This is a review essay based on two exceptional Rockaway surf documentaries that debuted last Fall. Like the Ramones, Kryssa Schemmerling's "Our Hawaii" and Thomas Brookins "Shadows of the Same Sun" both celebrate the glorious surfing legacy of my hometown, Rockaway Beach. In very different ways, each filmmaker explores Rockaway's weird geography and often brutal social history through archival footage and compelling oral histories. For scholars, surfers and Rockaway kids alike----anyone interested in surfing subculture, urban studies, oral history, policy planning, ethnography, localism and ocean activism---these docs are Surf-It-Deep Sociology!!!!
See ya in the water-
Dr. Donna
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