- A high school curriculum and toolkit, a screening guide, and many other resources have been provided on the film's website.
- Additional resources have been provided by PBS's Independent Lens
Black Built Environment
Black Built by ISBN: 9781732965102Publication Date: 2019-04-01"This book explores over forty works by Black architects and their impact in the Black community. A wide variety of projects are featured, from residences of affluent African Americans, to historic churches, to memorials and museums of Black culture and history. Each work, through brief examination of its history and architecture, exhibits the magnificent work of Black architects from past to present, and provides inspiration to architects of current and future generations."
Negro Building by ISBN: 9780520383074Publication Date: 2021-02-09"Focusing on Black Americans' participation in world’s fairs, Emancipation expositions, and early Black grassroots museums, Negro Building traces the evolution of Black public history from the Civil War through the civil rights movement of the 1960s. Mabel O. Wilson gives voice to the figures who conceived the curatorial content: Booker T. Washington, W. E. B. Du Bois, Ida B. Wells, A. Philip Randolph, Horace Cayton, and Margaret Burroughs. Originally published in 2012, the book reveals why the Black cities of Chicago and Detroit became the sites of major Black historical museums rather than the nation's capital, which would eventually become home for the Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture, which opened in 2016."
MoMA Exhibition - Reconstructions: Architecture and Blackness in America (New York, 2021)
"How does race structure America’s cities? MoMA’s first exhibition to explore the relationship between architecture and the spaces of African American and African diaspora communities, Reconstructions: Architecture and Blackness in America presents 11 newly commissioned works by architects, designers, and artists that explore ways in which histories can be made visible and equity can be built." As part of the exhibition, the museum created various resources including an exhibition catalog (below), an online course, and other online materials.
As part of the exhibition publicity, curator Mabel O. Wilson was interviewed in Metropolis magazine as well:
"Mabel O. Wilson is Updating the Narrative of American Architecture to Include Black Architects" by Kimberly Dowdell (Metropolis Magazine; May 21, 2020)
Reconstructions: Architecture and Blackness in America by ISBN: 9781633451148Publication Date: 2021-03-02"Reconstructions: Architecture and Blackness in America is an urgent call for architects to accept the challenge of reconceiving and reconstructing our built environment rather than continue giving shape to buildings, infrastructure and urban plans that have, for generations, embodied and sustained anti-Black racism in the United States. The architects, designers, artists and writers who were invited to contribute to this book--and to the exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art for which it serves as a "field guide"--reimagine the legacies of race-based dispossession in 10 American cities (Atlanta; Brooklyn, New York; Kinloch, Missouri; Los Angeles; Miami; Nashville; New Orleans; Oakland; Pittsburgh; and Syracuse) and celebrate the ways individuals and communities across the country have mobilized Black cultural spaces, forms and practices as sites of imagination, liberation, resistance, care and refusal. A broad range of essays by the curators and prominent scholars from diverse fields, as well as a portfolio of new photographs by the artist David Hartt, complement this volume's richly illustrated presentations of the architectural projects at the heart of MoMA's groundbreaking exhibition."
"Architectural Design in America" by BlackPast
"There is a rich heritage of architectural design in America by African Americans. While the number of these architects was not large, their influence has been and is far reaching (for instance, in 1930, of the 22,000 architects in the US, only 60 were African Americans). This blog post will feature buildings by 11 historically important architects; others can be found here at BlackPast.org. Seven young influential architects in 2010 who have been successful in an industry where success is difficult for many are listed here."
Chuches
A History of the African American Church by ISBN: 9781937306052Publication Date: 2013-09-01"Carter G. Woodson's classic text on the emergence of African American churches, chronicling their story out of the eighteenth-century evangelical revivals and their transformations through the nineteenth and early twentieth century, is important for reasons other than "black church" history. With the exception of recent books, such as C. Eric Lincoln and Lawrence H. Mamiya's "The Black Church in the African-American Experience," Woodson's text remains one of the best overviews of the topic. But Woodson's text is also a significant account of the ways in which Christian-based instruction and socialization shaped not only class divisions and vetted leadership among, but also shaped who/what became the "Negro/Colored/Black/African American."
