Search Help

How does this work?
There are many ways to search the collections of the Freedom Archives. Below is a brief guide that will help you conduct effective searches. Note, anytime you search for anything in the Freedom Archives, the first results that appear will be our digitized items. Information for items that have yet to be scanned or yet to be digitized can still be viewed, but only by clicking on the show link that will display the hidden (non-digitized) items. If you are interested in accessing these non-digitized materials, please email info@freedomarchives.org.
Exploring the Collections without the Search Bar
Under the heading Browse By Collection, you’ll notice most of the Freedom Archives’ major collections. These collections have an image as well as a short description of what you’ll find in that collection. Click on that image to instantly explore that specific collection.
Basic Searching
You can always type what you’re looking for into the search bar. Certain searches may generate hundreds of results, so sometimes it will help to use quotation marks to help narrow down your results. For instance, searching for the phrase Black Liberation will generate all of our holdings that contain the words Black and Liberation, while searching for “Black Liberation” (in quotation marks) will only generate our records that have those two words next to each other.
Advanced Searching
The Freedom Archives search site also understands Boolean search logic. Click on this link for a brief tutorial on how to use Boolean search logic. Our search function also understands “fuzzy searches.” Fuzzy searches utilize the (*) and will find matches even when users misspell words or enter in only partial words for the search. For example, searching for liber* will produce results for liberation/liberate/liberates/etc.
Keyword Searches
You’ll notice that under the heading KEYWORDS, there are a number of words, phrases or names that describe content. Sometimes these are also called “tags.” Clicking on these words is essentially the same as conducting a basic search.

Search Results

When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts
Date: 1/1/2006Call Number: V 233Format: DVDProducers: Spike LeeCollection: Videos in many formats – both camera originals as well as reference materials
As the world watched in horror, Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans on August 29, 2005. Like many who watched the unfolding drama on television news, director Spike Lee was shocked not only by the scale of the disaster, but by the slow, inept and disorganized response of the emergency and recovery effort. Lee was moved to document this modern American tragedy, a morality play witnessed by people all around the world. The result is WHEN THE LEVEES BROKE: A REQUIEM IN FOUR ACTS. The film is structured in four acts, each dealing with a different aspect of the events that preceded and followed Katrina's catastrophic passage through New Orleans.
Finding Common Ground In New Orleans Finding Common Ground In New Orleans
Date: 1/1/2006Call Number: V 256Format: DVDProducers: Walidah ImarishaCollection: Videos in many formats – both camera originals as well as reference materials
Addresses the social injustice that took place during and after the Hurricane Katrina disaster through the lens of poet and activist Walidah Imarisha. Through compelling and often heart wrenching interviews with residents, survivors, activists, volunteers and officials, the landscape of a city devastated and trying to rebuild comes to light. Finding Common Ground In New Orleans interrogates the changing realities of the city, the way that the physical space and realities of New Orleans and the surrounding bayou are forever altered because of both the natural disaster and the government’s criminal negligence. This film includes exclusive footage shot in the makeshift bus station jail known as “Camp Amtrak” and interviews with officials at the jail about the city’s criminal justice system, or lack thereof. The short documentary is able, through the lens of personal accounts that speak to broader issues and concerns, to capture the pain, the loss and the hope of New Orleans.