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Establishing a More Equitable and Accessible Web Archiving Practice

Archiving the Black Web (ATBW), co-developed by Makiba Foster, librarian of The College of Wooster and Bergis Jules, an archivist and a founding member of Shift Collective, has been awarded a $2.5 million grant from the Mellon Foundation to develop a continuing education training program in web archiving that is aimed at memory workers collecting archival content documenting Black life, history, and culture. In addition, the project will undertake a research initiative with the goals of mapping, describing, and producing scholarship about the Black web. The goal with this phase of ATBW is to diversify and increase the number of web archiving practitioners and collections that focus on the Black experience, as well as bring together scholars and archivists who want to increase understanding, collections, and scholarship about how Black people use digital communication technologies.

ATBW is driven by an urgent call to action to establish a more equitable and accessible web archiving practice to effectively document the Black experience. The expansive growth of the web and social media coupled with the wide use of these platforms by Black people presents significant opportunities and responsibilities for collecting institutions who are interested in documenting Black life and experiences online. Addressing the importance of this collaborative project, ATBW’s Principal Investigator, Makiba Foster states, “The ever-expanding role of the digital space within our daily lives requires memory workers to acquire skills to help them document and preserve this public knowledge. Our work is to create preservation pathways for those committed to documenting Black life as well as uniting with scholars to collaboratively define Black experiences on the web. ATBW’s ability to build a diverse interconnected network of people and organizations is made possible through the support of the Mellon Foundation. This funding enables ATBW to continue the critical work of education, practice, and research related to digital Blackness.”

Work on this grant project will be led by Makiba Foster (The College of Wooster Libraries), Bergis Jules (Shift Collective), and Dr. Meredith Clark (Northeastern University’s Center for Communication, Media Innovation and Social Change). Leading different aspects of the work, key partners representing diverse memory collecting organizations include community-based archives with Yusef Omowale (Southern California Library), public libraries with Derek Mosley (Auburn Avenue Research Library on African American Culture and History), and Historically Black Colleges and Universities with Holly Smith (Spelman College Archives). These organizations and their staff represent who ATBW hopes to impact through this project.

About The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation
The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation is the nation’s largest supporter of the arts and humanities. Since 1969, the Foundation has been guided by its core belief that the humanities and arts are essential to human understanding. The Foundation believes that the arts and humanities are where we express our complex humanity, and that everyone deserves the beauty, transcendence, and freedom that can be found there. Through our grants, we seek to build just communities enriched by meaning and empowered by critical thinking, where ideas and imagination can thrive. Learn more at mellon.org.

About The College of Wooster
Founded in 1866, The College of Wooster offers a comprehensive liberal arts education in a vibrant residential setting that culminates in a senior capstone project of in-depth research inquiry or creative expression. Working one-on-one with a faculty mentor, every student creates and presents new knowledge in their field of interest. Through this distinctive program, Wooster students develop abilities valued by employers and graduate schools: independent judgment, analytical ability, creativity, project-management and time-management, and strong written and oral communication. Students connect academic learning to the real world through internships, research fellowships, career pathways, and other experiential opportunities, and they forge lifelong bonds with one another, faculty, coaches, and staff in an environment that fosters diversity, equity, and inclusion. Among the most international campuses in the country and one of the top two most international in Ohio, the College enrolls approximately 2,000 students from 47 states and 77 countries.

