About The Collective
Our Story
The Black Memory Collective was founded in 2018 as part of an effort to recognize and support the varying forms of memory work being conducted by Black communities across the United States. In 2019, The Collective expanded to include communities from across the African diaspora and was formalized, alongside its sister organization, The Black Memory Workers, with a special double issue of The Black Scholar focused on Black Archival Practices. Since then, The Collective has grown to include students, faculty, staff, and community members from across the globe, all of whom are dedicated to documenting and preserving the memories of Black communities, collective work and responsibility, and uplifting Black Memory Work and Workers around the world.
About Black Memory Work
Deeply rooted in Black cultural traditions, Black Memory Work refers to the documentation and passing of traditional, cultural, and/or community-based knowledge from one generation to the next. Memory work has come to be equated with Black and African American memory and recordkeeping practices. As a result of this rootedness in Black traditions, the term “Black Memory Work” has come to represent the ways that Black communities intentionally and creatively document their lives and experiences.
​
Black Memory Work centers Black ways of knowing and being in the world and contends with the anti-Blackness of Western (and white) archives, challenging the dispossession, criminalization, oppression, and negation of American society, to attend to the beauty that is Black life.
Meet The Collective
Community Partners:
Los Angeles
Meet the dedicated Community Partners who are working with The Black Memory Collective in to preserve and celebrate the rich histories of the Black Los Angeles community.
Together, we strive to create a lasting impact through ujima, collective work and responsibility.
UJIMA: Collective Work & Responsibility
Proudly celebrating the contributions of other Black Memory Workers.
Support for The Black Memory Collective
is generously provided by:
