This September, the Pōpolo Project had the opportunity to travel with members of our Black community in Hawaiʻi to the Legacy Museum and the Memorial for Peace and Justice, two projects run by the Equal Justice Initiative in Montgomery, Alabama.
Read MoreOn June 19th we continued our community tradition of creating altar space to honor our ancestors, including those who endured enslavement in the Americas.
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We started our annual observance of Black History / Black Futures Month on January 28 with our partners at Kōkua Learning Farm, a project of Kōkua Hawaiʻi Foundation.
Our vision of an abundant and just future brings us to connect our community with the land through lending our time and energy to ʻāina projects and learning about and supporting efforts to increase food security in Hawaiʻi, restore loʻi and fresh water sources, and return land to kānaka Hawaiʻi.
Our keiki and ʻohana helped care for food plants and harvested cassava, an starchy plant important for cooks across our diaspora. Community members shared their own stories and connections to cassava, along with recipes for fufu, yuca frita, and more. Some community members finished the day working with textiles in the indigo bath, learning about the medicinal and spiritual properties of that plant and its long history in Africa and in the diaspora.
Photos: Vivir Photography
Part of our annual observance of Black August in Honolulu brings us to connect our community with the land through lending our time and energy to ʻāina projects and learning about and supporting efforts to increase food security in Hawaiʻi and return land to kānaka Hawaiʻi.
This August, we were hosted at Kōkua Learning Farm, a project of Kōkua Hawaiʻi Foundation. Our keiki and ʻohana learned about loʻi and restoration work undertaken at the farm, helped to weed and plant, and shared some of our community knowledge about medicinal and food plants of the African diaspora that grow in Hawaiʻi and on the farm.
We loved seeing so much of the community, from keiki to elders, gathered in joy and jubilation out at @kahumanaorganicfarm on Juneteenth! Mahalo to our friends at @blackbazaarhnl who collaborated with us on the event as well as all the vendors and volunteers who helped make the day a beautiful reflection of our community. 🌺✊🏿🌱
📸: @michaelmadeyoulook
Amid a global pandemic and uprisings in defense of the lives of Black people across the US and around the world, we held our fourth annual Black August observance in Hawaiʻi, holding space for our community to learn and grow together, to make commitments to this place and to each other, and to strategize, all while situating ourselves in a long, worldwide genealogy of resistance to White supremacy and colonialism.
While we were not able to meet in person, we hosted 24 virtual events over the course of the 31 days of August. We held virtual learning events, community gatherings, talks, classes, and reading circles over the four weeks, finding so much sustenance in making new relationships across our communities, learning hidden histories, and imagining what true freedom can mean for us, our planet, our ancestors, and the generations yet to come.
Some highlights from the month
Coverage in Hawaiʻi News Now:
Coverage in Honolulu Magazine:
Coverage in Honolulu Civil Beat:
Support for the Black Lives Matter movement following the killing of George Floyd swelled in Honolulu Saturday as thousands marched peacefully from Ala Moana Beach Park to the state Capitol.
The anguish and the hope of the past weeks have been weighing on us. COVID-19 has taken so many in our communities, made the vulnerable more so as the global economy has faltered. Across the US and around the world calls for the end of extrajudicial killings of Black people by the police and vigilantes ring out. For some, this moment has been a wake up call. For others, it is the continuation of a nightmare world of anti-Blackness. For some, calls for abolition are new, but for others of us it is what we have been demanding all along.
June 19, 1865 marks the day that enslaved people in Texas learned that the institution of slavery had been overturned as a result of the US Civil War and their continual efforts to liberate themselves, over many generations. Immediately, they rushed to find their family members, create works of art, build businesses, and community structures. They celebrated freedom by calling on their ancestorsʻ strength and even then, in 1865, imagined a world where Black lives would matter.
This year, the Honolulu City Council passed a resolution recognizing Juneteenth and the contributions of formerly enslaved people and people of African descent to Hawaiʻi since the founding of the Kingdom. The State of Hawaiʻi followed with a proclamation from Governor Ige.
We invited our community to gather at Mākālei Park, near Lēʻahi in Honolulu, to create a community altar to honor our ancestors, our continuing quest for liberation, and the building we are doing for a future where we are all truly free.