30 Great Black TikTokers to Follow!

As the Librarian for African American & African Studies at the University of Virginia and a general seeker of quality entertainment, when it comes to keeping my finger on the pulse of traditional forms of media that feature Black creators, I have choices. For classic books, I have the range of Alex Haley’s Autobiography of Malcolm X to Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God. For contemporary voices, I’ll readily point to Samantha Irby’s Wow, No Thank You or Nayyirah Waheed’s salt. For global music we can reference the Afro-Cuban All Stars’ A Toda Cuba Le Gusta, Bob Marley and the Wailers’ LegendBurna Boy’s African Giant or Tiwa Savage’s Celia. Or for more local tastes, Solange Knowles’ A Seat at the Table or Janelle Monae’s Dirty Computer. For film and television, I can drop big names: Ryan Coogler’s Black Panther, Issa Rae’s Insecure, Shonda Rhimes’ Scandal, etc. Even with all of these riches, if I kept myself restricted to these well known forms of media, I’d be missing out on a whole world of 21st century Black creators and influencers who are innovating untrodden paths! From the turn of the century up to now, we’ve enjoyed all types of new platforms: MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, Vine, SnapChat, and now TikTok. With every platform, Black creators have excelled in shaping content that is engaging, educational, and edifying! Like many of you, against the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic, I spent the last year expanding my personal library and becoming a massive connoisseur of TikTok videos. The algorithm on my for you page is highly refined, reflects my wide-ranging tastes, and likely knows more about me than I do myself! In my countless hours of scrolling, I’ve come across some favorite creators from the broader Black diaspora who I’d like to celebrate this Black History Month. While the creators highlighted below primarily represent the English-speaking world, you are not limited to curating your page to Anglophone content. I’ll link to a representative video for each creator and encourage you to follow them! Here’s how I’ve categorized the 30 TikTokers’ content highlighted below:

 

Culinary Wonders

@cheflovely is the queen of culinary self-care and teaches all of her followers that luxuriant drink and meal prep is a worthwhile undertaking. Whether she’s making something colorful and liquid or brown and fried, everything her hands touch becomes elegant and blessed. If you’re looking to step up your presentation skills in the kitchen, look no further than this account.

@emmanuelduverneau films elaborate meals step-by-step in a state-of-the-art kitchen. While he waits for his food to cook, he splices the prep scenes with brief shots of his skilled, high-energy dance moves. Once the food is served, he provides a brief critique with a simple nod or, the only uttered word in the vid: “Excellent.” His work is simple and consistent, providing great, accessible ideas on keeping one’s self fed.

Cute Couples

@ichvse’s channel features a young couple with a nosey boyfriend who has got a bad hankering for gossip surrounding his girlfriend’s social circle’s lives. When new “tea” is brewing, he makes sure he stays within earshot and asks for a piping cup. The beautiful pair indulge each other’s eccentricities and share intimate moments of coupledom with their viewers.

@lingandlamb are a couple comprised of a North American wife and a Nigerian husband. The connectedness of their union is shown in how much they laugh together. Many of the documentary skits of their shared life surround introducing husband Lamb to new foods. He expresses enthusiasm for highly seasoned dishes from Haiti and Jamaica but doesn’t care much for cheese, which his wife tricks him into consuming.

@shopaif’s account documents playfully instigated confrontations with her wife, LaShondra. LaShondra has an unrelenting habit of buying “prizes” for her wife, RaeShanda, that are cheap, tacky, and very hit-or-miss in thoughtfulness. Viewers, then, are regaled with videos in which RaeShanda objects to the purchases and demands apologies that are never granted.

@burr_jam is an account for an interracial couple, Amber and Ben, who podcast together and record many of their shared daily adventures. Amber is outspoken, confrontational, and unabashedly takes up a lot of space with her big personality; her husband Ben is mostly mild-mannered, making efforts to accommodate his demanding wife. The way they play foils to each other promises hilarity every time and their love for one another is clear and abiding.

 

Fun Afro-European Content

@mariah.baillie is a Scottish actor whose skits are broad in variety. A fan favorite, however, are the ones shared with her husband, “Ducky,” in which Mariah initiates a joke and her husband fills in a punchline that is a bawdy come-on. The couple’s content features their lives in the U.S. and in Europe and viewers can always count on a display of Mariah’s acting skills on this channel.

@khaby.lame is the second most followed TikTok creator of them all with over 130 millions followers. His content is distinctive in that he remains silent in each skit, demonstrating the facile ways to complete practical tasks and ridiculing those who make them unnecessarily complex. Senegalese by birth, he has spent the vast majority of his life in Italy. His wordless miming allows his content to reach followers all over the world.

@chevin_dash is an English actor and whether she’s playing all the character parts in a fictional café or recreating voice parts for popular songs while in pretend studio sessions, her content promises quirkiness, intimacy, curious observations, and beauty.

