Robbins, Paul
Summary: Cultural and human geography focuses on the distribution and actions of people, and the way people influence and are influenced by regional environments, economics, cultures and politics.
Format: moving image
Publisher / Publication Date: Teaching Company 2014
Copies Available at Woodmere
1 available in Adult Non-fiction, Call number: 304.2 ROBSummary: A city shouldn't be a problem, says Jaime Lerner, the former mayor of Curitiba. "It should be a solution." This program explores innovative planning, engineering, and conservation at work in the Brazilian metropolis as it transcends many of the problems plaguing other South American cities. The film spotlights fully modernized public transportation and recycling systems, a "Citizenship Street"...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: In 1532, 168 Spanish conquistadors arrived in Peru. They were exhausted, outnumbered, and terrified, and ahead of them were camped 80,000 Incan troops. And yet within just 24 hours, more than 7,000 Inca warriors were slaughtered, the Incan emperor languished in chains, and the victorious Europeans began what would become a brutal reign that would leave its marks throughout the Americas. This...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: Why do urban crime rates soar in some wealthy countries while dropping in others? This program analyzes that question using data-mapping to find telltale patterns in Japan and the United States. With the Japanese crime rate increasing in 90 percent of the nation, a data map based on locations and peak times of criminal activity sheds light on deteriorating conditions in city outskirts. Opposite...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: Coffee is second only to oil as the world's most valuable traded commodity, but small-scale producers rarely profit from it. This program reveals the hardship and uncertainty faced by coffee farmers in Guatemala, and how many are taking steps to obtain better prices and build better lives. Analyzing the country's traumatic history and the lingering effects of its civil war, the video sheds...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: Close to the Russian border, far removed from Mongolia's polluted and overcrowded capital city of Ulaanbaatar, an ancient herding culture fights to maintain its identity-and its survival. This program examines the nomadic communities of the Mongolian plains and their resistance to change, despite growing pressure on many herders to modernize and migrate to urban areas. Viewers meet some who...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: When an 11-year-old Paraguayan boy named Silvino Talavera died from pesticide poisoning in 2003, his name became a rallying cry in the fight against intensive soya production. This program recounts the tragedy and the legal, political, and economic impact of "agritoxins" in Latin America. Opening with a poetically filmed reenactment and moving on to feature key players in the story, the film...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: Characterized as an LDC or Least Developed Country, the nation of Chad wrestles with drought, population growth, and resulting tensions between farmers and herders. This program investigates hydraulic projects and mediation initiatives that are fostering relationships between Chad's food growers and its nomadic, livestock-centered cultures. Overviewing the basic causes of Chadian land disputes...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: Virtually every reef system in the world is endangered, and the island nations of the South Pacific provide some of the most troubling examples. This program examines the uncertain future of tropical offshore ecosystems using the French collectivity of New Caledonia as a case study. Viewers accompany lagoon protection crew members as they patrol fragile marine reserves by boat; an itinerant...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: Satisfying one's hunger is a primal act which most Westerners never connect to global issues. But the diets and farming systems of wealthy countries can be directly linked to starvation in the underdeveloped world. This program sheds light on the international tragedy of hunger and malnutrition, emphasizing that the problem is one of distribution, not production. Filmed in Asia, South America,...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2008
View online at AVOD
Summary: Carved in stone or scratched in clay, the first maps appeared at least 5,000 years ago. This program chronicles the rise of geographical awareness-manifested not only in crude cartography, but also through word of mouth and narratives such as Homer's Odyssey and the Viking sagas. Clearly illustrating the forces behind navigational learning and excursions into the unknown, this program presents...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: In Papua New Guinea, a local man asked Jared Diamond a question that penetrates to the very heart of the issue of global inequality: "Why is it that you white people developed so much cargo [material goods], but we black people had little cargo of our own?" In this program, Diamond traces the trail of history and proposes that a society's potential for advanced development lies not in race or...