The Next American Revolution: Sustainable Activism for the Twenty-First Century

In a Durham mining town during the 1984 strike, eleven-year-old Billy is sent to boxing lessons and sneaks into the ballet class next door. His father and brother are on the picket line, and the idea that Billy might dance is almost as hard for them as the strike. It is a family story, a class story and a story about who is allowed to want what.

Why it’s here: It's a film about what a community does with a kid who doesn't fit. What's punk is the strike behind the story: the film doesn't treat the picket line as a backdrop. What's pedagogical is the question it asks at the dinner table: who decides what boys are allowed to love? Pairs with Pride (suggested 10-14), The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists and Julian Is a Mermaid. Note: strike-era police violence and homophobic and gender-policing insults; PG-13 equivalent (15 in the UK).

Liberia, mid-2000s: a long civil war has killed hundreds of thousands, and the men at the peace talks in Ghana are stalling. A group of Christian and Muslim women, in white, organize a mass movement of sit-ins and prayers, and eventually barricade the talks until a deal is signed. A documentary about women who ended a war with no weapons and no permission.

Why it’s here: It's a film about what organized women did when the men with guns would not stop. What's punk is the sit-in, the refusal to leave and the fact that nobody gave them a seat. What's pedagogical is how clearly it shows nonviolent organizing as a skill, with meetings, tactics and a plan. Pairs with Unbowed, This Nonviolent Stuff'll Get You Killed and A Paradise Built in Hell. Note: documentary, PG-13; war footage and descriptions of atrocities; teens and adults. English, some Liberian English with subtitles.