 

Fun Pan-African Content

@iamjuliemango’s content constantly pokes fun at Jamaican culture. Whether it’s disciplinarian mothers, eccentric singers, or superstitious aunts and uncles, she always manages to hit the sweet spot of highlighting ostensibly silly patterns that she observes without being derisive. No Jamaican has greater love for her people and her country.

@maja_hype’s content is risqué and aims to reflect a variety of Caribbean nationalities: Grenadian, Jamaican, Trinidadian, etc. This TikToker plays up tensions between men and women in romantic relationships, conflict between parents and children, and discrepancies between employers and workers. If you watch these videos, there will always be a fight to witness.

 

Fun Pan-Caribbean Content

@iamjuliemango’s content constantly pokes fun at Jamaican culture. Whether it’s disciplinarian mothers, eccentric singers, or superstitious aunts and uncles, she always manages to hit the sweet spot of highlighting ostensibly silly patterns that she observes without being derisive. No Jamaican has greater love for her people and her country.

@maja_hype’s content is risqué and aims to reflect a variety of Caribbean nationalities: Grenadian, Jamaican, Trinidadian, etc. This TikToker plays up tensions between men and women in romantic relationships, conflict between parents and children, and discrepancies between employers and workers. If you watch these videos, there will always be a fight to witness.

 

Fun Celebrities

@tiktoktaye is actor Taye Diggs’ account in which he enjoys underscoring his lack of expertise using the TikTok app. He loves recording himself doing things poorly, namely dancing and singing. The audience relishes his self-aware incompetence, which shows his ability to clown outside of his dramatic roles.

@gabunion shares intimate family moments from the celebrity power couple actor Gabrielle Union and former basketball pro Dwayne Wade. Their daughter, Kaavia, regularly steals the show with her strong affirmations of boundaries and willful spirit. Kaavia is an overload of cute and the Union-Wade marriage provides viewers with a glimpse of luxury living.

 

Fun Fictional Characters

@mainlymannie “gives what it’s supposed to gave” in embodying the character “Boss & CEO,” a woman at the head of her company with an immeasurably inflated ego, a penchant for delivering eviscerating barbs to her subordinates, and blazer-skirt two pieces that just won’t quit. Boss & CEO is the epitome of deliciously abusive bosses of the fictive world.

@nasfromthegram plays Kesha, a fictional McDonald’s manager whose customers are an endless source of annoyance and whose co-workers offer her no respite. The adventures of the fast food restaurant, which track through love, aggression, power, and long-held vendettas, never fail to disappoint. With the wigs, acrylics, and constant gum smacking, Nas is fully committed to the character.

 

Great Afro-Latino Content

@lejuanjames is a comedian whose content is pure pleasure and joy. This creator revels in his Dominican culture, and whether you’re watching him shake a leg, prepare a well seasoned meal, or attempt to cure a cold, you won’t be able to wipe the smile off your face. This channel is recommended for folks looking to improve their Spanish auditory skills!

@roznyc shares her mental health journey with listeners in a way that is vulnerable, generous, and sincere. Providing tips to resist and interrupt generational trauma, this creator’s bilingual content reaches listeners within and outside of the United States, linking the origins of emotional abuse to the onset of colonialism and its hierarchical caste systems. Whether you’re of Dominican, Haitian, Jamaican, Puerto Rican or other descent, the videos on this page are sure to open eyes.

 

Great Womanist Content

@jazmynjw’s talent’s are many, but it’s the series of her promptly curtailed fictional dates with underperforming men that deliver hilarity every time. In this series, this creator visits the same restaurant to vet potential paramours and each encounter ends the same way: she requests the check early from her bestie-server-friend Sarah and punctuates dates that weren’t going anywhere.

@ebonie_qt’s personal journey towards becoming a business owner and her open exploration of her queerness teach about the audacity required for successful entrepreneurship and the embrace of new possibilities when normative, hegemonic culture simply ain’t working.

 

Most Comedic

@teeandersoncomedy hilariously describes the life of a woman who loves women who is constantly emotionally triggered by the “aggressive femmes” she dates. Tee’s paramours have unrelenting sexual appetites, are not afraid to make them known, and demand satisfaction. It’s impossible not to laugh at the sweet tortures Tee endures.

