Professor Kostis Kourelis's Pallas lecture, "Excavating Home: Archaeologies of the Greek American Experience" (March 21, 2019).  https://vimeo.com/326391134 17th Annual Pallas Lecture: Excavating Home: Archaeologies of the Greek American Experience Speaker: Kostis Kourelis, Associate Professor of Art History, Franklin & Marshall College Greek migration to the United States maintained two separate domestic environments, the Greek towns in urban America and the remittance villages in rural Greece. Both spaces played a central role in each country’s socio-economic modernization in the 1900s-1920s. Both spaces of this shared transformation were abandoned in the 1960s through urbanization, deindustrialization, suburbanization, white flight, and urban renewal. With the progressive passing of lived memories, archaeology must make increasingly important contributions in reconstructing the immigrant lifeworld of a century ago. By placing all of its archaeological res...

KALIMERA FROM BEIRUT A non-commercial documentary by George Eid that reveals the story of the Greeks of Lebanon for the 1st time on Lebanese television - with English sub-titles.

Cliffs of Freedom Brings Greek War of Independence to the Big Screen by Eleni Sakellis Published in The National Herald, February 16, 2019 ------------------------------ I am excited that  The National Herald  has given Hellenic Genealogy Geek the right to reprint articles that may be of interest to our group.  ------------------------------ Cliffs of Freedom opens in theaters in New York and Los Angeles on March 1 and expands on March 8 and 15. NEW YORK – Bringing the story of the Greek War of Independence to the big screen has long been a dream for many hoping to share this dramatic period in history with as wide an audience as possible. The soon-to be-released Cliffs of Freedom represents a true passion project for Greek-American Executive Producer and Co-writer Marianne Metropoulos, who spent several years developing a story that would bring the Greek War of Independence to life for modern audiences. Metropoulos told The National He...

BETWEEN SILENCE AND SOUND: GREEK ACTORS AND ACTRESSES OF HOLLYWOOD Part 2 By Steve Frangos Published in The National Herald, July 21, 2012 ------------------------------ I am excited that  The National Herald  has given Hellenic Genealogy Geek the right to reprint articles that may be of interest to our group.  ------------------------------ The era of silent film can be roughly marked between 1894 and 1927. During that period Greeks in Hollywood often enjoyed a privileged position. From the early 1900s to the Great Depression, Alexander Pantages owned and operated the largest independent chain of vaudeville and movie theaters in North America. Pantages was a born showman and so his name and actions were often in the nation's press promoting one of his ventures or another. Two of Pantages’ children, Lloyd and Carmen, were often covered by what today is called the celebrity press. Given their father’s prominence, Carmen seems to h...

EXPLORE THE DESERTED VILLAGE OF KALAMI, CRETE "Once a populous beautiful village where residents used to enjoy the sorrows of life.  Today, this place is forgotten by everyone.  Visitors will encounter open doors and windows, houses remains with objects scattered on the floors and dishes and glasses in position ready to be used again. "The smell of abandonment and melancholy has gripped the village decades ago.  Located 80 kilometers east of Heraklion city in Crete, near Ano Viannos village, this is the village of Kalami.  It is a village set in magnificent scenery, surrounded from mountains, rivers, rivers and dense vegetation, which makes you wonder why they left deserted. "Over 150 families used to inhabit in Kalami before its desertification in the 1970s.  The people gradually came down to the south coast, looking for a better life in Psari Forada and Arvi.  Today, the village remains are the most characteristic monument of rural exodus and has...

TREZOROS - The Lost Jews of Kastoria (Greece) One Story Speaks for Many (Town Life Clip) Watch by clicking on the video link above This deeply moving documentary illuminates the lives of a Sephardic community in Greece whose story speaks for all people who have been displaced and wronged by war and discrimination. The story is set in the beautiful and idyllic city of Kastoria where Jews and Christians lived in harmony for over two millennia. In October 1940 this would all change after the invasion of Greece by Axis forces. Initially occupied by Italy, the Jewish community remained safe- but after Mussolini fell from power the Nazis took control of the town, dooming the community that had existed since the times of the Roman Empire. The film uses never-before-seen archival footage, vibrantly bringing to life just one of the many Jewish communities that had existed in Greece before the end of World War II. “Trezoros” (Ladino/Judeo Spanish term of endearment meanin...

TheGreekReporter.com - Above, watch the full length video  In 2009, we visited the Princes’ Islands for the first time to discover some amazing Greeks, that -to this day- live there. They are the last guards of Greek history and culture on these beautiful islands where the Greek population has gone from tens of thousands to only 80. Watch our short documentary below and see  The Last Greeks of Princes Islands  talking about the Greek past and future of the Islands. Original music composed by  Ioannis Goudelis.  It is not easy to see people expelled from their homes, especially when the story is personally told by one of them who decided to go back and save the house in which he was born. It is a long and painful story with lots of political mistakes. According to the Greek residents of Princes Islands, the hatred between Turks and Greeks belongs to the past and Turkey is more tolerant to minorities and people of Greek decent who live in harmony...

LUDLOW, Greek Americans in the Colorado Coal War - Documentary Available Online The National Herald, NEW YORK - July 7-13, 2018 - The English Version of Ludlow, Greek Americans in the Colorado Coal War (2016) directed by Leonidas Vardaros, produced by Apostolis Berdebes Non Profit Company is now available online at vimeo.com -  https://vimeo.com/164340894 The film can be downloaded or streamed for personal use or public screenings of a non-commercial nature. Ludlow was selected as Best Historical Documentary in the 18th Thessaloniki International Documentary Festival.  In August 2016, the film received the 2nd Award for Feature Documentaries at the 3rd Ierapetra International Documentary Festival and in October 2016 it received the Best Editing Award at the 10th Chalkis Documentary Festival.  The film team, consisting of director Leonidas Vardaros, cinematographer Prokopis Dafnos, researcher Frosso Tsouka, editor Xenofon Vardaros, sound engineer Andreas Gkovas, ...

