Young, Gifted, and Black: Rising Stars in Education, Arts, and Tech
In a world where systemic barriers persist, a new generation of Black Canadians is rising in education, arts and technology. In communities across Canada and beyond, Black youth continue to break boundaries in education, the creative arts and technology, shaping bold futures while inspiring the next generation. These innovators are not only challenging racial stereotypes, but they are also redefining what success looks like in their respective fields. Their stories highlight both the progress made and the work that remains to build a truly equitable society. Technology and Innovation Tamar Huggins (Toronto) Founder of Tech Spark and Spark Plug AI, Huggins is a trailblazing advocate for culturally responsive tech outreach. Since launching Tech Spark, a Canadian ed-tech school for Black and marginalized youth, she has reached over 1,500 students. Her Spark Plug AI platform integrates hip-hop culture and personalized learning to empower Black students through digital literacy and identity-aligned education. Rising Star Mentorship Program (Canada-wide) Run by Athlete Tech Group, BlackMINT and RBC Future Launch, this initiative empowers high school students through six to nine month internships in data science, cloud computing and game design. In its pilot year, all 25 participants completed the program with over 80 per cent expressing interest in tech careers and several securing paid internships at RBC. One student project even launched a startup that was accepted into Toronto Metropolitan University’s DMZ program. Arts and Creative Expression Ekene Emeka-Maduka (Winnipeg) This Canadian-Nigerian contemporary artist uses self-portraiture and Nigerian heritage to explore identity, displacement and visibility. Based in Winnipeg, her work has garnered international attention for its emotionally resonant and culturally rich storytelling. Anique Jordan (Toronto) A multidisciplinary artist, curator and writer, Jordan reimagines Canadian history through visual art rooted in Black and Indigenous experiences. Her installations have been exhibited widely in Toronto and beyond, challenging narratives while centering marginalized voices. Meanwhile, Obsidian Theatre’s Young, Gifted and Black Program’s six-month-ensemble initiative supports Black practitioners behind the scenes, training designers, directors and producers through mentorship, masterclasses and apprenticeships grounded in Black diasporic aesthetics and decolonial practice. Advocacy at the Intersection of Art and Education Dr Nia Imara Astrophysicist, artist, educator the author of Painting the Cosmos, Dr Imara fuses science and art to inspire Black and brown youth. Her nonprofit offers free STEM tutoring delivered by scientists of colour, linking cultural narrative to scientific identity. Research consistently shows that Black students face disproportionate declines in arts programs, nearly a 50 per cent drop since the 1980s compared to virtually no decline for white peers. These inequities harm academic engagement, creativity and future opportunities. Meanwhile, creative pedagogy such as the Rising Stargirls astronomy-art workshops for middle school girls boost science identity and engagement through Afrofuturistic STEM learning models. These individuals and initiatives reflect a broader shift: young Black talent using education, art and tech not only to succeed but to reshape society. As programs expand and more discover their voice through creative and intellectual expression, their collective impact will ripple through academia, culture and innovation ecosystems. Despite their success, these young changemakers face unique challenges. A 2021 report by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives revealed that Black youth face higher unemployment rates and lower income levels than their white peers, even with similar qualifications. However, their achievements speak volumes. They are reshaping Canadian society by demanding inclusion, sparking conversations and creating opportunities for others to follow.