"Saving Praise Houses Before Their African Lineage Is Forgotten: The Gullah Geechee fight to preserve the tiny structures, a cradle of the Black church, before they’re erased by sprawl, climate change and fading memories." by Patricia Leigh Brown (New York Times; November 23, 2023)
"The writer traveled to seven praise houses in South Carolina and Georgia, along the Gullah Geechee Corridor."
Monuments
Shadow of a Face: monument to Harriet Tubman, Newark, New Jersey by Nina Cooke John (2023)
- Harriet Tubman Square's official website
- Shadow of a Face: Harriet Tubman Monument by Studio Cooke John
- Creating a monument to Harriet Tubman 'rooted in community' in Newark, NJ (PBS News Hour; posted January 2, 2022)
- A monument of Harriet Tubman now replaces a statue of Christopher Columbus in Newark by Jonathan Franklin (NPR; March 13, 2023)
- A Monument to Harriet Tubman Replaces a Columbus Statue in Newark by James Barron (The New York Times; March 9, 2023)
Shirley Chisholm Monument, Brooklyn, New York
Shirley Chisholm Monument, Prospect Park, Brooklyn, New York (forthcoming) by Olalekan Jeyifous and Amanda Williams
- "City Approves Design for Shirley Chisholm Monument in Prospect Park" by Zachary Small (The New York Times; July 17, 2023)
- "A Monument Honoring Shirley Chisholm, the First Black Congresswoman, Is Coming to Brooklyn" by Sonja Anderson (Smithonian Magazine; July 20, 2023)
- "Olalekan Jeyifous and Amanda Williams’s design for the Shirley Chisholm Monument gets approval" by Chris Walton (The Architect's Newspaper; July 25, 2023)
AUGMENTED REALITY APP: Kinfolk
"Kinfolk is an archive on a mission. We bring underrepresented history closer than ever through immersive augmented reality (AR) experiences. Using accessible technology, experience history come to life in your hometown, community center, local museum, living room, or your classroom....
Kinfolk, our flagship AR app, brings newly imagined monuments to life, featuring underrepresented Black and Brown historical figures. Choose a monument, place it anywhere, and hear about how our Kinfolk helped bring us to the world we live in today."
What Can and Can't Be Said by ISBN: 9780300211757Publication Date: 2015-11-24"An original study of monuments to the civil rights movement and Black history that have been erected in the American South over the past three decades, this powerful work explores how commemorative structures have been used to assert the presence of African Americans in contemporary Southern society while showing how the construction of such monuments frequently exposes the myth that racial differences have been overcome."
Museums
Begin with the Past by ISBN: 9781588345691Publication Date: 2016-09-27"The Building of the National Museum of African American History and Culture traces the making of this unparalleled museum. Founding director Lonnie G. Bunch III described it as "ten years in the making, and 100 years in the making," and Mabel O. Wilson explores that effort in her narrative. As she discovers, initial calls for a permanent place to collect, study, and present African American history and culture in the early twentieth century never got off the ground. In the late 1990s, the notion began to gain momentum from increasing public interest and Congressional support. In 2003 the museum was officially established. Yet the work of the museum was only just beginning. Wilson takes an in-depth look at the selection of the director, site, and architects in the years that followed. Rising on the National Mall next to the Washington Monument, the museum is a tiered bronze beacon inviting us to understand our past and embrace our future. Wilson explores how the "four pillars" of the museum's mission shaped its powerful structure, and she teases out the rich cultural symbols and homages layered into the design of the building and its surrounding landscape. This book is an important inside look at the making of a monument."