“East African retro-pop” group Alsarah and the Nubatones visited Hawai‘i in December 2018 for concerts, workshops, and cultural exchange in an artist residency that explored themes of migration, home, and belonging.
The iconic Ishmael Butler (of Digable Planets, Shabazz Palaces, Knife Knights) talked story with us about his connections to Hawai‘i, his practice as an artist, and how he encounters the occupation here.
This summer we bring you Saltwater People, a monthly rooftop dance party celebrating the global flow of African and Pacific diasporas converging in Hawai‘i, featuring live music, DJs, and more. In partnership with 23rd Elevation and collaboration with Guayakí Yerba Mate, at the Hyatt Centric Waikīkī.
July 21, 2019
featured performers The Fat Moxy Bombay, Afro Criollo, DJ Shy Shonnie and DJ Lonnie Bonds; photos by Jimmy DiCarlo.
This summer we bring you Saltwater People, a monthly rooftop dance party celebrating the global flow of African and Pacific diasporas converging in Hawai‘i, featuring live music, DJs, and more. In partnership with 23rd Elevation and collaboration with Guayakí Yerba Mate, at the Hyatt Centric Waikīkī.
Read MoreThe Pōpolo Project is again partnering with Shangri La Museum of Islamic Art, Culture, and Design to host musicians the Reminders as artists in residence at the museum. This dynamic duo—Big Samir & Aja Black—will be in residence from May 26- June 7, 2019! They seamlessly blend hip hop, soul and roots music and melodies into powerful performances with insight and thoughtfulness.
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Mahalo to everyone who came to Kuʻi for a Cause, a monthly fundraising event hosted by Hawai‘i People’s Fund with Hui Aloha ʻĀina Momona that supports a new community organization each month. We are so grateful for the community that came to support the Pōpolo Project and for the team that made it possible.
As part of our observance of Black August 2017 we gathered at the Box Jelly to learn and think about the connections between Black liberation and aloha ‘āina. One of the results of that afternoon workshop was this collaborative zine art piece, "Mai ka pō mai," a digital copy of which you can view here. Mahalo to all the contributors!
A collaborative zine workshop by the Pōpolo Project
A Honolulu-based collective shares the complex diversity of what it means to be Black in Hawai'i and the larger Pacific. Video by Flux Hawaiʻi.
The Pōpolo Project is featured in volume 8, issue 2 of Flux Hawaii magazine, where artist Nicole Maileen Woo graces the cover in a stunning portrait captured by Chris Rohrer. Inside, through a series of portraits, we share about our collective and individual processes for exploring Black identities in Hawai‘i via the Pōpolo Project.
The stories featured within explore the meaning of “tribes” in what feels like an increasingly polarized and divided society this year. How can they bind us together, what are their limits, and how can the disparate and overlapping tribes — of which we all belong — build stronger bridges to each other's communities across the islands?
Read “The Lineage of Language” by Kelsie Pualoa in full here. Photos by Chris Rohrer.
Healing Traditions is a short film produced by the Pōpolo Project that explores Blackness, healing, and water through the story of Prentis Hemphill, a healer and activist who, in making Hawaiʻi their home, explores the potential of interconnected healing while overcoming ancestral trauma.
Recorded September 4, 2018 at the Doris Duke Theatre. Moderated by Dr. Akiemi Glenn, founder and executive director of the Pōpolo Project.
On Sept. 4, the Honolulu Museum of Art hosted Ta-Nehisi Coates in Conversation as part of the Honolulu African American Film Festival 2018 program in celebration of Black August. Sponsored by The Pōpolo Project and moderated by the founder and executive director of The Pōpolo Project, Akiemi Glenn, the two-part event explored the intersection between the experience of Blackness in the Pacific and the experience of Blackness in the Atlantic world.
Highlights of the event were written up on the Honolulu Museum blog.
We celebrated Juneteenth 2018 in Queen Kapi‘olani Park with an afternoon of music and cultural arts from across the African diaspora. We created collages and contributed to a community quilt prompted by the question “what does it mean to be Black and free?” We stitched together the responses that came in text, in image, and in vibrant color. It was a beautiful afternoon spent with family and in community across generations, sharing food, laughter, and joy in the potential of being free.