Reclaiming the Lens: Black Filmmakers Reshaping Cinema
A new generation of Black filmmakers are taking charge in front of the camera but also changing the way visual stories are told. Their work is bold, unapologetically political, deeply personal and transitional. Their work challenges authorship, disrupting norms and conventions expanding the possibilities for Black cinema. From Toronto and Tiohtia’ke (Montreal) to Los Angeles, the project is international — yet there is a common thread: resistance. Resistance to characters only seen as one-dimensional, to a lack of nuance around the erased histories, and to severe historical gatekeeping that has kept honest Black voices on the margin. In reclaiming the lens, these filmmakers are not only telling new stories — they are reframing the story of cinema. Clement Virgo: Canada’s Cinematic Trailblazer Clement Virgo is a prominent Black filmmaker from Canada, born in Jamaica and raised in the city of Toronto. Virgo is an unflinching artist working in the realm of creativity and horror of race, sexuality and power, with his film Brother (2022), being a haunting coming-of-age story. The film, which is an adaptation of David Chariandy’s book of the same name, explores what it means to cope with grief, define masculinity and emerge from systemic neglect in Scarborough, Toronto. Visually “still” in many ways, Brother frames numerous profound emotional renderings, illustrating Virgo’s skill in cinematic language. There is a poetry to the stillness in this film: a shared glance between siblings, a shadow of a body stretched down a hallway, all visually communicated to say just as much as any line of dialogue. Virgo’s work embodies his own assumptions of what potential narrative arcs can look like for Canadian cinema, while inciting similar assumptions about the racial and cultural varied backgrounds of the country. Charles Officer: Documenting the Unseen The late Charles Officer provided a legacy in narrative and documentary film. His films, Nurse.Fighter.Boy and Unarmed Verses center Black lives with tenderness and nuance. Officer sought to tell the stories that Canada too often overlooks — Black youth in housing projects, Black elders impacted by gentrification and Black families existing while fighting against exclusion. Officer’s dedication to telling stories that represent Black communities, and with a focus on community storytelling, inspired a new generation of Canadian documentarians/fledgling filmmakers to tell stories that reflect the country as it is, and to wrestle with the aspects of its existence that it has no interest in owning. Ava DuVernay: Narrative Power as Activism Ava DuVernay has established herself as one of the most powerful filmmakers of the 21st century. From Selma to 13th to When They See Us, her work defies the entertainment/education binary. DuVernay’s 2016 documentary, 13th, about the prison-industrial complex connecting slavery to mass incarceration was a cultural reckoning and an educational tool in its own right. DuVernay is also changing the industry off-camera. She founded ARRAY, a distribution collective focused solely on films by people of colour and women. In an industry that often talks about equity but rarely does it, DuVernay is interrupting that process and making a structural change. Barry Jenkins: Tenderness as Resistance Films by Barry Jenkins are quiet revolutions. In Moonlight, he reinvented Black masculinity and opened the world up to the intimate experience of a queer Black boy finding his way in love, fear and identity. Moonlight became an instant classic and won the Academy Award for Best Picture in 2017— an iconic moment in Black cinema. Next, Jenkins released If Beale Street Could Talk, a complex and masterful adaptation of James Baldwin’s beloved novel which embraces both romance and injustice as one whole lyric. The power of Jenkins’s work arises from his patronage of restraint. In Moonlight, among the most unforgettable moments was where the camera spent a long time on a young boy’s face as he watches and thinks about his own reflection. No words; just light, shadow and feeling. Resisting Gatekeeping, Reclaiming the Frame The common trait shared by these directors is intent, not style and budget. They do not aim to fit into the industry’s default shapes, but instead create new shapes — shifting aesthetics, power dynamics and audience obligations. In Canada, black filmmakers still face barriers to funding, distribution and recognition. The systemic absence continues to exist, yet creators like Virgo and Officer have established that excellence will find a way — and potentially provide space for others to follow. In the U.S., the struggle looks somewhat different, but the urgency is still unchanged. The rise of book bans, political censorship and disinformation campaigns puts value on the struggle for narrative sovereignty. Film is not simply art; it is archive, argument and anthem. Final Frame The future of Black cinema is already here! It lives in the nuanced depictions of Black lives in Toronto apartments, in the grand narratives that politically reclaim history and in the sci-fi shorts that distort time and space. These filmmakers are not waiting for license, they are instead creating space, and inviting us along. To reclaim the lens is to reclaim power, and these artists are proving to us that, if we own the frame, we own the future of the story.