"Phil Freelon and the Creation of the National Museum of African American History and Culture" by Ronald Jorgenson, Ja-Zette Marshburn, and Michelle Joan Wilkinson (National Museum of African American History and Culture)
Landscape Architecture
Black Landscapes Matter by ISBN: 9780813944852Publication Date: 2020-11-17"Black Landscapes Matter probes the very timely issue of how race, memory, and meaning intersect in the American landscape. The book provides examples of how African American landscapes are rejected and erased in a variety of places across the US--from Charlotte, NC, to New Orleans, LA, Detroit, MI, and Milwaukee, WI--along with calls to action."
PODCAST: UVA Press Presents: Black Landscapes Matter interview with Walter Hood and Grace Mitchell Tada (18 min)
"The question "Do black landscapes matter?" cuts deep to the core of American history. From the plantations of slavery to contemporary segregated cities, from freedman villages to northern migrations for freedom, the nation’s landscape bears the detritus of diverse origins. Black landscapes matter because they tell the truth. In this vital new collection, acclaimed landscape designer and public artist Walter Hood assembles a group of notable landscape architecture and planning professionals and scholars to probe how race, memory, and meaning intersect in the American landscape." This interview is with co-editors Walter Hood and Grace Mitchell Tada, "an independent scholar, writer, and journalist" and is part of the publisher's promotion of the book (publishers website).
The book also won a 2021 American Society of Landscape Architects Professional Award of Excellence.
(above) VIDEO: How Urban Spaces Can Preserve History and Build Community by Walter Hood (TED Talk; 2018)
"Can public spaces both reclaim the past and embrace the future? Landscape architect Walter Hood has explored this question over the course of an iconic career, with projects ranging from Lafayette Square Park in Oakland to the upcoming International African American Museum in Charleston, South Carolina. In this inspiring talk packed with images of his work, Hood shares the five simple concepts that guide his approach to creating spaces that illuminate shared memories and force us to look at one another in a different way."
PODCAST: UVA Press Presents: Black Landscapes Matter interview with Walter Hood and Grace Mitchell Tada (18 min)
"The question "Do black landscapes matter?" cuts deep to the core of American history. From the plantations of slavery to contemporary segregated cities, from freedman villages to northern migrations for freedom, the nation’s landscape bears the detritus of diverse origins. Black landscapes matter because they tell the truth. In this vital new collection, acclaimed landscape designer and public artist Walter Hood assembles a group of notable landscape architecture and planning professionals and scholars to probe how race, memory, and meaning intersect in the American landscape." This interview is with co-editors Walter Hood and Grace Mitchell Tada, "an independent scholar, writer, and journalist" and is part of the publisher's promotion of the book (publishers website).
The book also won a 2021 American Society of Landscape Architects Professional Award of Excellence.
Other Typologies
"Fugitive Libraries" by Shannon Mattern (Places Journal; October 2019)
"Public libraries may be a democratic commons, but they have often excluded Black voices and perspectives. Communities have responded by creating their own independent, itinerant libraries — spaces for learning together and building futures together."
High-Risers by ISBN: 9780062235077Publication Date: 2019-02-12"Joining the ranks of Evicted, The Warmth of Other Sons, and classic works of literary non-fiction by Alex Kotlowitz and J. Anthony Lukas, High-Risers braids personal narratives, city politics, and national history to tell the timely and epic story of Chicago’s Cabrini-Green, America’s most iconic public housing project."
"'Swimming Wasn't for Us'" by Campbell Robertson (New York Times; July 4, 2022)
"The nation’s first Black-owned pool club aims to teach hundreds of children to swim this summer, helping to close a dangerous racial gap in the process."
DOCUMENTARY: United Skates (2018; 1 hr 27 min)
"When America's last standing roller rinks are threatened with closure, a community of thousands battle in a racially charged environment to save an underground subculture--one that has remained undiscovered by the mainstream for generations, yet has given rise to some of the world's greatest musical talent."
