Blacademics focused on providing black art students at predominantly white institutions (PWIs) a space to conduct meaningful conversations about issues that are important to us.
Step I: Immersion
After attending several black art events, conversing with current and former black art students, and conducting ethnographic research, I created a motion piece documenting my experience.
The final piece juxtaposes a collage of various images displayed on the top art schools websites (Fashion Institute of Technology, Pratt Institute, School of Visual Arts, Parsons, etc.) against the thoughts and opinions of black art students attending these universities in order to underscore the absence of black students in the white academic art arena.
Step II: Cultural Probe
This cultural probe prompted students to complete the following fill in the blank sentence: My classmates will never understand… and then asked them to explain why. Roughly 40 probes were collected from two prominent art universities in NYC, The Fashion Institute of Technology and Pratt Institute. The responses garnered ranged in specificity and context.
In order to determine what topics black students were most interested in, the cards were sectioned into nine categories: My Skin, My Logo, Being the Only One, My Personal Hindrances, Classroom Struggles, Individual Thought, Their Privilege, We’re Not the Same, and I Don’t Know Where I’m From, and Other Issues. This project highlights the oversight in many PWI (Predominately White Institution) classroom settings, as black students find it difficult to speak candidly about their race and culture, diversity, and tokenism with their peers.
Step III: Participatory Workshop
Following the cultural probe, I led several participatory workshops, in the form of roundtable discussions with black art students at PWIs. The topic for the table, My Skin, My logo, encompassed a large bulk of the cultural probe responses, as most referred to the need for more representation, conversation, and inclusion of our black identity and culture in academic spaces.
Moreover, students participating in the Blacademics roundtable were given 15 minutes to brainstorm about visions, obstacles, and opportunities their blackness affords them. They were then asked to share why they wrote certain answers and discuss them. This roundtable ran for roughly 45 mins and generated a cathartic, necessary dialogue.
For many, this was their first time expressing their frustrations with not only their respective programs and peers but themselves. They expressed their difficulty having nuanced, productive conversations about a range of topics, including the lack of inclusion and understanding in the art and design field, cultural dissimilarities with their other classmates, and the socioeconomic and sociopolitical climate of America. The roundtable discussion also provided them the space to be critical of their blackness, artistic voice, and experiences.
Step IV: Toolkit & Instagram
The last stage of the Blacademics project was to create a toolkit and disseminate it through a social media account. The issues expressed in the cultural probe and roundtable discussions are universal to many black academics across PWI campuses. The Blacademics toolkit equips other black students with a set of guidelines to follow in order to facilitate their own dialogue about their identities, deterrents, and successes.
The accompanying Instagram account features quotes from the roundtables conducted and examples of visions, opportunities, and obstacles. It provides visuals of the process and makes the information more digestible. In the bio of the Blacademics Instagram account, there is a link to download the toolkit and instructions detailing how to use it. It was important to me that the toolkit was accessible and approachable.