A New Canon: The Black Canadian Writers Changing Literature
In the past few years, we have witnessed a chorus of Black Canadian voices emerge to rethink Canada’s literary canon. Though the writers in this anthology range from poets, novelists, essayists and historians who are contributing to Canadian literature, they are all authors who are also redefining Canadian literature. Memoirs, speculative fiction and blistering critiques of culture help tell the stories of belonging, resistance and the Black diasporic experience. Canisia Lubrin: Reimagining the Poetic Form Canisia Lubrin was born in St. Lucia and now creates poetry in Canada. She has emerged as one of Canada’s leading poets. Lubrin’s book The Dyzgraphxst won the Griffin Poetry Prize in 2021. It was praised for its experimental structure and rigorous engagement with identity, race and power. Lubrin’s work is made so vital by its brute force, bending the form of language itself; creating poetry that confounds the container of poetry. Her voice generates a challenge to the literary establishment and to her readers to engage with the historical erasures of Canada’s colonial past. Chelene Knight: Writing Home and History Chelene Knight‘s writing is a dual action of memory and reclamation. Knight, a Vancouver writer of Dear Current Occupants and Junie, writes stories that celebrate personal and collective history. In her memoir Dear Current Occupant, Knight shares her experiences of growing up as a Black girl in East Vancouver, a place that rarely gets acknowledged in the Canadian canon. Chelene Knight continues to work not just as a writer, but as the founder of Breathing Space Creative, a literary consultancy that strives to include diverse communities in the publication of literature, where she advocates for structural change to the literary landscape in Canada. Desmond Cole: Journalism as Resistance Desmond Cole is recognized primarily as a journalist and activist, with his 2020 book The Skin We’re In presenting as a cultural manifesto. It chronicles 12 months of systemic racism in Canada and switches up the idea of Canadian exceptionalism—the notion that somehow, Canada does not feel the racial tensions of other countries. Cole’s voice is unrelenting, and its strength blends lived experience with careful reporting. He reminds readers that Canadian literature must also function as a mirror of its most marginalized, as it reflects their struggles and triumphs. His message is that resistance, while made tangible in art and narrative, can also act as the turnstile to change. Afua Cooper: Excavating Erased Histories Afua Cooper, a historian and poet, is critical to the Black Canadian literary tradition. Cooper’s ground-breaking book The Hanging of Angélique unearths the untold story of an enslaved Black woman who was hanged in 18th century Montreal. Her work and poetry collections illuminate the histories that are missing from Canadian textbooks. Cooper’s work connects to the theme of loss, specifically the Black histories and voices that have been erased from the historical collective. Cooper’s writing pushes back against just this, assembling pieces of history to create a path of resilience and identity for future generations. Why a New Canon Matters The Canadian literary canon has long highlighted white, Eurocentric voices while often silencing writers of colour. The work of Lubrin, Knight, Cole and Cooper—alongside many other emerging voices—together challenge this exclusion. They ask readers to reimagine Canada’s identity, one not just of one story but the many that make up its communities. These writers aren’t waiting to be inserted into the canon—they’re crafting their own canons. Their forms of speaking to anti-Black racism, diasporic belonging and cultural memory often overlap, as do their genres of writing and forms of storytelling. A Growing Movement This wave of literature is one major part of a larger movement of Black creators going from musicians to filmmakers, who are looking for representation and re-envisaging culture. As publishers and readers start to explore broader narratives, Black Canadian literature and literary texts are moving from the margins to the centre of the national conversation. Literary festivals are also beginning to emerge, namely the Festival of Literary Diversity (FOLD). Groups such as the FOLD have a variety of content to offer, such as mentorships, workshops and community events. Together they all combine to create important platforms for voices that have been silenced for decades. Final Word The direction of Canadian literature is not to preserve old canons but to build new ones. New voices like Lubrin, Knight, Cole and Cooper are creating space for others to move through, redefining what it means to belong and to be heard. Our job, as readers, is to listen—not as passive viewers, but as active participants in a cultural shift. Canada’s literary canon is changing, and thanks to these Black Canadian writers, it will never look the same way again.
Black Representation in Video Games
