No Signifyin' Please: Your visual dose of black history

February, you might have heard, is Black History Month (or African-American History Month, depending on your leanings).

What better way to celebrate than to actually learn a little history? And what better way to learn than through your television? Isn't that what it's for?

Mark your calendar.

UNC-TV will air four Independent Lens films. Unfortunately, they will air at 2am on Friday mornings. DVR, tape, or stay up -- they are all worth seeing. (If anything changes in the airdates, I'll update.)

So, early on Feb. 6 is "Adjust Your Color: The Truth of Petey Greene" a film about the late, great outrageous Washington, DC TV and radio host. Don Cheadle, who played Greene in an underseen, underrated 2007 movie "Talk to Me", narrates. If you saw that film, you really only got a taste of Greene and his vast influence. (Two words: Howard Stern.) And Greene's family didn't like that dramatization. The documentary must be more to their liking; Greene's children participate. It includes footage of Greene on his DC TV show that was presumed lost for 25 years. Artist Ernie Barnes, sports broadcaster James Brown, actor Robert Hooks are just a few of the folk whose lives Greene touched.

Feb. 13 look for "Tulia, Texas," a dcoumentary about how in 1999, an undercover cop executed one of the biggest drug busts in Texas history --46 people, 39 African-American. Later, problems arose with Coleman's police reports and court testimony and the cases were overturned. In this one, lawyers are the good guys. A fascinating story of injustice and justice.

"Billy Strayhorn: Lush Life" on Feb. 20 is a profile of the jazz composer, arranger and pianist who collaborated with Duke Ellington. Besides "Lush Life," which he wrote in his mid-teens!, he also wrote "Take The A Train." Dule Hill, from "Psych" plays Strayhorn in recreations and Dianne Reeves and Elvis Costello sing his music.

Feb. 27 brings "The Order of Myths" a documentary shown at Full Frame. If you missed it there, try to catch it here. It's a look at America's oldest Mardi Gras in Mobile, Alabama; even today, events are segregated between blacks and whites. The doc follows a younger generation and how they navigate race relations.

The Documentary Channel will by showing a rarely seen documentary every Wednesday in February (that includes tonight) at 8pm. Don't have that channel? That's OK: all the docs will be shown on the Documentary Channel's Youtube channel: www.youtube.com/documentarychannel

On tonight, "A Time for Burning," a 1968 Oscar nominated film chronicling an Omaha, Nebraska minister's attempts to persuade his all-white church to reach out to black Lutherans in the city's north side of town. (The film was commissioned by the Lutheran Church.)

On Feb. 11, “No Short Climb: Race Workers & America's Defense Technology” brings to the forefront the contributions of African-American scientists and technicians who helped shape America’s defense efforts in World War II. Filmmaker Robert Johnson, Jr., combines personal memoir with archival footage, still photography, and graphics to tell this first-hand account.

Feb. 18: “Have You Seen Drum Recently,” is regarded as one of the most important films to emerge from apartheid South Africa. It is the story of a black magazine (Drum Magazine) in a white world. The 1998 film explores the golden era of the South African magazine during the 1950s and its contribution to the cultural and political life of the country, before the system of apartheid had been fully implemented.

On Feb. 25, “New York Noir: The History of Black New York” examines the history of New York's African-Americans.