The idea of using technology to recover narratives of marginalized groups is not unique to Black studies, however, utilizing the tools and techniques of the digital humanities to “expose humanity as a racialized social construction” and de-center “whiteness by default” using Afrofuturism as a distinct lens to achieve recovery, most certainly is (Gallon 2016; Baker and Chambliss 2020).
Dr. Julian C. Chambliss views Afrofuturism as a “Black speculative practice that critiques the status quo and projects a liberatory vision for the future” (Baker and Chambliss 2020). This vision for the future can be found in Black voices, and Black spaces, of the past. Dr. Chambliss states that Afrofuturism as an intellectual movement involves "all Black people who are struggling towards liberation" (Baker and Chambliss 2020). Zora Neale Hurston’s biography of her life in the historic Black town of Eatonville, Florida, Dust Tracks on a Road, is an excellent example of Afrofuturism found in literary history. Hurston's rich account of her life in Eatonville “doesn’t assume whiteness is the norm” and is not framed, or constrained, by the racial hierarchies of the day (Baker and Chambliss 2020). Her voice lies in stark contrast to contemporary sources which actively sought to dehumanize Black individuals of Central Florida, as can be seen in this Sunday Sentinel-Star clipping from 1937, which was coincidentally just five years before Hurtson published Dust Tracks on a Road.
Chambliss’s work with Mapping Black Imaginaries & Geographies seeks to “break down barriers of geographies and chronology by mapping, visualizing, and cataloging the production of these Black spaces” (Mapping BIG 2023). Shifting the perspective of the standard (white) historical narrative of Black spaces as “sites of memory” using digital tools can serve to do more than analyze and disseminate knowledge of a subaltern perspective; it can quite literally restore the humanity of individuals in spaces where “Black people’s humanity is not a given” (Chambliss and French 2022; Gallon 2016).
In “Making a Case for the Black Digital Humanities,” Dr. Kim Gallon highlights that the standard color-blind scholarship of digital humanities bases their work on whiteness as the default, or “standard of the real” (Gallon 2016). Gallon says that we must examine the tools of the digital humanities to “consider how the very foundation of the humanities are racialized through the privileging of Western cultural traditions” (Gallon 2016).
Drs. Julian Chambliss and Scot French have worked with an Afrofuturist lens to view and explore connections and community in Black spaces in Central Florida. Their work in reframing the historical narrative of Winter Park to include the historic Black community of Hannibal Square is just one example of the benefits of collaborative efforts in using the methodologies of Black digital humanities and tools such as podcasting and mapping to “collect, preserve, and broadly disseminate” narratives that recover Black humanity (Chambliss and French 2022).
Bibliography
Baker, Holly and Julian C. Chambliss. “501: Dr. Julian Chambliss and Afrofuturism and the Zora Neale Hurston Festival.” Every Tongue Got to Confess: A Podcast about Communities of Color, Inspired by the Zora Neale Hurston Festival of the Arts and Humanities. (Orlando: University of Central Florida, 2020). Podcast, MP3 audio, 30:02.
Chambliss, Julian C. and Scot A. French. "A Generative Praxis: Curation, Creation, and Black Counterpublics." Scholarly Editing 39 (April 2022). Accessed January 23, 2023, https://scholarlyediting.org/issues/39/a-generative-praxis
Gallon, Kim. "Making a Case for the Black Digital Humanities." chap. 4 in Debates in Digital Humanities 2016. (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2016), https://dhdebates.gc.cuny.edu/read/untitled/section/fa10e2e1-0c3d-4519-a958-d823aac989eb
Mapping Black Imaginaries and Geographies. Accessed January 25, 2023, https://mappingbig.org/
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