Video games have existed for over 60 years and have seen major upgrades. One upgrade that has been adopted at a really slow rate is the inclusion of Black characters. In cases where Black characters are included, there are heavy limitations on aspects like their skin tones and hair. While it is good to be satisfied that Black characters have some representation, it’s still important to ask for better. Black hair in video games Rumors of cauliflower The Sims 4 is the fourth iteration of the life simulation series The Sims. Simmers, as the games’ players are called, saw an article where a concept designer showed that they modelled an afro after a cauliflower. Now, it’s not known if this designer actually worked with Electronic Arts (EA), the company behind The Sims franchise. However, what is known is that simmers weren’t happy with the afro choice they did end up with. After seven years of that afro, The Sims team (the team at EA responsible for The Sims franchise) released a new afro. Simmers do end up referencing the old ‘fro as “the cauliflower hair”. Hair has been a contention in The Sims franchise. An EA Forums post from 13 years ago, before The Sims 4, had discussions about hope for the inclusion of more Black hair. Modders (someone who creates modifications and custom content for a game) have had to come to the virtual rescue. They will often add in content like Black hairstyles that aren’t available in the game, among many other things. The problem with this is that the entire Sims 4 community isn’t being served as simmers on consoles like the PlayStation, and Xbox can’t access that content. Kilmonger The award-winning film Black Panther graced screens in 2018. One of the main villains is Eric Killmonger. He sported a high-top fade with locs. The look inspired too many video game characters; the style has been dubbed the “Killmonger hair.” The problem is that the overuse of this hair makes players become tired of seeing it. It also gives the illusion that game development companies were finally glad to have another easy hairstyle (like the afro and cornrows that they always do) instead of also incorporating other natural hairstyles. Black skin in video games The Sims 4 finds itself here again. The problem was that the skin colour swatches were limited and some of the darker shades were ashy with bad undertones. Then, six years after the initial release of the game, Black simmers had more options when the game developers expanded the available skin tones. This came after a modder, Xmiramira (Amira Virgil), released a custom content pack with better skin tones than what was available in-game. The Sims 4 article that announced the update credited her and other simmers for helping them diversify the game. In 2024, the Sims team teamed up with Ebonix (another prominent modder) and Dark & Lovely (the haircare company) to add more variety for Black simmers. Black characters Adding a Black character to a game stirs online talk as a lot of people take issue with what skin colour a fictional character has, like Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed Shadow. The Assassin’s Creed series changes locations for every installment. This installment is set in Japan and has a Black samurai, Yasuke, and female shinobi (ninja), Naoe, as protagonists. Many people got upset that the samurai isn’t a traditional Japanese man; however, Yasuke is historically accurate. There is an argument to be made about the lack of a male Japanese protagonist in a game that is based in Japan. However, the conclusion should be to ask Ubisoft (and any other game developer) to expand its inclusion, not limit it. What Black people are doing in response There is a lack of education on how to make Black hair and a lack of Black video game developers. Many Black artists are now creating the change they want to see. More Black video game models A.M. Darke is an Associate Professor of Performance, Play, and Design, and Digital Arts at the University of California Santa Cruz (UC Santa Cruz). Alongside a team headed by Yale computer science professor Theodore Kim, Professor Darke worked on a program “that better represents coily hair in animation.” This collaboration is important because, as Professor Kim says, “[an] artist and a scientist put their knowledge together and make something really interesting that neither could have done individually.” To add to that idea, it is important to get Black artists involved when tackling issues like hair and skin tone in the virtual space. For artists like Professor Darke, knowing how and why Black hair works the way it does is a step towards knowing how to recreate it. You can read the study that came from the team here. Professor Darke also started the Open Source Afro Hair Library where individual artists can use models (created by contributors) to make their art. The library being open source means that artists can freely transform the models while giving the contributors credit. Code my Crown is a guide that stems from a collaboration between Open Source Afro Hair Library, Dove (yes, the body care company) and artists. The guide “[offers] more help combating the lack of access to resources and detailed documentation.” According to Isaac Olander, one of the artists who worked on the guide, “the response to Code my Crown has been overwhelmingly positive across the industry.” Black Girl Gamers Female gamers tend to receive a lot of harassment online, and that harassment worsens for Black female gamers. This is misogynoir, the intersection of sexism and racism. To provide a space for Black female gamers like herself, Jay-Ann Lopez founded Black Girl Gamers. Today, the company has expanded into consulting and doing events. They also have a Twitch page (with over 40k followers) that features several Black gamers. A common theme in asking for new hair
Rewriting the narrative: Black voices in psychology