"Remembering the Rosenwald Schools" by Witold Rybczynski (ARCHITECT Magazine; September 16, 2015)
"How Julius Rosenwald and Booker T. Washington created a thriving schoolhouse construction program for African Americans in the rural South."
(above) "Lauren Halsey, the eastside of south central los angeles hieroglyph prototype architecture (I) (2022). Installation view at the Roof Garden Commission. © Lauren Halsey. Courtesy of the artist; David Kordansky Gallery, Los Angeles/New York. Photo by Hyla Skopitz, courtesy of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York."
EXHIBITION/INSTALLATION: the eastside of south central los angeles hieroglyph prototype architecture (I) by Lauren Halsey (The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City; April 18-October 22, 2023)
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"Met’s Beloved Roof Garden Draws on Ancient Egypt and South Central L.A." by Holland Cotter (New York Times; April 16, 2023)
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"L.A. Artist Lauren Halsey’s ‘Afrofuturistic, Ancient, Funkified Space Ship’ Has Landed on the Met Roof" by Sarah Cascone (ArtNet;
Compton City Hall and Civic Center, Los Angeles, California by Harold L. Williams (Los Angeles Conservancy)
"When the City of Compton completed its new City Hall and Civic Center in 1977, it declared a new beginning for a city incorporated in 1888. The new Civic Center included a post office, police department, county library, and courthouse arrayed around a large, paved central plaza creating an open public space for pedestrians. The plaza’s focal point, a tribute to Martin Luther King, Jr., is a large sculpture of angled white planes arranged in a circle and converging at the top..."
Cities and Neighborhoods
"The Promise of Parkridge: Hilyard Robinson" by Marlys Deen (African American Cultural and Historical Museum of Washtenaw County)
"When thousands began to pour into the Ypsilanti, MI area to work at the Ford Willow Run Bomber plant in Ypsilanti, there was a great need for housing for families. Workers came to build the B-24 bombers. He designed the war-housing project for Black workers, Parkridge Homes, in Ypsilanti in 1943. “Willow Run was built just for white workers, and Parkridge was meant just for Black workers (not just for Willow Run workers). By the time Parkridge was finished, the color line had been broken at Willow Lodge (at least externally)”, according to local historian Matt Siegfried."
California
INTERACTIVE MAP: Mapped: 20 places in LA where black architects left their mark by Biana Barragan (Curbed LA; February 28, 2020)
"When architect Jason E. Morris set out to create a map of Los Angeles to highlight buildings designed by black architects, the body of work he found was smaller than he had hoped. Not only did African American architects lack professional opportunities—they often weren’t credited for their contributions.
So Morris scoured databases and records and contacted architects’ relatives and architecture firms, ultimately pinpointing 53 structures of social, cultural, and historic importance that were built because of the contributions and leadership of black architects."
Historic Places in L.A. by Los Angeles Conservancy
"Explore our directory of historic places in Los Angeles to learn more about significant landmarks and sites that showcase the county's rich history and cultural heritage." Searches for Black American architects can be done by the architects names.
(above) MOVIE: The Last Black Man in San Francisco (2019; 2 hrs)
"Jimmie Fails dreams of reclaiming the Victorian home his grandfather built in the heart of San Francisco. Joined on his quest by his best friend Mont, Jimmie searches for belonging in a rapidly changing city that seems to have left them behind. As he struggles to reconnect with his family and reconstruct the community he longs for, his hopes blind him to the reality of his situation. A wistful odyssey populated by skaters, squatters, street preachers, playwrights, and the other locals on the margins, The Last Black Man in San Francisco is a poignant and sweeping story of friendship, community, and the true meaning of home. Joe Talbot's directorial debut is a deep and resonant meditation on the stories we tell ourselves to find our place in the world... Directed by Joe Talbot and starring Jimmie Fails, Jonathan Majors, Rob Morgan, Tichina Arnold, and Danny Glover. Winner of the Sundance Best Director and Special Jury Awards."