"Forgotten Movie Theater Pioneer:  Alexander Pantages & Immigrant Hollywood", authored by Lagos G. Taso.  Published in the Journal of Modern Hellenism 32 (2016):  96-114 Here is an excerpt from the article: "Alexander Pantages was an unlikely motion picture theater pioneer and mogul. Born on the Greek island of Andros sometime between 1867 and 1875, Pantages’s meteoric rise in the motion picture exhibition business beginning in 1902 seems like a fairy-tale. Then suddenly in 1929 it all crashed down when he was accused of sexually assaulting a seventeen-year-old dancer. In between Pantages established his business with a keen focus on customer satisfaction, attention to detail, and building grand, ornate theaters. He was, by all accounts, one of the greatest film theater owners in the country at the time, a true film theater pioneer, yet today, he is hardly remembered by most Americans, including Greek Americans.  Pantages as an historical figure present...

British PATHE - Historic Film Archive - Footage Library ----- 1923  Film clip title - Click on title below for link to video   "Out of the land of bondage". Poignant pictures that illustrate tragedy of Greek exodus from Turkish rule in Thrace. 

British PATHE - Historic Film Archive - Footage Library ----- 1949  Film clip title - Click on title below for link to video GREEK KIDS MAKE OWN SHOES FROM UN LEATHER Athens, Greece Various shots of young boys in a Government Children's Village making shoes from leather supplied by UNICEF, the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund. A boy uses a sewing machine on some leather while some men stand around and watch. A line of children queue for shoes handed to them by officials. 

British PATHE - Historic Film Archive - Footage Library ----- 1925 Film clip title - Click on title below for link to video Weddings - wholesale!  Picturesque scenes at nuptials of 16 orphans - Athens, Greece .

Issue Vol. 32 / 2016 of the Journal of Modern Hellenism was published entirely on the subject of the GREEKS OF HOLLYWOOD.  This looks so interesting.  I haven't had time to read it myself, but plan on doing so over the next week.  Enjoy it! READ THE ENTIRE JOURNAL FOR FREE -  http://journals.sfu.ca/jmh/index.php/jmh ARTICLES The Greek American Image in American Film:  Creation of a Filmography by Barbara Saltz From "Other" to "One of Us":  The Changing Image of Greek Americans in American film:  1943-1963 by Dan Georgakas The Hollywood Films of Irene Papas by Gerasimus Katsan Before and Beyond America America by Stathis Giallelis And the Winner is Olympia Dukakis by Elaine Thomopoulos Working Through and Against Convention:  The Hollywood Career of A. I. Bezzerides by Yiorgos Kalogeras Creating Images for Hollywood Classics by Vicki James Yiannias Forgotten Movie Theater Pioneer:  Alexander Pantages and Immigrant Hol...

THE DAWN OF GREEK STEREOTYPES IN EARLY AMERICAN CINEMA Published in The National Herald, March 4 - 10 , 2017 Issue Authored by Steve Frangos TNH Staff Writer ------------------------------ We are excited to announce that  The National Herald  has given Hellenic Genealogy Geek the right to reprint articles that may be of interest to our group.  ------------------------------ ----------------------- It is difficult, from this historical distance, to decipher exactly what the average American first saw when attending the then-newly developed entertainment medium, the motion picture. Complicating our understanding even further for those concerned with Modern Greek Studies is that cultural stereotypes of Greeks are so fluid, many associations once inseparable image about Greeks in the average American mind are no longer recognized. Unpacking these historically fixed images can seem, from time to time, unnecessarily complex. Nonetheless,...

EVENEMENTS DE PHOCEE 1914 from STELIOS TATAKIS on Vimeo . This message originally came to me through the MGSA (Modern Greek Studies Association).   Our names are Agnes Sklavou and Stelios Tatakis. We are independent Film Directors-Producers from Greece. We want to inform you about how our film the Historical documentary  "The sacking of Phocaea" (International title) "Γεγονοτα στη Φώκαια 1914"  (Greek title) can be screened to your community. The film had screened or will be in Montreal, Chicago, Huston, Marseilles and Nice for 2016. Synopsis: June 1914. Just before the outbreak of the First World War, the entire Greek population living on the coast of Asia Minor had to evacuate their villages and flee to Greece, abandoning homes and land. This expulsion, happening during a difficult political and diplomatic period, did not have the impact one might have expected. At the time French archaeologist Felix Sartiaux, and three colleagues were in the region on an...

ONE ARCADIAN VILLAGE HAS GONE DIGITAL Published in The National Herald, August 15-21, 2015 Issue Authored by Angelike Contis Special to The National Herald ------------------------------ We are excited to announce that  The National Herald  has given Hellenic Genealogy Geek the right to reprint articles that may be of interest to our group.  ------------------------------ VLAHOKERASIA, GREECE - Vlahokerasia, population 424, will soon have something most Greek villages can only dream of:  its own digital museum.  Over the course of four years, a volunteer committee spearheaded by retired Sociology/Anthropology Professor Nikos Petropoulos, has prepared a collection of images, moving pictures, and documents to share with the world, digitally. If you've ever traveled between Tripoli and Sparta, in Greece's Peloponnese, chances are you've seen the sign for Vlahokerasia.  "To horio," or the village, as its fondly called by its son...