Psychology is one of the most rapidly growing fields in the social sciences. It seeks to understand human thought, behaviour and feeling. Yet, when we examine the individuals credited with laying the foundation of the discipline, we can see one thing in common: they are all white men. Freud, Jung, Adler, Piaget, Frankl — these are the titans of psychology, those whose work fills the pages of all psychology textbooks and whose names ring in university lectures and on bookshop shelves. However, what is missing from this narrative is the contribution of Black psychologists, psychologists who were crucial to the development and understanding of psychology. This is not by accident; it is a consequence of systemic erasure. Best-selling books, such as The Psychology Book: Big Ideas Explained and How Psychology Works: The Facts Visually Explained (both published by D.K. Publishing), offer comprehensive encyclopedic overviews of the field featuring hundreds of entries. But neither of these publications includes a single Black psychologist. The same pattern carries over to any bookseller. Walk through the psychology section at Indigo any other major bookseller in Canada. After the first couple of shelves that contain books on cognitive science, behavioural psychology, mindfulness and positive psychology, you are hard-pressed to find any written by a Black psychologist. That sends a subtle but damaging message that Black minds and Black voices are not included in the canon of psychology. Recovering what was lost To adequately rewrite the story, we need first to recover it. This begins with the recognition of the supreme inequitable labour of countless Black psychologists who irreversibly changed the field of psychology — limited only, in some instances, by the field simply trying to forget them. Francis Cecil Sumner, who is widely referred to as the “Father of Black Psychology,” was the first African American to earn a PhD in psychology (Clark University, 1920). Sumner wrote academic papers that acknowledged systemic bias and inequality against African Americans. While Sumner was publishing in the 1920s, two psychologists, Mamie Phipps Clark and her husband, Kenneth B. Clark, were conducting the well-known “doll experiments” in the 1940s. These proved that the cultural and self-regard of Black children had been damaged due to segregation. The Clarks’ work eventually played a role in convincing some justices of the U.S. Supreme Court in the case of Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka (1954) that segregation in places such as schools should not continue to exist as it was unconstitutional. The Clarks are best known for their pioneering research on identity and racial bias in children. In their most cited work, the “doll experiments,” their most important finding was that Black children preferred white dolls. Such findings were discounted by their more significant finding, that of evidence for internalized racism and the psychological effects of segregation. The Clarks argued that systemic racism contributed to Black children’s low self-esteem and deficiencies in their psychosocial development and perspective. In their research on childhood racial identity development, they claimed to be the first to study Black children or children of colour. The significance of the Clarks’ work grew, following its citation in the civil rights Supreme Court case Brown v. Board of Education. This case can be regarded as one of the most significant instances of social science being applied in U.S. legal history. Then there is Na’im Akbar, a current Black psychologist, who is recognized for synthesizing Afrocentric ways of knowing into psychology. A key part of Akbar’s contribution involved a significant critique of Western psychological models based on individualism and Eurocentrism. Akbar’s promotion of community, historical trauma and spirituality as foundational to the Black experience was only an example of his new thinking. What about Beverly Daniel Tatum? Tatum is a former president of Spelman College and is best known for her scholarship around racial identities and education. Her book, Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?, is brilliant for understanding how systemic oppression operates by forming young minds. Tatum is well known for her work on the topic of racial identity development, especially through the lens of schooling. Broadly based on William Cross’s Nigrescence Model, Tatum described her work as an exploration of how Black adolescents develop a sense of racial identity, particularly in predominantly white institutions. In her influential book Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?, Tatum frames racial grouping not as self-segregation, but as a healthy and necessary part of the tailored identity space for youth in a racially divided society. Moreover, Tatum recognized just how much structured racism plays a role in the institutional development of the student. Therefore, combined with other educators, she made a call to create more equitable and inclusive educational spaces. These scholars did not simply “contribute” to psychology; they interrogated and expanded the field’s domain. They revealed the blind spots of psychology and conceptualized how it can address race, power and identity in ways all too often forgotten. Why this story matters For Black students, creatives, educators and mental health advocates, this is not just a historical reckoning — this is validation. To see oneself represented in the histories of a discipline as deeply personal as psychology validates belonging, pride and intellectual curiosity. Representation matters not just for social justice, but also scientific rigour. If social science erases the experiences and wisdom of entire populations in the study of the psyche, then the science is inherently compromised. A comprehensive understanding of psychology cannot omit what it means to be Black — it cannot simply remain as footnotes and electives in the body of theory and practice. The cultural cost is significant: when authorities on mental health, trauma and resilience are almost entirely recognized as white voices, the various ways of healing, identity and community are narrowed. The work of Black psychologists, for example, provides different therapeutic modalities, critiques of colonial and western perspectives and praises of holistic mental wellness and justice that are rooted in their lived experiences. Next steps in rewriting
