Teaching.
The starting point of Black. Migration. Houston. is one that acknowledges a long trajectory of antiblackness, homophobia and transphobia.
We serve as a resource hub to educate the public, from emerging scholars to community leaders. Our pedagogy project is part of a larger effort to develop open source curriculum and pedagogies tools around the broader topic of migration.
Black. Migration. Houston. responds to the current globalizing moment with intellectual work, curriculum and digital design which focuses on understanding how anti-blackness, transphobia and homophobia informs the experiences of migration, community and resource availability/scarity.
We use research and teaching methods derived from the fields of digital humanities, ethnic studies and gender studies. We draw on qualitative and quantitative data from the Black LGBTQIA+ Migrant Project, review video recorded interviews questionnaires and engage with networks of Black LGBTQIA+ migrants who are essential collaborators in building a useful and accessible teaching and resource center.
Research questions: Questions that matter.
This Digital Humanities project asks
How can we center the needs and concerns of those individuals who are most marginalized and most vulnerable, in part, because of their blackness, gender identity and expression, and sexual orientation?
How can Digital Humanities methodologies be used to highlight anew the experience of this particular group of migrants during immigration and resettlement?
What is effective pedagogy and sound curriculum and how can we translate this into the classroom in ways which convey the realities of Black LGBTQ+ migrants?
Framework.
Black. Migration. Houston. uses research and teaching methods derived from the fields of digital humanities, ethnic studies and gender studies have called for.
We draw on qualitative and quantitative data from the Black LGBTQIA+ Migrant Project, review video recorded interviews questionnaires and engage with networks of Black LGBTQIA+ migrants who are essential collaborators in building a useful and accessible teaching and resource center.
Mural on boarded up windows in Uptown, Minneapolis. By PiM Arts High School; Photo by Priscilla Gyamfi via Unsplash
Our Plans: Our Vision of Our Teaching
Through our site, we seek to inform the public about:
key factors driving forced migration of Black LGBTQ+ migrants today;
the depth and breadth of queer/trans Afro-Caribbean & Afro-Latinidad histories, expressions, and cultural production;
the current realities of structural racism and anti-blackness within the U.S. as it impacts Black LGBTQ+ migrants.
As our site grows, we will map the following concepts:
the continent/African Diaspora and produce an imaginable region
the forced migration of Black people
sex trafficking and labor migration
foundations in LGBTQ+ Rights/Human Rights
African knowledges and cultures
transnational networks
Digital Humanities as decolonial theory
Blackness and Afro-Latinx identities
histories and expressions of queerness and gender-fluidity in the African diaspora.
Over time, through this effort we will build a compendium of local resources to support additional public education tools (webinars, Twitter townhall, edit-a-thons, video PSA, etc.) as well as recorded events that we can share online (panel discussions, forums, workshops, university-wide and community wide), thereby making visible the experiences of Black LGBTQ+ migrants in Houston, in Texas more broadly, and in the U.S. South.