Online in Oakland: Public History in the Time of Corona

This week, I’ve been wrapping up my time as a graduate research fellow at the African American Museum and Library at Oakland (AAMLO). It’s been so rewarding to support the museum staff as they adapted to the pandemic with virtual programming while we continue to shelter-and-place. As I mentioned in my first blog post, one of the most meaningful experiences from this fellowship had to be the opportunity to work with middle-school students. I supported my colleagues at AAMLO behind the scenes by creating educational materials for Girl Scouts from Oakland and Richmond as part of a “virtual field trip.” 

Photograph of the facade of the African American Museum and Library at Oakland, part of the city's public library system. Image Credit: Oaktown Art

Although it had to be done behind a screen, we found a way to meaningfully share the African American history of California and the museum’s role in curating it. I contributed to these efforts by creating an activity worksheet that could be completed from home. I broke down complex historical topics (such as the legacy of the Black Panther Party) into accessible content for these local Girl Scouts troops. I worked hard to encourage the middle schoolers to reflect on the trailblazing leaders in Oakland’s local history and how they could create positive change in their own communities today. I learned a great deal myself from this process of tailoring history to a specific audience. I’m thrilled that both the Girl Scout troops and AAMLO plan to continue using the worksheet in the future.

I’ve also been impressed at what’s been possible for public history and community building in spite of the loss of in-person interaction. As long as we are innovative and adaptable, Oakland’s cultural institutions can still have an impact in our lives. We can still keep our community and our children educated and empowered. The public health situation may restrict our physical movement, but it does not need to restrict the potential reach of public history. 

Of course, I anticipated that there might be a few social and logistical challenges to working for a museum remotely. However, having served as a volunteer for AAMLO prior to my graduate studies, I experienced less hurdles than I imagined. It felt natural to rejoin the AAMLO team in a more full-fledged role, even if I had to work exclusively from my apartment here in Oakland. It was quite helpful to be based in the same city as the museum, even though it was closed to the public. New ideas for our digital projects surfaced in my mind as I walked around Oakland. Perhaps such thoughts would not have come up so fluidly if I wasn’t in close proximity to the museum and immersed in East Bay life. 

A couple weeks ago, I blogged about Ishmael Reed’s book A Walk in Oakland. I’m convinced now that the only way to really get to know a city is to spend enough time walking through it! Like Reed, if you have an open mind as you explore new neighborhoods in your city and turn down unfamiliar streets, the urban past will naturally open itself up to you, as long as you are just as open to taking it all in. 

Although I am shooting for the stars in my pursuit of a PhD in History and hope to be a professor one day, this fellowship opportunity at AAMLO helped me appreciate the importance of always striving to connect the past to the present. My experiences this summer solidified community engagement and public history as values that should inform my academic career. I'm looking forward to being a historian that creates meaningful change both within and beyond university walls.

As I look to the academic year ahead, I’m also thankful that I could enhance my digital skills during this summer fellowship. This fall, I’ll have the opportunity to be a teacher’s assistant in the History Department at Stanford University. I will facilitate online classes for the first time, a responsibility I expect to be equally exciting and challenging. I’m looking forward to applying everything that I learned this summer about virtual programming to support undergraduate students. Even as we connect from faraway on Zoom conference calls, I am excited to guide these students to appreciate history in new ways and how it can help us better understand the world we live in today.

I am transitioning from my museum work back to my graduate studies, but I will continue to post every Thursday here on Black Beyond Borders. In the coming weeks, stay tuned for reflections about the intersection of the Black experience, science fiction and history. I will share my thoughts on the life and legacy of trailblazing novelist Octavia Butler as well as the life lessons we can all glean from Marvel’s Black Panther comics taking place in the Afrofuturist world of Wakanda. 

I know our future seems more uncertain than ever with each passing day. Yet there’s so much we can learn from the speculative writings of imagined futures as we overcome this pandemic and advocate for a more socially just world!