Black Women in Media
The medium is the message” – Canadian theorist Marshall McLuhan, 1964. McLuhan believed that media, like TV, radio, etc., have a bigger impact on their audience than the content they deliver. So, a TV screen has more influence than the shows or movies playing on it. This is a good base, but more can be added to it. It is true that something like a movie screen signals to a population that something is worth seeing en masse. Here, though, is where the meaning behind a movie comes in. What is it that movie creators feel is so important for a large audience to watch together? As we’ve built up more understanding on how people are influenced, it’s important to look at both the movie screen and the movie as equally impacting. This understanding helps us ask an important question: why did/do creators make Black actresses portray so many negative/overdone/misogynistic tropes? Representation has slightly improved for Black women over the years. More of them are able to wear their natural hair on screen and get better roles (often from creating those roles themselves). However, there is still more to be done. While not every trope is negative, they largely make a character lack range and depth. One common theme is that many of these roles are filled with dark-skinned Black actresses—even younger (under-18) ones. This is just a list of tropes that you should be critical of while consuming content. Black woman voice of reason While not an official term, this trope is similar to the “magic negro.” The “Black woman voice of reason” is about a Black woman who is the involuntary counsellor in a movie or show. Sometimes she’s a side character who encourages the main character(s). Other times, she’s the main character and one of the side characters needs to be encouraged. The problem is that she’s never on the receiving end; she has to be the one to encourage herself. Throwaway Black girlfriend This character is too often a stepping stone for a main character (normally a white male). She exists to be his partner for a short amount of time before she leaves his life. Sometimes this ends up with the male character finding a new (white) girlfriend. On the graphic end, she ends up dying and that jump-starts something in him. This has overlap with the women in refrigerators trope. Token Black friend This friend has no goals of her own—she only exists to move the story along for the main character. When this happens with two Black actresses, the main character is often lighter than the token friend. The audience knows almost nothing about the character other than her name and her relationship to the main character. She can also double as the “Black woman voice of reason” in her friend’s eventful life. Obnoxious Black characters Obnoxious covers a lot of different areas: unnecessarily loud (mostly for comedic effect), overbearing or just plain mean. Again, these roles are populated with dark-skinned actresses. Unnecessarily loud She’s loud with a laugh track. The unnecessarily noisy character announces herself by yelling or just talking over everyone else. Whether she’s excited, sad or angry, all of those emotions just come out as loud. Overbearing Almost the opposite to the “token Black friend” and the “Black woman voice of reason,” the overbearing character is always in the main character’s business. She mostly annoys them by giving unsolicited opinions and constantly judging them. Mean This character never has any nice things to say. If she’s in a scene, she’s there to be mean to the main character. Her character acts as a foil to the protagonist. Much like the overbearing trope, she constantly judges and gives unsolicited opinions. She takes it further by outright insulting the main character—which can sometimes fuel the main character to seek revenge that furthers her own character development. Disparaging tropes These are the tropes that can draw from reality but take things to an extreme: overly sexual, constant slang or AAVE usage, ratchet and constantly struggling. Overly Sexual This is mostly the Jezebel trope. There is no depth to the character other than being desperate for male attention. Her character is always flirty and sometimes handsy. She often gets portrayed as not being able to have a long-term relationship because of her promiscuity. Lots of slang or AAVE usage This trope is often associated with a character that hasn’t gotten a high level of education. She speaks completely different to those around her—even if they are Black too. She often takes on other tropes like “Black woman voice of reason” or any one of the “obnoxious” tropes. This makes slang/AAVE seem as though it’s only for those who haven’t gone far academically. Ratchet Ratchet is somewhat of a reclaimed word. However, in this context it is in reference to being “trashy and disorderly…”. She’s often the “slang/AAVE” character who is loud and overbearing. It’s not part of who she is, it’s who she is. This doesn’t match up with the way that Black people have shifted the meaning where it’s part of a whole. Constantly struggling This character struggles in everything but mostly love and finances. This, too often, manifests in the Black single mother. She is looking for love after her “baby daddy” left her, but raising a child or children on her own becomes hard financially. This happens especially with dark-skinned characters. This subconsciously implies that her skin colour plays a role in her current situation (dishonourable mention: the welfare queen). There are many more examples of these types of tropes. No matter how fictional this type of entertainment is, it still draws from the real world and affects it. If the only exposure some people get are negative tropes, they might come to expect them in the real world. Be more critical of the content you consume and, where you can, support creatives
