Author

"...thoughtful and visually exciting at the same time. It is a musical documentary that gives a powerful sense of life in contemporary Africa."--John Akomfrah, Filmmaker and founder of Black Audio Collective, Smoking Dogs Films Founder of Black Audio Collective

Third World Newreel

TWN Film and Video Production Workshop in NYC

2008 Film and Video Production Workshop

The 2008 Film and Video Production Workshop applications are now available!

This 6 month production workshop covers both 16mm and digital video production, from preproduction to shooting and editing.

Highly selective, students meet in the evenings and shoot on the weekends. Aimed at emerging artists from communities of color, low income and other marginalized groups, this workshop is entering its 31st year!

Graduates include feature directors Grace Lee (The Grace Lee Project), Alice Wu (Saving Face), Byron Hurt (Beyond Beats and Rhymes) and many more.

The deadline for the 2008 session applications is January 9th, 2008, and classes start in February.

To register go to TWN.org http://www.thirdworldnewsreel.org/workshop_2004.html

Techno Organizing workshop for music artist on Halloween

Third World Newsreel Presents
10/31 Techno Organizing
http://www.twn.org

From basic to brilliant, a workshop exploring the benefits of using technology to organize information and resources over traditional approaches. In the spirit of the pioneers who utilized new technology to create art (DJ, Aerosol Artist & Producer), the course of this workshop demystifies using the new age of Web 2.0 online services instead of desktop applications, and details how storing data online rather than onto one's desktop or laptop hard drive can help with the overall effectiveness and value of the information being created, stored and/or distributed among the community. Taught by Rolando Brown of the Hip Hop Association.

Walk-in seminars on film/video/digital production topics from funding to sound and more!
Professionals in the field provide down to earth "how- to's" for the independent media-maker. Classes are $25, $15 for low income/students.

"29 Essential Facebook Applications for Public Relations Professionals"

An excellent resource from the HYPERtext blog.

Preventing a cultural faux pas-parnter with a local PR agencies

The following article is a good example why governments and companies need to consult local PR agencies before engaging foreign populations:

"Anger over 'blasphemous' balls"
Source: BBC

A demonstration has been held in south- east Afghanistan accusing US troops of insulting Islam after they distributed footballs bearing the name of Allah...

The balls showed the Saudi Arabian flag which features the Koranic declaration of faith.

The US military said the idea had been to give something for Afghan children to enjoy and they did not realise it would cause offence...

Read article: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/6964564.stm

In the US it is not uncommon to find the flag on nearly everything and I think the US military made an honest mistake with the soccer balls (unlike the planned invasion and colonization of Afghanistan).

This faux pas however is inexcusable the US military has the means of working with local PR firms in the region that could have assisted in developing this campaign.

Also, there are many American citizens and legal residents who are Muslim or from Western Asia, who could have been consulted on this campaign. However, even this is dangerous because depending on how long people have been living outside of the region their knowledge of current cultural norms can be limited.

Caveat: No one should conduct business in a foreign culture without a local partner.

For more information on international Public Relations refer to the following links:

International Public Relations Association: http://www.ipra.org/
International Public Relations Network: http://www.iprex.com/