Louisiana
Building Antebellum New Orleans by ISBN: 9781477323021Publication Date: 2021-08-10"The Creole architecture of New Orleans is one of the city's most-recognized features, but studies of it largely have focused on architectural typology. In Building Antebellum New Orleans, Tara A. Dudley examines the architectural activities and influence of gens de couleur libres—free people of color—in a city where the mixed-race descendants of whites and other free Blacks could own property."
Michigan
INTERACTIVE MAP: 14 notable buildings in Detroit designed by black architects, mapped by Aaron Mondry (Curbed Detroit;
"... when Detroit was booming in the first half of the 20th century, racial and economic conditions barred black architects from securing commissions.
In the latter half of the 20th century, especially during Mayor Coleman Young’s tenure, that dynamic changed, allowing black architects to make many notable contributions to Detroit’s built environment. Several other significant buildings in development by black-led firms are currently being constructed, like at City Modern in Brush Park."
New York
Harlemworld by ISBN: 9780226389998Publication Date: 2003-04-01"Harlem is one of the most famous neighbourhoods in the world - a historic symbol of both black cultural achievement and of the rigid boundaries separating the rich from the poor. But as this book shows us, Harlem is far more culturally and economically diverse than its caricature suggests: through extensive fieldwork and interviews, John L. Jackson reveals a variety of social networks and class stratifications, and explores how African Americans interpret and perform different class identities in their everyday behaviour."
Architects of Black Harlem by Thandi Nyambose (Urban Omnibus; January 5, 2021)
"Thandi Nyambose delves into the impact of Black architects and urbanists on place. We’ve asked before who makes Harlem, a neighborhood whose centrality to African-American identity and culture remains a constant, while its population and physical structures see rapid change. Here, in an adaptation of her new StoryMap of the neighborhood, Nyambose surveys some of the places where Black designers have made space for domesticity, creativity, and community, and built a Harlem of bricks and of the imagination."
INTERACTIVE MAP: 13 notable NYC projects designed by black architects by
this map hopes to... showcase the work of black architects who’ve left an indelible mark on New York’s built environment. The projects here run the gamut from museums to memorials to apartment buildings..."
DOCUMENTARY: Decade of Fire (2019; 1hr 16min)
"Decade of Fire covers a shocking but untold piece of American urban history, when the South Bronx was on fire in the 1970s.
Left unprotected by the city government, nearly a quarter-million people were displaced as their close-knit, multiethnic neighborhood burned to the ground, reducing the community to rubble.
Buildings burned almost continuously from an estimated forty fires a day that destroyed 80% of area housing stock and displaced a quarter-million residents. Decade of Fire uses striking, never-before-seen archival and home movie footage, plus testimonials from retired FDNY firefighters and brass, as well as Bronx historians and community organizers, to reveal the real reasons for the devastation, showing what can happen when a community chooses to fight back and reclaim their neighborhood.
With the help of fellow survivors, Vivian Vázquez Irizarry, who grew up in the South Bronx, and other community leaders tell the story of how they banded together amidst the rubble and built a better future for their children."
Disappearing Queer Spaces by Queer Students of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation (QSAPP), a student organization at Columbia University with members who are in the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation (GSAPP) in New York City.
"We, the authors, have chosen the disappearing queer spaces within Harlem as our topic of discussion. Places that identify an entangled history of queer people of color; a group that has been marginalized throughout time, and deserves to have their stories told and spaces memorialized. Acknowledging this reality, our research documents seven key queer spaces from the peak of the Harlem Renaissance in New York City. Spaces that disappeared over time due to processes of urban renewal, ownership changes, and gentrification. The seven sites will serve as case studies for our analysis. Each place will be cataloged individually in order to recreate a panorama of demolished and dilapidated buildings, which once activated and housed queer life in Harlem. The analytical focus will be on (1) the contextual situation of the place, (2) each space’s significant characteristics and function during the era, and (3) their discontinuation and decay. At the very core of this study, we hope to identify the reasons behind the demolition of these queer spaces and understand how queer erasure, gentrification, and marginalization played a role in the transformation of these sites. "
VIDEO: "Introduction to the History of Black Architects in New York" by Roberta Washington (nycoba NOMA and AIANY; February 22, 2016)
"QUICK! NAME A BLACK ARCHITECT!