@jasonbankscomedy’s work hinges on a fictional father-son relationship between Derrick and his dad. As a school-aged boy, Derrick constantly finds himself confused as he navigates the world of romantic crushes and the demands of school-aged social life. His father loves him but doesn’t understand why Derrick is so slow to pick up on social cues and norms. Jason Banks plays both characters and has amassed nearly 8 million followers.

 

Most Countercultural

@donnellwrites’ graduate studies made him realize Christianity was in need of “deconstruction.” His TikTok content identifies a variety of hegemonic beliefs that hinder inclusion, enlightenment, and self-actualization. Dramatically declining rates of church attendance suggest his analytical content is representative of a trend and he is not alone in resisting traditional paradigms of spiritual engagement.

@misty_dopeland’s target for fire is capitalism. Disenchanted with the extractive paradigms of capitalism, she openly criticizes the soul-sucking systems to which many have grown numb. This TikToker shakes her followers awake and encourages us to reexamine the footholds that keep us locked in place by sharing her own critical journey.

 

Most Dynamic Storytelling

@thecannongoesboom3 doesn’t simply make TikTok skits: he makes *films,* films with vision, a directorial eye, creative shots, and special effects. My favorite of his tales follows his girlfriend who cannot resist her urges to pop pimples that appear on his face and the energy he puts into deflecting her warring advances.

@joetb3s autobigraphical account recounts his travails of going in and out of correctional facilities for years with serious charges ranging from robberies to attempted murder. In spite of the traumas he has endured, he maintains an infectious sense of humor and shares the wild rides of his life while broadcasting on his lives. For stories of crime, sex, and evasion, look no further.

 

Most Gen Z

@imdrebrown’s humorous skits visit his work life in the corporate world as a young, new employee. He’s constantly caught between the capitalist drives to earn, impress, build, and profit and his insistence upon luxuriant self-care, which mandates a separation between his office time and his free time.

@flossybaby’s non-stop, unapologetic, self-absorbed character is constantly asking, “How can I have a better experience on this ride called “life”?” She wants to finesse, to travel, and show off her outfits all the while. Follow to hear her takedowns of influencer culture, the poor quality of the dating pool, and the incessant demands of the wellness journey.

 

 

 

Katrina Spencer

Katrina Spencer

Librarian for African American & African Studies at the University of Virginia

Katrina Spencer works as the Librarian for African American & African Studies at the University of Virginia, Charlottesville. As her TikTok consumption reveals, she enjoys well presented meals, pursuing a diasporic lens, questioning the hegemony, and good-natured comedy. Find out more about me at www.katleespe.com and @Katleespe on Twitter.

Archiving The Black Web Conference

Convened towards the end of April 2021, Archiving the Black Web (ATBW) was a virtual conference just after the one-year anniversary of a global pandemic that has had inequitable impact on the lives of Black folks. The intentions of the space were clear – “The Archiving the Black Web national forum is an urgent call to action to address these issues with the goal of establishing a more equitable and accessible web archiving practice that can more effectively document the Black experience online.” Shoutout to the producers of this space, Makiba Foster, ATBW project director, and (her ace) Bergis Jules, ATBW project advisor, and the rest of the team.

Originally conceived to take place in person, this forum was imaginative as it remixed what we’ve come to know as online gathering spaces. Centering Blackness authentically and Black collecting institutions purposefully, ATBW was ultimately the Blackest space one could even begin to hope for with its infusion of musical interjections and improvisations by the talented Lamar Harris aka DJ Nune. This conference was hip hop and jazz (cool, reflexive, and creative) which is always understood to have originated from testimonies of the blues. But nothing about ATBW was reminiscent of a sorrowful past. Panels were part kitchen table conversation, part reunion familiarity, and all brilliance. As an audience member, one was able to witness and be in community through discursive forms of knowledge dissemination and collective explorations that examined the unique space between web and memory work.

