Open-source arts-based curriculum

Experimenting with art-making as a research modality, I co-created an arts-based curriculum with my Urban Design Forum team that instigates a creative dialogue with teens about their experiences and dreams for a future library. We piloted Dreaming in Place: Libraries as Catalysts for Social Change at The Free Black Women’s Library in the spring of 2024. We took a neighborhood-centered approach to our workshop series, which amplified the work and legacy of June Jordan, a queer Jamaican-American writer and educator who was raised in Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn.

June used libraries to self-educate on architecture and urban planning, which led to her vision for Skyrise Harlem. An innovative public housing proposal for Harlem residents after the 1964 riot, co-designed with futurist architect Buckminster Fuller. I see so many parallels between the social and political conditions of the 1960s and the 2020s, which made constructing this curriculum and activating June’s work with teens a fun, creative challenge.

We layered poems like Intifada Incantation: Poem #8 for b.b.L. and I Must Become a Menace to My Enemies atop architecture and urban planning exercises to introduce students to the spatial dimensions of June’s political action and architectural speculations.

“June Jordan’s ‘Skyrise for Harlem” plan sought to transform the built environment in service of Harlem’s residents. The cone-shaped towers would contain new dwelling space—light-filled apartments of twelve hundred square feet, each equipped with a balcony and parking spot—as well as studios, concert halls, theatres, athletic fields, and recreational space. Think of an empty or abandoned storefront in your neighborhood and envision converting it into a free community library space. What would it look like? What services would it offer? What kind of book collection would it have?”

One of my favorite lectures and round table discussions about Skyrise for Harlem that we shared with our students.

Illustrations by Ping Zhu