FEBRUARY 28, 2023

BLACK PUBLIC MEDIA

WEEKLY DISPATCH

By Leslie Fields-Cruz

Black E’RY Month

This week marks the end of another wonderful Black History Month celebration. We hope you’ve had a chance to attend spirited events in your community and to view some of the enriching content that has aired on public media throughout the month.

Regular readers of this blog will recall the frustration I expressed a few weeks ago in reaction to the dust up over the College Board’s new AP course in African American Studies. Sadly, the month is closing with cartoonist Scott Adams’ recent rant against Black folks. I guess haters are always gonna hate. But I’m encouraged by the groundswell of disapproval people across the country are directing toward Adams. Instead of erasing Black people from the national story, his actions have effectively erased his work from hundreds of newspapers across the country.

Attempts to erase Black history, Black achievement, Black pain, and Black people from the story of this country are not new. But history has shown that Americans are much better off when we work together to amplify and celebrate the contributions and struggles of ALL our people.

It is in this spirit that BPM is pleased to reintroduce its Black Every Month campaign. Each month, we will salute a BPM filmmaker via our Instagram Black Every Month highlight reel with a film 10 years or more past its broadcast premiere date. Each highlight reel will include a short bio, headshot, and photo of the filmmaker, or 15-second clip of the selected project. For the month of March, we’re featuring Eliaichi Kimaro. Her film A Lot Like You originally aired in 2013 for season five of AfroPoP: The Ultimate Cultural Exchange. Look for the reel this Fri., March 3, on IG.

Here at BPM, celebrating Black people and Black stories is what we do. You can join us by spreading the word about our Black Every Month campaign and sharing your feedback with us on IG.

BPM 2023 Trailblazer Yoruba Richen

BPM also is pleased to announce that this year’s BPM Trailblazer is documentary filmmaker and educator Yoruba Richen. We will celebrate her as part of our PitchBLACK Awards program on Thurs., April 27. Baltimore-based comedian Sir Alex will emcee the ceremony, which will live stream on the BPM YouTube Channel. Don’t miss this opportunity to join us as we celebrate Black media makers and award up to $150,000 in project funding to winners of the PitchBLACK Forum.

BPM 2023 Trailblazer Yoruba Richen

Black Public Media (BPM) is supported in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, with further funding from the MacArthur Foundation and the New York State Council on the Arts.  BPM is the only nonprofit that offers training, funding and distribution for projects solely about the black experience. We are seeking foundations, corporations and individuals to help our work. For more information about underwriting and contributions, please contact Alisa Norris (alisa@blackpublicmedia.org). 

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