Being in that space made clear that documenting Black folks utilizing the web is necessary in preserving the 21st century’s manifestation of the Black tradition. Exploring Black folks’ agency and impact on the web seems particularly poignant right now as we’ve seen how Black creatives recently resisted the eternal pathology of “Blackfishing”. Blackness has been commodified in ways that disrespect our humanity and allow others to profit off our creativity. During Black music month, Black Tik Tok creatives engaged in a staunch refusal to create online content. Bearing witness to this protest and the commentary about it has me deeply introspective about the work we engage in to preserve the originators. A more recent radical undertaking has seen Black creatives successfully reclaiming their artistic outputs as evidenced by the recent triumph of Tik Tok creator, Keara Wilson. Our work will ensure that her story and others are preserved, rendering a more accurate history of how Black people’s audacious forms of movement require a particularistic lens and documentation.

Archiving the Black Web was the balm, turn-up, and energy my soul needed. If you don’t believe me – check to see who all was there on the virtual stage. It was a function. It was a (re)orientation. It was blackness. It was abundant. This convening was needed. For a profession that is #archivessowhite, with such recent numbers from survey participants in the Women Archivists Section/SAA Salary Survey of the profession being 3% Black and 88% white and eerily mirroring those same numbers from the A*CENSUS from 2004. As someone who is still unlearning the value placements inscribed to me at library science school, this space was a seminar on Black Archival Studies/ Black Digital Studies.

This convening demonstrated engagements and research possibilities that observe the intersection of the web and Blackness. The forum included panels on joy, scholarship, print culture, activism, and space making. I appreciated Meredith Clark’s questions to panelists about their personal memory relating to Black web historical moments – signaling the importance of witnessing and introspection. As a technology conference there was reference and use of online digital tools and a continued appreciation for analog. Kimberly Drew mentioned the tactile nature of publishing a book evidencing web culture, or the Black press being the fullest archive of Black life (Paulette Brown-Hinds), or the individual tweet analysis approach of scholars in the first panel.

Multiple panels mentioned the importance of documenting the fullness of Black humanity. Scholars in the first panel, remarked on the tendency for research to address Blackness and technology from a deficit model under the guise of statistics about the digital divide. This space honored Black creativity and had a committed ethos to truly loving Black people.  A love of Black people necessitates care and an understanding of the possibility of harm and belief in repair (Yusef Omowale). Yusef evoked Fred Moten and reminded the audience that “for us our understanding is that we are willing for the archive to burn. That the archive is not what is precious, our lives are precious.” Syreeta Gates’ brilliant framework of memory work as a flower business to demonstrate reverence and appreciation to honor folks and their legacy.

Archiving the Black Web created a space for fellowship and mission alignment. It demonstrated the opportunities before us and the importance of Black stewardship, love, and care in web archiving. With acknowledgement that this will take resources, skills, and developed expertise. The task is mighty before us, yet we must remember web archiving is not meant to be done alone (Zakiya Collier) and the importance of each of us taking a corner (Makiba Foster). With all the gems I am taking with me from this space, I will commit to determining which corner I will tend to and steward.

Andre Brock cited the powerful poem, Technology and Ethos by Amiri Baraka in the opening panel reminding us to recall the power of this piece. Baraka’s words are clear, “creation powered by the Black ethos brings very special results” and this is the essence of what we experienced about who we have always been, who we are and who we will become.

Archiving the Black Web yielded special results and gifted us with an energy renewal of epic proportions. I am still basking in the glory of the art of replay as it lives where it should on the stage of the world wide web – the vibe check is clear – the audacity, boldness and unapologetic stance of centering Black collective institutions pays homage to the ancestors and charts our course for the future. We can give ourselves even more by returning to spaces and gathering our truths, quilting them together and stitching our proverbial Black ethos through the intersections of our work as memory keepers.

Our spaces centering Blackness replenish us in ways that are irrefutable. Archiving the Black Web is now firmly grounded and rooted in the cultivation of the joy and resistance we find in being memory workers giving us permanence in the power of what we can yield together. We know intuitively that our work thrives on our connections with one another, and the archive reflects how humans process and gather information. We are keepers of the culture and our ability to be capacious in our understanding of what should be valued ensures that stories told in the future will always include us. May we continue to bear the fruit of our labor. Asé.

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