American INSIGHT

American INSIGHT’s mission is to promote knowledge of (and insight into) "Free Speech, Human Rights, and the Rule of Law," by broadening exposure to the history and future of Free Speech through emerging technologies. Combining the resources of a broadcast-quality television production company with a fully integrated digital network and delivery system for multi-platform media content, American INSIGHT is a 501 (c) 3 nonprofit organization registered in the State of Pennsylvania.

American INSIGHT was founded in 1983 by Margaret Chew Barringer under the original name of the American Poetry Center to promote Free Speech and the Spoken Word. Its success in Pennsylvania led to the creation of National Poetry Month. The organization legally changed its name to American INSIGHT as it prepared to reach Internet audiences through the latest advances in all-digital historic archival research, video production techniques, and Internet-based delivery systems.

Ongoing Programs

Internship Program
Initiated in 2001, American INSIGHT's Internship Program has fostered the talents of over 50 university students in the Greater Philadelphia area who are dedicated to preserving our nation's history. Interns who successfully volunteer or receive academic credit for a semester are eligible to apply for American INSIGHT's paid Internships. By including Interns in all phases of the production of historical documentaries, American INSIGHT fills a critical need in our nation's television production industry.

Free Speech Film Festival + Free Speech Award
American INSIGHT’s Free Speech Film Festival was created and developed after six years of detailed research into the history of Free Speech. Managed by university students enrolled in American INSIGHT’s Internship Program, the Festival is a low-cost, grassroots, sustainable program that unites Celebrity Presenters, students, scholars, poets, artists, scientists, writers, educators, and the general public in conversations about the history and future of Free Speech.

Filmmakers from nations around the world participated in American INSIGHT's 2012 Free Speech Film Festival. Winner of the 2012 Free Speech Awards was Free China: The Courage to Believe, directed by Michael Perlman and Kean Wong. The film focuses on human rights and slave labor camps inside China, and is told through the story of a Chinese mother whose life is transformed by the peaceful spiritual movement that swept across China in the 1990s. Israeli-American film director, Joseph Ohayon, won American INSIGHT's 2013 Free Speech Award for his documentary, Crossroads: Labor Pains of a New World. The documentary explores the depths of the current human condition and the emergence of a new worldview.

American INSIGHT’s 2015 Free Speech Award-winning film, Honor Diaries, the first film to break the silence on “honor violence” against women and girls, features women’s rights advocates with roots in Muslim majority societies. Winner of American INSIGHT’s Free Speech Award in 2016, Australian Director Judy Rymer’s film, I Will Not Be Silenced, graphically predicts the beginnings of change for women in Kenya. British Director Tarquin Ramsay’s film Free Speech Fear Free, examines the lurking threat of corporate and government surveillance, and won American INSIGHT’s 2017 Free Speech Award.

American INSIGHT's 2018 Free Speech Award was given to TEAM ENOUGH, a youth-based group committed to ending gun violence.  The 2019 Free Speech Award was presented to Brave New Films Founder and Director Robert Greenwald for his film "SUPPRESSED: The Fight to Vote."  The event took place at Cliveden of the National Trust in Germantown.

Free Speech Storyline
American INSIGHT's Free Speech Storyline was initially based on research completed by our Interns on Philadelphia artist Violet Oakley, who was commissioned to complete thirteen life size murals in the Governor’s Reception Room at the Pennsylvania State Capitol building in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania in 1906. Featured in the story are William Tyndale printing the Bible in English, Poet Anne Askew, the English Civil War, Quaker leader George Fox, and six murals depicting the visionary life of William Penn. American INSIGHT Interns continue to carry the Storyline both backward through history and forward to the next Free Speech Award-winning film.

Andrew Hamilton, Esq.: The Philadelphia Lawyer
A website-in-progress dedicated to continuing research on Colonial lawyer and public figure, Andrew Hamilton, Esq. Hamilton is best remembered for his pro bono defense of John Peter Zenger in 1735, in which he successfully defended the press’ right to free speech, forty years before the American Revolution.

Benjamin Chew, Esq.: The Politics of Peace
A website-in-progress dedicated to promoting ongoing historical research, manuscripts, articles, lectures and films about the life and career of a critically important, but overlooked, American hero, Benjamin Chew, Esq. A lifelong pacifist, negotiator and consummate lawyer, Chew helped forge the legal pathways that led to the creation of the United States Constitution.

Arthur B. Carles: Philadelphia Artist
Completed in 2005, American INSIGHT's first historical documentary Arthur B. Carles: Philadelphia Artist, examines the life and work of seminal Philadelphia artist, Arthur B. Carles, and was produced in cooperation with seventeen scholars over forty cultural institutions in the Greater Philadelphia area. Archival photographs, film clips and footage of locations important to Carles’ life provide a backdrop for readings from Carles' letters. Poetry readings occur throughout the film by Carles’ contemporaries Wallace Stevens, Ezra Pound, Gertrude Stein, and William Carlos Williams. Philadelphia composer Eric Sessler provided the documentary’s original score. The film was screened at over twenty venues throughout the region, including the Barnes Foundation and the Michener Art Museum.

Robert Indiana: Full Circle
American INSIGHT’s documentary-in-progress, Robert Indiana: Full Circle, examines the ingenuity of American Pop artist Robert Indiana, who considered Philadelphia his spiritual home. Inventing, but never copyrighting, the famous LOVE sculpture, Indiana continues to use words and typographic forms to define his distinctive approach to both language and art. American INSIGHT crews have captured hours of footage containing both conversations with him and his public appearances since 1990.

Notes

Further reading
A Sacred Challenge:Violet Oakley and the Pennsylvania Capitol Murals. United States of America: The Pennsylvania Capitol Preservation Committee, 2002. 
Ryan, S. E. (2000). Robert Indiana: Figures of speech. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. 
Konkle, B. A. (1932). Benjamin Chew 1722–1810: Head of the Pennsylvania judiciary system under colony and commonwealth. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press.

External links
American INSIGHT Homepage
Andrew Hamilton Esq. A site dedicated to emerging research on Andrew Hamilton, Esq.
Benjamin Chew, Esq. A site dedicated to emerging research on Benjamin Chew, Esq.
Free Speech Film Festival

Category:Non-profit organizations based in Pennsylvania
Category:Companies based in Philadelphia
Category:History of Philadelphia
Category:Organizations based in Philadelphia
Category:Culture of Philadelphia
Category:Media in Philadelphia
Category:1983 establishments in Pennsylvania