History Main / Roots

** ''Series/{{Roots 1977}}'', a miniseries adaptation of the novel.
** ''Series/{{Roots 2016}}'', TheRemake of the miniseries.
* ''Music/{{Roots}}'', the music album by Music/{{Sepultura}}.

* ''Series/{{Roots 1977}}'', the original miniseries.
* ''Series/{{Roots 2016}}'', TheRemake of the miniseries.

* ''Series/{{Roots 1977}}'', the miniseries.
* ''Series/{{Roots 2016}}'', the remake.

* ''Series/{{Roots}}'', the miniseries.
* ''Music/{{Roots}}'', the music album.

[[redirect:Series/{{Roots}}]]

[[quoteright:220:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/220px-Roots_25th_Anniversary_Edition_5734.jpg]]

->''"[[TragicHero Kunta Kinte]], behold the only thing greater than yourself!"''
-->-- '''Omoro Kinte'''

'''''[=Roots=]''''' was a MiniSeries presenting a dramatized account about author Alex Haley's family line and their struggles coping with slavery from ancestor Kunta Kinte's enslavement to his Civil War descendants' liberation. Based on a novel by Haley.

First broadcast in late January and early February 1977, the series was a tremendous success, prompting new public interest in genealogy and, in regard to television, established the MiniSeries as a high profile prestige format for prime time.

The first ''Roots'', the generally better received one, went only up through the [[AmericanCivilWar Civil War]], while a 1979 {{Sequel}}, ''Roots: The Next Generations'', picked up in 1865 and went through to Alex Haley himself, culminating in Haley visiting Kunte Kinte's home village in the 1970s.

1988 brought a third (fictional) entry: ''Roots: The Gift.'' This was a single two-hour side story, bringing back [=LeVar=] Burton as Kunta Kinte. As a piece of trivia, this film features a few actors who would be in ''Star Trek'' productions, just as Burton was. Avery Brooks ([[Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine Captain Benjamin Sisko]]), Kate Mulgrew ([[Series/StarTrekVoyager Captain Kathryn Janeway]]), and Tim Russ ([[Series/StarTrekVoyager Lieutenant Tuvok]]).

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!!This show provides examples of:

* AccidentalMisnaming: The TearJerker variety - it's Kunta Kinte, ''not'' Toby.
* AdultFear: Being powerless to stop your children from being abducted, or from being raped by your superiors.
* AllStarCast: The mini series featured many famous black celebrities of the time.
* {{Arc Words}}: "(Name), behold! The only thing greater than yourself!"; in the later episodes, the story each generation of Kunta Kinte's family tells about their family tree.
* ArtisticLicenseHistory: Though the series is (rightly) praised for its unflinching depiction of the brutality of the Atlantic slave trade, its depiction of White "slave catchers" is [[RuleOfDrama a bit historically inaccurate]]. In RealLife, though the slave trade itself was facilitated by European and American traders, most African slaves were physically captured by other Africans who took them as prisoners in intertribal battles and sold them for profit--not by Whites who travelled into the interior of Africa to quietly ambush slaves one by one. This involvement of some Africans in others' enslavement is mentioned in the series but not directly shown.
* {{All There In The Manual}}: There is a somewhat obscure special called: ''Roots: The Gift'' that takes place between Parts 2 and 3 of the series that explains how Kunta and Fiddler moved to Reynolds's plantation.
* BasedOnAGreatBigLie: Well, maybe not an intentional lie. But while the book was classified as a novel, and Haley admitted that many of the events were his invention, he also claimed that he had really traced his ancestry back seven generations, to a West African man named Kunta Kinte who was kidnapped by slavers and sent into slavery in the American South. In fact, as TheOtherWiki [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roots:_The_Saga_of_an_American_Family#Historical_accuracy notes]], the documentary evidence contradicts Haley's accounts, and the oral histories and testimony he relied on is unreliable and contradictory as well. There is little to suggest that any of Haley's history before Chicken George is factual.
* BeastlyBloodsports: The cockfight.
* {{Big No}}/{{Say My Name}}: KUNTAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!
* [[ChangedMyMindKid Changed My Mind, Kid]]: Pettijohn refusing to stick his neck out again for Simon Haley and help save Ab Dekker.
* FalseFriend: Missy Anne who did nothing to try to save Kizzy after her uncle sold her to another slave owner, and had the ''gall'' to feel betrayed for Kizzy helping out some abolitionists.
* FamilyDrama: Extended multigenerational.
* GenerationalSaga
* IDieFree
* {{Large Ham}}: George "Chicken George" Moore
* MadeASlave: Kunta Kinte.
* MiniSeries
* TheManIsKeepingUsDown: And how! There are a couple of sympathetic whites, though, particularly George Johnson and his wife.
* PetTheDog: Some of the masters have a couple of moments that could count -- even Tom Moore.
* PlayingGertrude: The actress playing Kizzy was 3 years older than the guy who played her son, Chicken George. (necessary though, since she also played a younger version of Kizzy.)
* PrisonRiot: One happens in the slave ship transporting Kunta Kinte.
* RiteOfPassage: During the first episode, the adolescent boys of the village are taken out to a remote area and subjected to several rites of passage.
* StockSubtitle: ''Roots the Next Generations''.
* TwoPlusTortureMakesFive: [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ByhFz5e5Tno "Your name is TOBY!"]]
* YouCantGoHomeAgain: Kunta Kinte/Toby
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* FalseFriend: Missy Anne who did nothing to try to save Kizzy after her uncle sold her to another slave owner.

* ArtisticLicenseHistory: Though the series is (rightly) praised for its unflinching depiction of the brutality of the Atlantic slave trade, its depiction of White "slave catchers" is [[RuleOfDrama a bit historically inaccurate]]. In RealLife, though the slave trade itself was facilitated by European and American traders, most African slaves were physically captured by other Africans who took them as prisoners in intertribal battles and sold them for profit--not by Whites who travelled into the interior of Africa to quietly ambush slaves one by one.

->'''Omoro Kinte''': [[TragicHero Kunta Kinte]], behold the only thing greater than yourself!

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<<|AmericanSeries|>>

* InspiredBy: The earlier parts, before Chicken George are all fiction. There ''was'' a Kunta Kinte and a ''Lord Ligonier,'' but neither have a proven connection to Haley. The rest may have been altered here or there for the sake of drama.

<<|AmericanSeries|>>

* MyNameIsNotDurwood: The TearJerker variety - it's Kunta Kinte, ''not'' Toby.

'''''{{Roots}}''''' was a MiniSeries presenting a dramatized account about author Alex Haley's family line and their struggles coping with slavery from ancestor Kunta Kinte's enslavement to his Civil War descendants' liberation. Based on a novel by Haley.

* TwoPlusTortureMakesFive: [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BgGLjNMEVR4 "Your name is TOBY!"]]

* HeyItsThatGuy: OJSimpson is one of the random tribesmen in the first episode who Kunta runs into on his bird hunt.
** Maya Angelou cameoed as Kunta's grandmother.