The Block is the Gallery: Streetwear, Graffiti and the Art of Everyday Resistance
Toronto’s cityscape is more than just sleek glass towers and polished gallery walls; it’s a raw canvas of everyday resistance. Nowhere is this truer than in neighborhoods like Queen Street West’s famous Graffiti Alley, Kensington Market, Parkdale or Little Portugal, where Black streetwear and graffiti culture converge to shape narratives of identity, resistance and creativity. Style Painted on Stone Walls Streetwear and spray paint go hand-in-hand in Toronto’s visual dialogue. Grassroots brands and underground collectives repurpose city walls, fire escapes and basement storefronts into immersive galleries. Their murals become mood boards for streetwear trends like bold African-inspired patterns, hand-me-down sneakers reimagined with lacquer and slogans that echo in hoodie prints and bucket hats. This is art that isn’t framed, it’s worn and walked in. Sun-bleached tees, hardwood deck caps and cargo pants become moving billboards that amplify Black voices on sidewalks, underpass pathways and shadowed laneways. Each outfit becomes a visual extension of the mural behind it and vice versa, embodying the synergy between fashion and paint. Graffiti Alley: Rush Lane as Black Canvas Between Spadina and Portland, just south of Queen Street West, lies Graffiti Alley (officially Rush Lane), a three-block kaleidoscope of colour, commentary and protest. Long celebrated by locals and tourists alike, the alley was designated an area of municipal significance in 2011 thanks to the advocacy of businesses and artists, including Black creatives pushing for permission to paint freely. In 2020, during the peak of Black Lives Matter protests, Graffiti Alley took on a new purpose. The “Paint the City Black” initiative, organized by Black graffiti artists Jessey Pacho, Moises Frank, Yung Yemi and others, transformed the alley into a living mural dedicated to Black lives, from portraits of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor to powerful slogans such as “No Justice, No Peace.” Here, style meets purpose: artists wearing rugged streetwear like hoodies, Carhartt jackets and baggy cargo worked through the night, turning walls into protest signs and resistance becoming a runway. The effect? Sidewalks became exhibition spaces where fashion and message walked the same beat. Kensington Market & Augusta’s Black Lives Mural Around the corner in Kensington Market, Black artists again took over the streets with public art. In June 2020, a collective led by Yung Yemi painted the iconic “Black Lives Matter” block-letter mural on Augusta Avenue. Each letter was created by a different artist—reflecting both diversity and unity with the project being fully self-organized and funded by the Art Gallery of Ontario. In this gritty, repurposed neighbourhood, streetwear thrives, like second-hand bomber jackets, loose-fitting jeans and crisp white sneakers. These outfits are both tribute and tool, canvases for embroidered patches, political pins and bold graphic prints that echo the messages painted on walls. Fashion and art amplify each other’s narratives. Kensington Market is also home to many second hand stores lined up side by side selling streetwear clothing. Parkdale & Little Portugal: Hidden Black Gems Beyond the mainstream lanes, Parkdale and Little Portugal host lesser-known murals by Black artists like Elicser Elliott, Canada’s leading aerosol artist. His signature soft, whimsical characters whether it be people, animals or blends of both, bring tenderness to brick and cement, interrupting the urban grind with empathy and community. Outfits worn by local youth mimic his aesthetics: pastel hoodies, netted hats and sneakers. Little Portugal’s laneways also whisper with Afro-Caribbean influences. Cadenced lyrical graffiti and icons rooted in ancestral stories, like Phillip Saunders’s murals celebrating Black women, or Curtia Wright’s vibrant portraits of Black queer femmes at 529 Oakwood Avenue, add depth to Toronto’s street art scene. Their art becomes fabric inspired. Caps and tees are screen-printed with reinterpreted motifs: bold florals and lyrical lines. Street Art as Everyday Resistance What makes these spaces, or this block gallery powerful is how resistance walks among the people. These are not stories told but kilned into the asphalt. Graffiti Alley, for instance, continues to shift, ebb and grow; it’s a living protest. Some murals honor lost community members like Jamal Francique or pay homage to Martin Luther King and James Baldwin. In crafting these walls, Black artists claim space at every level: municipal, cultural and sartorial. Meanwhile, streetwear spreads the message further. A block-print hoodie reminds you of the mural; a cap worn backstage at a music venue references the same protest slogans. The synergy becomes immersive. Why It Matters In Toronto, the city isn’t just a backdrop for Black stories, it’s the storyteller. Streetwear and graffiti are culture, protest, prayer and celebration. Walls and wardrobes invite us in. Do you see a mural? Think of its story. Do you wear the brand? Think of its lineage. Everyday resistance isn’t always loud; sometimes it’s painted in pastel, drawn into the seam of a cap, or worn as a reminder that even when institutions ignore us. The block hears, remembers and reflects us back. Toronto’s street art, such as Queen West’s Graffiti Alley, Augusta’s Black Lives mural, or Parkdale’s hidden gems, act as open-air galleries curated by Black artists in and beyond fashion. These are not just aesthetics. Through paint and pattern, local walls and wardrobes create a narrative that cannot be ignored.