In 1907, The New York Times reported that E. R. Williams, a "colored architect," was hired to add two floors to a four-story commercial building at West 46th Street and Eighth Avenue to create a department store for Negroes. Williams was also the architect of the first African American Museum planned for the Mall in 1929. Ever heard of him? Come get acquainted with a part of almost-forgotten architectural history. Washington will present stories of black architects in New York’s past and map the path to the present."
WALKING TOUR: Last Address Tribute Walk: Harlem by Visual AIDS and the Studio Museum in Harlem
"Initially proposed by poet, artist, and activist Pamela Sneed, the project honors sites, people, and histories of Harlem critical to understanding the artistic and creative aspects of the AIDS epidemic." Resources include a map, descriptions of the selected locations, and video of the remarks from the origianl event on May 28, 2022.
Legacies of San Juan Hill by Lincoln Center
"Legacies of San Juan Hill aims to explore the largely working-class Manhattan neighborhoods that existed in and around the area where Lincoln Center was built in the 1950s and 1960s. A huge swath of the area, home to more than 7,000 families and 800 businesses by mid-century, was razed in the 1950s as part of the Lincoln Square Development Plan. One of many “urban renewal” programs across the country, the Plan replaced existing residential and commercial buildings with a series of superblocks and other developments, including Fordham University, Lincoln Towers, and Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts." This online resource shares well-researched histories in articles, videos, an interactive map, oral histories, art, and more.
(above) DOCUMENTARY: The Stroll (2023; 1hr 25min)
When Director Kristen Lovell moved to New York City in the 1990s and began to transition, she was fired from her job. With so few options to earn money to survive, Kristen, like many transgender women of color during this era, began sex work in an area known as “The Stroll” in the Meatpacking District of lower Manhattan, where trans women congregated and forged a deep camaraderie to protect each other from harassment and violence.
Reuniting her sisters to tell this essential New York story from their first-hand experiences, Kristen’s intimate narration and interviews bring an astonishing array of archival material of bygone New York from the 1970s through the early 2000s to life.
Oklahoma
"What the Tulsa Race Massacre Destroyed" by
This interactive report used various historical sources to create a 3D rendering of Greenwood, the neighborhood in Tulsa, Oklahoma once known as "Black Wall Street" that was destroyed by a race riot in 1921.
Washington D.C.
DC Legacy Project: Barry Farm-Hillsdale
"The DC Legacy Project: Barry Farm-Hillsdale is dedicated to uplifting the Black-led struggle for land and housing in DC at an important site of this sacred struggle—the five remaining buildings of Barry Farm Dwellings. In 2020, the site was designated a historic landmark.
By undertaking research, creating art, hosting public programs, and engaging former Barry Farm-Hillsdale residents and their descendants in planning and advocacy, we will secure the Barry Farm historic landmark as a commemorative community space honoring the generations of people who have lived in and were displaced from this area. The site is also envisioned as a space for community organizing, education, small business incubation and other activities that support Black DC residents impacted by gentrification and dispossession."
The Long Walk by ISBN: 9780965209113Publication Date: 1996-11-01"This book traced the 129-year history of the physical development of the campus and was the historical framework for the 1998 Campus Plan. The book celebrated black architects who designed many of the buildings. It is a much sought-after resource for architects and developers engaged in work at the university. As a Special Assistant for Campus Planning and Development at Howard she was able to chart the future for two of the university’s four campuses. The Long Walk project has led to funded research and published work on placemaking at other historically Black colleges and universities in the United States." (source: https://profiles.howard.edu/hazel-edwards)
