Journey of Man

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Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1 Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated) Binding: DVD EAN: 0841887001267 Format: Color Label: PBS (Direct) Manufacturer: PBS (Direct) Number Of Items: 1 Publisher: PBS (Direct) Region Code: 1 Release Date: 2003-08-05 Running Time: 120 Studio: PBS (Direct) Theatrical Release Date: 2003
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Spotlight customer reviews: Customer Rating: Summary: Informative Comment: Extremely interesting, educational and informative. Learned a lot, and had a lot of questions answered. Customer Rating: Summary: Color Me Skeptical Comment: I've just seen this video on Maryland Public Television. It's very good. However, I have reservations about the certainty with which Dr. Wells approaches his subject, and most particularly the sermonizing at the end about how "we are all one." This is Barack Obama territory; Scientists should stick to science, IMHO. Leslie Marmon Silko, in her book, "The Almanac of The Dead," strongly objects to the western scientific view that all Native Americans came from a few hardy souls who crossed the Bering Sea during the last ice age. So, apparently, do the Navajo, who politely told Dr. Wells in the video that their founding myth says they emerged from the earth right there in Arizona. In the video, Dr. Wells blithely dismisses their myth as unscientific, and therefore not worth considering. He offered photos to prove it. To me, this revealing episode smacked of nothing less than the same old white man's imperialism, in its self-evident superiority sweeping away all resistance before it. It may well be that Dr. Wells' and his colleagues' theory about the origin and then spread of mankind is dead on and therefore the case is closed. Based on 3,000 or so blood samples from 2 billion potential donors, and assuming 100% accuracy of the lab results (hope the FBI's lab wasn't involved!). Talk about bold! Nevertheless, I would be willing to bet the ranch that in 50 years this DNA-based theory will have been superceded--or perhaps complemented is a better word--by other discoveries and that Dr. Wells' will not be the accepted scientific wisdom. After all, that's how science works--someone posits a theory, and offers proof, and that theory lasts until someone comes along with another one, and so on. I would have been happier if in the video (the book may be more nuanced) Dr. Wells had admitted that he was offering a theory only, not the definitive view of human life's origins. One of the least credible portions of the video was the effort of the scientific lady who struggled to explain how northern Europeans gained their appearance (in a mere geologic blink)--as fair skinned and ended up looking like--well, like Dr. Wells. In sum, I thank Dr. Wells for his efforts, which were not small, but color me skeptical about swallowing whole the story he put together. Customer Rating: Summary: WE . . .who are anthropologists Comment: WE . . . did not want to see Dr. Wells' face; we could have missed most of that all together. WE . . . did not want to hear so much of Dr. Wells' speech, we could have missed that and everyone on Earth could have done without his arrogance and imperialistic stance as he trotted all over the indigenous peoples on earth. He appeared to my senses like a bull in a china shop; he would easily just knock them down and kept going without a care. He was never one of them, never was with them and he never tried to be with them as a human while others have gone and learned the language and the customs. He took from the people and left. He appeared not as a "teacher" teaching something; he appeared as a force stuffing his position down their throats just as it was done centuries ago. ("You will accept this or else!") I found it more to the point, if you get my drift, to watch the socalled educated man in the midst of the socalled uneducated ignorant people but people who have lived in their environments for what: 50-100,000 years (so they must have known something very important) and they never went to Europe or anywhere else tracing anything to prove it! They never sent millions of species into extinction by their globe trampling and never annihilated strains of human existence. They stayed home and lived within their means with other life-forms, killing a few for food and killing a few humans in war (and we still don't know why that happens) but they stayed home and life flourished. We owe the indigenous people a debt of gratitude for all the beautiful animals in Nature we see today. I found it more to the point that Spencer drove a fancy jeep around and flew in a fancy plane and wore extraordinary clothing to face the elements but the true pioneering, adventuresome humans used their bare feet for thousands and thousands of miles. They carried a stick, maybe a bow and arrow, and headed out to conquer the world as people. Just as people; as a legacy to us; they spread the human genome to every environment on earth. IN WHAT ORDER? We don't know that. (Most of us don't even care about that.) We probably will never, ever really know that for sure. In the meantime, we create! We create stories and myths we don't even bother to prove and we still live in our environments forever! What we know, from academics, is a Western World Creation Story called the Evolutionary Theory and before that we used a basic creation story called Genesis in the Bible. (That's why the two of them should be taught in schools; they enhance the need for people to create a creation story; that behavior is a universal act among humans.) OUR creation stories are just two stories among many just like the Native Americans said when they said they knew about creation stories. The Native American man asked the "teacher", "Why do our sacred stories have to be myths and yours have to be facts?" Spencer responded with a definite, quiet force, "Because we are scientists and require proof. These are your relatives . . ." he went on with his worldview jamming it into their native reality. (I FOUND THIS MOST INTERESTING.) I don't think native people have to be taught that other people are people just like them. I think they have known that all along. It has been Western thought in recent centuries that promoted and believed otherwise.) At this moment in the documentary the Native Americans HAD TO DO WHAT PEOPLE AROUND THE WORLD HAVE HAD TO DO WHEN THEY ARE FACED WITH A FORCE LIKE SPENCER . . . they have to go along with it and talk about it later. (And laugh too.) The Native Americans did not respond, "Wasn't science an idea just like our myths?" They will learn to do this and they will come to know like other people around the world, like the most beautiful people on Earth: the People of the Kalahari Desert, that the whole point in having a Creation Story (in the first place) is the creation of it with your friends and family and tribesman in your orb or world. It is a bonding ritual. And, what's to say it isn't true? Huh? What's to say it isn't true? Whatever, whichever . . . ! Life has gone on forever without the Western version of everything and the world will go on after the Western version dies out and no longer exist. That much I do know. And, so does everyone else who is indigenous. I don't think this documentary does much to end racism because people already know that races do not exist when two people can reproduce by having sex with each other if they are not prevented - now, that's racism! And, why is this a "Journey of Man"? That's an erroneous title. This journey would not have gone very far if man left woman at home. She was on the journey too . . .giving birth all the way. I don't think this documentary was complimentary to Dr. Wells' craft and expertise. I found it to be a regular market presentation but I never tire of the pictures of people from all over the world and I never tire of the earth's scenery (the little bits and pieces we did see). I give it 3 stars for that. --Margaret Opine Customer Rating: Summary: Origin of Species for a New Millenium Comment: While Dr. Wells' delivery in the documentary can be occasionally a bit hyperbolic to compensate for a wide audience, the material is fascinating. The people he encounters along his journey are intelligent and articulate individuals, presented respectfully with varying opinions in regards to their own beliefs. Dr. Wells' gradually becomes more comfortable with what he calls his "blood speech," the explanation of his genetic research and his purpose for seeking those individuals specifically, and he is patient to give equal emphasis to their stories as well supporting his own. What I truly respected about this video is that it doesn't beat the Creation vs. Evolution argument into the ground. That isn't the point of the documentary. What it does do is re-emphasize that no one ethnic group is superior over another, and that, regardless of skin color or ethnic background, we are all brothers and sisters. With documentaries such as this one, and proper education, we can eradicate the false idea of "race," and just start seeing family. For an interesting website on more of this information, check out The Bradshaw Foundation at www.bradshawfoundation.com. Customer Rating: Summary: The best documentary I've seen in years! Comment: Last night we got this DVD and that was something! My wife stopped studying, my 8 year old daughter missed her go to bed time by a couple hours because we just couldn't stop watching. It's a great film for the whole family. Travel to exotic places, cutting edge science, great music - a perfect mix! More Reviews