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: This program examines types of conflict that can occur at the local level, whether that locality is a single town, a region, or an entire country. After generally addressing armed conflict-different types of war, where they tend to proliferate, and kinds of weaponry used-Conflict on a Local Scale illustrates unarmed conflict through five examples. They include a clash of recreational interests...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: Tokyo is one of the most technologically advanced cities on the planet, but Japan's low birth rate and the diversifying interests of its young people are causing Tokyo to rely increasingly on skilled immigrant labor. This program examines the implications of that change, gathering insightful commentary from a wide range of Japanese society about multiculturalism, racism, and interracial...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: Anthropologist/ethnobotanist Wade Davis is a passionate advocate for preserving what he's dubbed the "ethnosphere." Using stunning photos and stories, Davis celebrates the extraordinary diversity of the world's indigenous cultures in this TEDTalk. A National Geographic Explorer-in-Residence, Davis travels the globe to document the cultural practices of people whose time-honored ways of life are...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2007
View online at AVOD
Summary: The world is a mosaic of visions, and each vision is encapsulated by a language. Yet every two weeks, one of the world's approximately 6,500 languages dies out. What is the significance of this loss to those who speak the language as well as for the rest of humankind? Why do some languages become global while others disappear? And how are language and identity connected? In this program,...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2007
View online at AVOD
Summary: “I have found my mission in Kyrgyzstan,” says French horse expert Jacqueline Ripart. In remote areas of the Tian Shan mountains in Kyrgyzstan, Ripart hopes to find descendents of the small, tough horses with which Genghis Khan once conquered Central Asia - if they are not already extinct. Under Soviet rule, the Kyrgyz horse was bred with larger Russian strains to produce meat for slaughter....
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2008
View online at AVOD
Summary: Among the largest, most pristine areas of tropical woodland on the planet, the Congo Basin forests could easily fall prey to shortsighted and exploitative commercial interests. This program looks at sustainable lumber production initiatives taking root in the region, with a focus on cutting-edge forestry management as well as economic growth through increased cooperation between local...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: From medicinal shamans to taxi drivers in rusty death traps, this program plunges further into the depth and breadth of life in South America-following American adventurer Karin Muller as she travels the ancient Incan highway. Muller joins Peruvian fishermen plying their trade in handmade reed boats; watches herds of vicuna penned and sheared of their precious wool; absorbs the spectacle of...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: As climate change lays waste to the Niger River, the great Malian city of Timbuktu increasingly resembles a desert landscape. The same is true for much of land-locked Mali, which could, in a worst-case scenario, find itself without water altogether. Incorporating discussions of poverty, population growth, and other issues, this film examines the impact of desertification on two of the nation's...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
View online at AVOD
Summary: This program defines Mexico City's globalization in terms of winners and losers, examining how, in the world's largest metropolis, immigration challenges are linked to poverty and population influx from surrounding rural areas. Contrasting the city's high-tech facilities and fashionable neighborhoods with its sprawling slums and their struggling inhabitants, the program outlines the...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: In Nicaragua, a growing awareness of domestic violence and its consequences has spurred grassroots activism. This program documents the efforts of two groups, the Xochitl-Acatl Center and the Association of Men Against Violence, both of which confront gender and sexual abuse. Arguing that economic and political oppression influence male tendencies to exercise physical authority within the home,...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: Our most valuable treasure, is how residents of Dakar describe the Bay of Han. But pollution from both residential and industrial sources is destroying the body of water that has long supported fishing families in the Senegalese capital. This program reports on Western-aided efforts to restore the bay's ecological health and its viability as an economic resource. Specific challenges include the...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: Each week, in countries around the globe, nearly a million people say goodbye to their homes in impoverished rural regions-and move to even worse conditions in cities. This program explores the tragic results: illegal slums filled with some of the poorest people in the world, lacking water, sanitation, and other resources needed to support exploding populations. Viewers are shown the lives and...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2007