Black Heritage London

In November 2021, we ran a new programme for budding creative producers: Black Heritage London, in partnership with Numbi Arts.

We kicked off the programme by inviting young creatives to interactive sessions that helped them to explore their Black identity.

These included a placemaking walk in Poplar, archival workshops with filmmaker Imruh Bakari, a talk from a panel of Black voices in the heritage sector and a visit to our London, Sugar & Slavery gallery.

We worked with four creative producers who designed and delivered their own projects inspired by the programme.

Amina's archiving project A Week in Our Ends collected stories from young people in the capital, working in partnership with Photofusion in Brixton.

Amina worked with 12–15-year-olds to document everyday life with disposable cameras.

Amina is an aspiring archivist who is primarily interested in exploring the Black diaspora.

Less than 1% of British archaeologists identify as people of colour or Black (Chartered Institute for Archaeologists, 2020). Black Archaeo combats this by engaging 15–18-year-old Black Londoners with archaeology, museums and heritage through two workshops.

In the first workshop, Dr Rebecca Redfern presented her research on Black people in London through history and invite participants to handle artefacts from the museum’s collection. The second workshop gave students the opportunity to take part in a mock excavation.

Mercedes recently completed her Archaeology and Anthropology degree at UCL and is particularly interested in public archaeology.

Language is an important part of connecting with our history and identity. Caribbean Oral History took visitors on a historical and linguistic journey through time, inviting them to look deeper into their own histories.

Kia’s research explores indigenous languages, the transition from Pidgin to Creole and Caribbean dialects.

Kia is a journalist and producer whose work gives voice to minorities. Kia currently works in TV production and is pursuing a career in factual entertainment.

Oral Historiography explored what Black heritage is and how it could be presented. The project enabled new forms of storytelling through voice recordings, since the essence of heritage is telling stories.

Visitors were invited into a listening booth to make a recording using prompts. The recording then disappears forever after being played.

Jabir is a recently-graduated student interested in human approaches to architecture and heritage conservation.

On 9 July 2022, the producers came together to take over the museum and showcase their projects. Visitors took part in object handling, listened to archive material and enjoyed photography created by young Londoners.