News and Events => Arts & Entertainment News => Topic started by: Shana A on November 20, 2011, 09:26:23 AM Return to Full Version
Title: Two Spirit Documentary Breaks PBS Records
Post by: Shana A on November 20, 2011, 09:26:23 AM
Post by: Shana A on November 20, 2011, 09:26:23 AM
Posted on Advocate.com November 19, 2011 12:00:00 PM ET
Two Spirit Documentary Breaks PBS Records
The Native American documentary Two Spirits, now out on DVD, broke PBS records earlier this year.
By Diane Anderson-Minshall
http://www.advocate.com/Arts_and_Entertainment/Film/Two_Spirit_Documentary_Breaks_PBS_Records/ (http://www.advocate.com/Arts_and_Entertainment/Film/Two_Spirit_Documentary_Breaks_PBS_Records/)
That call is a bit too late to offer security to Fred Martinez, but a new film, which broke audience records earlier this year and is now available on DVD, both documents Martinez's life and the long history of different perceptions of gender and sexuality among the Navajo Nation. Fred Martinez, a Navajo boy who was nádleehí, or male-bodied person with a feminine spirit. When Fred was 16-years-old, Shaun Murphy bludgeoned him to death for being different. The film interweaves the tragic story of a mother's loss along with Native American cultural traditions that once held places of honor for people of integrated genders. Being nádleehí was, in ancient Navajo culture, a special gift but in modern culture Martinez was not honored; his brutal murder made him one of the youngest hate-crime victims in modern. But the film brings home the resounding message that being true to oneself is the bravest thing anyone can do.
Two Spirit Documentary Breaks PBS Records
The Native American documentary Two Spirits, now out on DVD, broke PBS records earlier this year.
By Diane Anderson-Minshall
http://www.advocate.com/Arts_and_Entertainment/Film/Two_Spirit_Documentary_Breaks_PBS_Records/ (http://www.advocate.com/Arts_and_Entertainment/Film/Two_Spirit_Documentary_Breaks_PBS_Records/)
That call is a bit too late to offer security to Fred Martinez, but a new film, which broke audience records earlier this year and is now available on DVD, both documents Martinez's life and the long history of different perceptions of gender and sexuality among the Navajo Nation. Fred Martinez, a Navajo boy who was nádleehí, or male-bodied person with a feminine spirit. When Fred was 16-years-old, Shaun Murphy bludgeoned him to death for being different. The film interweaves the tragic story of a mother's loss along with Native American cultural traditions that once held places of honor for people of integrated genders. Being nádleehí was, in ancient Navajo culture, a special gift but in modern culture Martinez was not honored; his brutal murder made him one of the youngest hate-crime victims in modern. But the film brings home the resounding message that being true to oneself is the bravest thing anyone can do.