When I was in College, I organized a “Heritage Fair” for local elementary and middle school students. At the time, I was co-leading the Black Students’ Network on campus. The Heritage Fair featured exhibits depicting key moments in African and Afro-Canadian history as well as various performers. My idea was to bring youth of color from the surrounding communities in Montreal to McGill University for the day so that they could be exposed to black culture.

We rented buses to transport students, recruited volunteers to design the historical exhibits, and hired performers including an African American storyteller. The day was a big success for all involved. I am thinking about the Heritage Fair today because over 20 years later, I am working on another exhibition with similar goals in mind. I don’t know what motivated my interest in curating exhibitions about history for youth when I was still a teenager myself. I can only attest to the fact that I have seen the magic and power of young people having a better understanding of themselves rooted in knowing where they come from.

A couple of weekends ago, I met with my friend Billy to go over ideas for designing our Black/Inside exhibition. I am excited to say that we now have a concrete plan for moving forward which is a real relief since the exhibition will open in just a couple of months.

I can’t wait until young people are able to interact with the artifacts and to trace the history of Black incarceration through the exhibition. Someone recently asked about whether I worried that Black/Inside would actually serve to reinforce ideas about black criminality rather than subverting them. My answer was an honest one: I don’t know. I think that if people are looking to have their stereotypes affirmed, there isn’t much that can be done to overcome that. However, I suspect that most of the people who will attend the exhibition will be coming because they are genuinely curious and open to learning more. I am a believer that more information is always better than less.

I think that the fact that hyper-incarceration is so invisible to so many is a crisis and detrimental to our efforts for social change. I hope that the exhibition conveys the fact that black people have ALWAYS borne the brunt of punishment in American society. I hope to convey that resistance to the unjust U.S. criminal legal system has been constant and consistent. Finally, I want to clearly underscore that race and racism have always been organizing principles in the treatment of black people in the U.S.

What I hope this accomplishes is to foster greater community engagement in the struggle to dismantle the PIC. Quite simply, I want new recruits for the anti-PIC movement.

Black/Inside will open in late October at the African American Cultural Center at the University of Illinois at Chicago. I’ll share more information closer to that date.