Black Quantum Futurism, Space-Time Collapse Volume II: Community Futurisms

212 Pages·2020·7.594 MB·English

by  Rasheedah Phillips, Jessi Jumanji, Camae Ayewa, Womanist Working Collective, Marcus Borton, Natalie-Claire Luwisha-Bowditch, North Philly Peace Park, Dox Thrash House, R.L. Stanford , Jason Harris, Arturo Castillon, Soraya Jean-Louis, Faye Anderson, Quentin Vercetty, Aiden Gibbs, Nyasha Felder, Marcus Borton, LaTierra Piphus, Quentin Vercetty

ISBN 978-0-9960050-7-4
Space Time Collapse Il: Community Futurisms
Works compiled by Rasheedah Phillips
Copyright © 2020 Rasheedah Phillips. All rights reserved. No part of this
book may be reproduced or copied in any form or by any means without
the express, written permission of the author.
Archival Images reprinted with permission from Special Collections
Research Center, Temple University Libraries, Philadelphia, PA.
Published by
AFRO
The Afrofuturist Affair /H ouse of Future Sciences Books
www.afrofuturistaffair.com
www.blackquantumfuturism.com
https:/ /futureslab.community
Cover Image and Design by Jessi Jumanji
Interior Layout by Max Scratchmann
Space-Time Collapse Il:
COMMUNITY
FUTURISMS
Black Quantum Futurism
Acknowledgments
Camae Ayewa and Rasheedah Phillips would like to express our sincere
thanks of gratitude to all residents, former residents, organizations,
collectives, interns, collaboratives, leaders, and neighborhood owners in
the Sharswood neighborhood and larger North Philadelphia community
who participated in Community Futures Lab and Community Futurisms
projects in any way, shape, or form. Your time and belief in the project is
immeasurable and everlasting. We would like to recognize in particular
the Brewerytown-Sharswood Civic Association for sharing their wisdom,
experience, and space with us on many occasions, truly demonstrating
and invoking the meaning and feeling of community. Finally, we would
like to thank A Blade of Grass for its critical funding support as well as
those who provided donations, platforms for sharing the project,
discounts, freebies, time, tech support, love, resources, space, funds,
energy, books, zines, art, visions, and good intentions to Community
Futures Lab and the many and ongoing iterations of the project.
CONTENTS
Time Pockets: The Building of Communal Nostalgia
Camae Ayewa - 1
Time & Memory in North Philly
Rasheedah Phillips - 10
Blumberg
Aiden Gibbs - 52
Remembering the Future in North Philadelphia: Engaging
community futurisms to restore hope and healing in the face of
collective trauma
R.L. Stanford - 54
What Now
Soraya Jean-Louis - 71
Up Against the Wall
Arturo Castillon - 73
Community Project Lightcone: North Philly Peace Park
Nyasha Felder - 84
Black Fire
Marcus Borton - 88
Community Project Lightcone: Womanist Working Collective
LaTierra Piphus - 106
Ridge Avenue: From Renaissance to Riot to Revitalization
Faye Anderson - 117
Community Project Lightcone: Dox Thrash House
Dana Rice, Andrea Haley, Maya Thomas & Chris Mulford - 128
Building the X Variable: Artivism with Afrofuturis
Quentin Vercetty - 133
The First Gate
Jason Harris - 153
Black Female Engineer + Her Afrofuturist City
Natalie-Claire Luwisha-Bowditch - 167
Resources
174
Excerpt of CFL Oral Histories /F utures Questions
Sharswood Online Reading List
Sharswood Thrash Workshop Prompt
Deep Space Mind Worksheet
Contributor Bios
191
Other Titles from House of Future Sciences
200
Time Pockets
\ sri
Camae Ayewa
North Philadelphia timeworks
uproot culture time
in the house of renewal
The map
of renewal
of time renewal
A Philadelphian memory
lost in time maps
North Philly String Theory
before the condos went up
after housing control
section 8 time capsules
forever time shift & section 8 collapse
The future of housing culture
eminent futures
eminent erasure & memory rebuild
before
neighborhood collapse
high rise futures
Demolishing
the past and rebuilding memory
he grid has already been set, a vortex of looping events. Time
pockets are places that exist in a looping or perpetual wave of
discord, often attracting systemic takeover—government housing
agencies, contractors and developers, gentrification. These entities create
a map of communal living in which the lines and boundaries are always
drawn and its impressions forever shape the landscape through memory
migration. This map is usually laid out according to developers and
government actors’ interpretations and capitalists’ goals and intentions.
We notice the ever- changing landscape and identify how poor people are
historically denied agency when it comes to ownership and whatever the
future vision/ tradition that the land shall hold.
What remains of a neighborhood after it has been gentrified? What
memories do the land and trees hold once the buildings are destroyed?
I lived in the same Section 8 housing community of Washington Park
in Aberdeen, Maryland for most of my life. The land was washed and
marked for me before I was even born. My great great grandmother lived
across the street from where I would soon spend my entire childhood and
young adult life. My great grandmother sold take-out soul food platters
from her apartment— something that proved to be the heartbeat and
pulse of a community forced by necessity to rely on each other. By the
time I was born, or old enough to remember, the economy of the
neighborhood was something that every member of the community had
a chance to participate in— regardless of age, sex, or class. I look back to
my youth marveling at the fact that many of us had creative business
ideas, and that we could sell perfume or popcorn out the back of an
apartment window. We were just following a tradition that was built
throughout the land. A legacy that was wired into the vibrations of the
neighborhood.
I grew up in a community of 98% black people. My neighborhood had
a bad reputation for drugs, crime, and violence. And even though I knew
people on drugs or involved in crime, there was never fear because a
certain type of respect had been established.
In my neighborhood, many food delivery and taxi cab drivers refused
to come into the housing complex. But every weekend we had the Fish
Man yelling “Fresh fish for sale!” in each housing court. We never felt like
it was a problem that certain services didn’t come because we had the
Candy Apple Lady. We had a man who fixed all the children’s’ bicycles.
We had a man who was the neighborhood taxi. Many folks had stores in
their homes where you could get anything you wanted or needed. These
were the building blocks on how to learn how to respect and support each
other economically.
3 ey 8
Brewerytown-Sharswood Community Civic Association Community Unity Day. Credit:
BQF (2016)
On many occasions when you sat down for dinner there were other
kids at the table with you. I remember growing up sharing many meals
with families in the neighborhood because it was an unwritten rule to take
care of each other. Together we took on issues of police harassment. We
took on issues of people coming into our neighborhood to cheat, steal and
lie — restorative justice. In my book of poetry called Fetish Bones (2016) I
speak to this life, calling it “a new happiness.” Looking back, I can
recognize that I was experiencing a utopia. But back then my sense of it
was clouded by all the stuff people who didn’t live in the neighborhood
would say. I didn’t realize I would never experience another like it.
A utopia only seen by the blue blackness of eyes wet and in control of
the economics of our own tears/waters.
Sharswood Community Memorial (2017)