‘Nuance’: the focus of Chapman’s new shareable, multi-format ‘28 Days of Black History Month’ event

Justin Riley, director of Black excellence at Chapman, set out to expand popular definitions of “Black history” with the project, which emphasizes contemporary issues and celebrations of Blackness. MADDIE MANTOOTH, Staff Photographer

Slavery, Jim Crow and the civil rights movement: these are the things people think of when they hear “Black History Month,” according to Justin Riley, director of Black excellence at Chapman University.

“It's very much framed in a deficit-based perspective,” Riley told The Panther.

With the new virtual “28 Days of Black History Month” exhibit, hosted by Chapman’s Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI), Riley and graduate assistant Schnayma Saint-Fort sought to expand the public’s understanding of Black history. 

The exhibit consists of a digital list of dates — one for each day of February — with each containing a link to a different long-form article, an informational video and an image of a figure in Black history, alongside some brief text on their importance. The topics of the long-form articles and videos vary from topics like “100 Years of Black Hair” or “The Birth of Hip-Hop” to discussions about economic disparities and police brutality.

For Riley, it was important to communicate to readers that injustices in Black history have a direct effect on contemporary issues, but also do not represent Blackness in its entirety. 

“There are so many nuances … within Blackness, and that's what we wanted to showcase,” Riley said. “(Our project) highlights the fun that is happening in the Black community, … but we also wanted to point out that there are things that are still happening today that are having disproportionate impacts on the Black community.”

As a natural storyteller and first-year screenwriting student, Saint-Fort saw the project as an opportunity to represent Black stories that aren’t commonly recognized in the public eye. 

“I want to tell stories that tell people, ‘You're seen,’” Saint-Fort said. “So this project was similar in that way; it (communicates that) there's more to us than the civil rights movement and slavery.”

The project, which showcases three pieces of content for each day of February, displays only a fraction of the amount of media Saint-Fort and Riley had to sort through for the project’s selection process, Riley told The Panther. 

At one point, the two had filled a spreadsheet with approximately 150 links to content that could potentially be included in the final exhibit. The spreadsheet itself was already a smaller grouping of content from hundreds more that the two parsed through together.

Once reviewed, each piece of content on the spreadsheet was given various notes and comments. A prominent piece of criteria, Saint-Fort said, was whether or not the media would be likely to spark conversations.

Some topics included in the project had a personal significance to the team. For Saint-Fort, who is Haitian-American, it was particularly exciting to share the history of the Haitian Revolution and its journey to independence as a part of “28 Days of Black History Month.”

When laying out the emotional feel of the project, Saint-Fort and Riley decided to focus on different tones when using different mediums. 

“I knew from the very beginning what I wanted the articles to be; I like publications … that put out in-depth, investigative historical pieces,” said Riley, an avid fan of periodicals like The Atlantic or The New Yorker.

Some of the periodical articles from the project ruminate on topics like the 1985 MOVE bombing or discrimination in healthcare.

“(These articles) also do a good job with tying (Black history) into today,” Riley said. “There's an article in this series about the Tulsa massacre and what that city looks like now. Things that happened in history have long-term effects.”

If the articles were to take on heavier topics, Riley and Saint-Fort concluded, their video content should take on a more uplifting tone. The videos also provide a shorter glimpse into Black history for those who may not have the time for a lengthy investigative article.

The digital format of the exhibit was an obvious choice for both team members.

“We were … trying to capture everyone's attention when you're fighting millions of stimuli daily,” Riley said.

Saint-Fort commented that digital exhibits have a wider reach internationally, and therefore make “28 Days of Black History Month” more accessible to communities outside of Chapman.

“We wanted the information to be shareable,” Saint-Fort said. “(Our project) can stay online for years down the line, so people can look back at this in a few years and they'll still be learning things.” 

As the vice president of DEI, Reginald Stewart believes the project is the first of many to come.

“This project is an early example of the intentional efforts you will see coming from the Office of (DEI) team,” Stewart said in a Feb. 7 statement to The Panther. “It is my hope that our campus community will take what they learn over these 28 days and use it for the next 11 months, not just in Black History Month.”

Saint-Fort also encouraged readers to extend their education beyond the month of February. 

“Go out and see what else is out there,” she said. “Because there's still history in the making.”

That continuous education, Riley told The Panther, was something he himself found fulfilling as he orchestrated the project. 

“I think that's what's really powerful about this whole thing — I'm learning as I'm creating,” Riley said. “I am 100% certain that everyone who engages in this content is going to walk away learning something, and that's the most powerful thing.”