LibGuides: Middle East Complexities: Culture & Conflict: Videos

Video Databases

These databases contain thousands of films on many topics. Films can be streamed and viewed in their entirety or by segment. You can create a private and free user account in each database to keep track of favorites and to create clips and playlists.

Films on Demand This link opens in a new window
You can search Films on Demand by using keywords in the search box, and then choosing one of these three options: film title, segment or transcript . You can also navigate FOD by topic. One way to find information on the Middle East and North Africa is to click on Collections at the top of the page, and then on Area Studies. From there, choose North Africa (under African Studies) or Middle East (under Asia & The Pacific).
Films on Demand is a collection of more than 40,000 educational videos available for video streaming. Titles are organized into subject and other categories. Most videos are divided in to segments which may be searched and viewed individually.

Films on Demand User’s Guide
Academic Video Online (AVON) This link opens in a new window
Includes documentaries, films, and demonstrations in a wide range of subject areas.
Includes more than 62,000 titles spanning the widest range of subject areas including anthropology, business, counseling, film, health, history, music, and more, curated for the educational experience with a wide range of content types such as documentaries, films, demonstrations, etc.

Videos from the Web

Saudi Arabia Uncovered
With undercover footage and on-the-ground reporting, FRONTLINE reveals a side of Saudi Arabia that's rarely seen, and traces the efforts of men and women who are working to bring about change.
Syrian Children of the Front Line
The story of five young children whose lives have been changed forever by the civil war in Syria by journalist and filmmaker Marcel Mettelsiefen. Documentary. Insaane Rights Watch. Published on YouTube Feb. 18, 2014. (48:05)

YouTube has proven to be a very valuable tool, used by the dissidents in the Middle East to provide up-to-the minute news when state-run media were providing only the views of the government. As always, discretion is advised when using YouTube, especially in political situations, where the opposing side can post the party or official line or even falsified videos.

You can try a general search such as Middle East unrest. Or, to get more specific results, trying adding a country name to your search. Examples: Libya protest, Egypt facebook revolution, Syria civil war. If you want videos from CNN, BBC or another network, try this kind of search: ISIS BBC

YouTube searches often return a huge number of results. In the upper left hand corner of the YouTube screen, you'll see Filters. Click on this to limit your videos to those uploaded today, this week, this month, etc. The Filters feature provides you with additional ways to limit your search as well.

Music Videos

Popular Kinan Azmeh and Hewar videos PlayList
Since 2004, as Syrian-US relations have steadily deteriorated, Kinan Azmeh, a Syrian clarinetist, and a group of six other Syrian musicians toured throughout the U.S. as a new musical group and with a new musical concept going by the name of "Hewar," or Dialogue. "When we are playing Arabic music, influenced by jazz and classical music, we don't ever have to explain it," says Azmeh.
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"People in the West can just connect to you on a purely musical level. We want to invite musicians from other countries so that we can dialogue through music. The music takes you to a physical place where you can sit together and share the same feelings. We need this not only from a musical point of view, but also from a social and political point of view."
Kinan Azmeh: Clarinet, Composer
Hailed as a “virtuoso” and "Intensely Soulful" by the New York Times and "Spellbinding" by the New Yorker, and "Incredibly Rich Sound" by the CBC, Kinan Azmeh is one of Syria’s rising stars. His utterly distinctive sound across different musical genres is now fast gaining international recognition.
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Born in Damascus, Kinan was the first Arab to win the premier prize at the 1997 Nicolai Rubinstein International Competition, Moscow. A graduate of New York's Juilliard school as a student of Charles Neidich, and of both the Damascus High institute of Music where he studied with Shukry Sahwki, Nicolay Viovanof and Anatoly Moratof, and Damascus University’s School of Electrical Engineering. Kinan earned his doctorate degree in music from the City University of New York in 2013.

Kinan has appeared worldwide as a soloist, composer and improviser. Notable appearances include: Opera Bastille, Paris; Tchaikovsky Grand Hall, Moscow; Carnegie Hall, Alice Tully Hall and the UN's general assembly, New York; the Royal Albert hall, London; Teatro Colon, Buenos Aires; der Philharmonie; Berlin; the Library of Congress, the Kennedy Center, Washington DC; the Mozarteum, Salzburg and the Damascus opera house for its opening concert in his native Syria. His compositions include several works for solo, orchestra, and chamber music; film, live illustration, and electronics. His discography include three albums with his ensemble HEWAR, several soundtracks for film and dance, a duo album with pianist Dinuk Wijeratne and a recent album with his New York Arabic/Jazz quartet. He serves as artistic director of the Damascus Festival Chamber Music Ensemble, with whom he released an album of new contemporary Syrian chamber music written especially for the ensemble by various composers and is also a frequent guest faculty at the Apple Hill Center for Chamber Music and is on the advisory board of the Nova Scotia Youth Orchestra. He is also a member of Yo-Yo Ma's Silk Road Ensemble.

The Origins of ISIS (Islamic State)

Published on Nov 17, 2014 by the Brookings Institution. Longtime CIA veteran and counterterrorism expert Bruce Riedel details the origins and history of ISIS and how the extremist group's self-proclaimed caliph Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi came to power.