Black Theatre in Canada: More Than a Spotlight
There’s something electric about walking into a Black-led theatre production. The smell of the stage paint. The low hum of anticipation in the seats. Black theatre in Canada has been creating space, telling stories and telling the truth long before most people were paying attention. But if you’re just tuning in now, don’t worry. The curtains are still rising. A Legacy That’s Been Here When people think of Canadian theatre, they usually picture Stratford or Shaw. Polished stages. Shakespeare. Maybe a polite slow clap. But Black Canadian theatre has always had a different rhythm—rooted in resistance, reflection and joy. Companies like Black Theatre Workshop in Montreal (founded in 1972) or Toronto’s Obsidian Theatre (est. 2000) were never just about entertainment. They were about carving out space in an industry that often excluded, stereotyped or straight-up ignored Black stories. Let’s be clear: these aren’t just theatres. These are institutions. Cultural keepers. Launchpads for some of the country’s most important voices—Djanet Sears, Trey Anthony, Omari Newton and so many more. Not Just Representation – Reclamation In recent years, the word “representation” has become trendy. Every festival now scrambles to include “diverse” voices. But Black theatre doesn’t do it for the optics. It does it because the stories need to be told—raw and specific. Take ’da Kink in My Hair. When Trey Anthony’s groundbreaking play first hit the stage in 2001, it wasn’t just a play—it was a cultural moment. Set in a West Indian hair salon, it explored grief, joy, sisterhood and resilience. It went from a fringe show to a full-blown hit, and eventually even a TV series. But its heart was always in the theatre. Intimate. Unapologetic. Ours. Or look at Obsidian Theatre’s 2021 project 21 Black Futures—a digital series showcasing 21 Black playwrights envisioning the future of Blackness in Canada. It was bold and collaborative. The Challenges? Still Here. Of course, it’s not all standing ovations. Funding for Black arts organizations is still a fight. Black creators are still told their stories are “too niche” or “too specific.” There’s still that subtle pressure to only produce trauma narratives, as if Black joy, fantasy and absurdity don’t deserve stage time too. And yet—people keep writing. Keep directing. Keep showing up. What’s Next? More. What’s exciting right now is how many younger artists are coming up with ideas. They’re not asking for permission. They’re just doing the work. Theatre collectives, solo performers, indie playwrights—Black Canadian theatre is not waiting to be mainstream. It’s building its own path. And it’s not just in the big cities either. You’ll find small but mighty productions popping up from Halifax to Winnipeg to Vancouver, often in community centres, pop-up spaces and schools. Anywhere someone has a script, a speaker and something to say. Final Act Black theatre in Canada isn’t just alive—it’s thriving, evolving and refusing to be placed in a box. It’s not just about taking up space in White institutions. It’s about building our own stages, writing our own roles and deciding for ourselves how the story ends. So go to the show. Support the fundraiser. Share the flyer. And when the lights dim and the stage glows, remember: this isn’t just performance. It’s history in motion.
Rewriting My Curriculum: How I’m Bringing More Black Voices Into My Classroom
The first time I realized my English curriculum was deeply whitewashed, I was already halfway through teaching it. I was reading Of Mice and Men with a room full of students—many of them racialized, some Black, some newly arrived in Canada—and I could feel the disconnect. It wasn’t that Steinbeck didn’t have value. It’s that we were centering the same voices over and over again: white, male, American and dead. I started asking: “Who’s missing? And what would it look like to change that?” Learning & Unlearning When I went through teacher’s college, the reading lists were traditional. Shakespeare. Fitzgerald. Orwell. Maybe Toni Morrison if the syllabus wanted to feel diverse. But most of the “canon” wasn’t built with Black students—or Black people—in mind. It’s not that I wanted to get rid of the classics entirely. It’s that I didn’t want my classroom to be a museum. I wanted it to be a space for conversation. So, I began the slow, intentional process of reimagining my course content—not just sprinkling in “Black History Month” lessons but embedding Black voices into the foundation of what we study year-round. More Than Just a Book List This isn’t just about adding The Hate U Give to the shelf (though we did read it, and the kids ate it up). It’s about challenging what kinds of texts we value through graphic novels, spoken word, Hip-hop, essays, and plays by Black Canadian authors. I also incorporated stories that reflect real-life intersections of identity: being Black and queer, Black and Muslim, Black and neurodivergent. In Grade 12, we now compare The Great Gatsby with excerpts from Desmond Cole’s The Skin We’re In. We read poetry by Canisia Lubrin and Rupi Kaur alongside Shakespeare and Sylvia Plath. We watch Amanda Gorman’s inauguration poem and ask why it went viral—and what that says about how we consume Black brilliance. This work doesn’t just amplify Black voices. It complicates the narratives. It makes students question who gets to be “universal” and who’s always labeled “specific.” Resistance Comes Quiet and Loud Some pushback is subtle—an email asking why we’re not reading Macbeth “like we used to.” Some are louder. But most of it is internal. The fear of not “doing it right.” Of being performative. Of tokenizing. But perfection isn’t the point. This work is messy. It requires reflection. Correction. Sometimes an apology. But it’s worth it when a student picks up a book and says, “I’ve never read something that felt like me before.” What I’ve Learned (So Far) Bringing more Black voices into my classroom has made me a better teacher and, more importantly, a better listener. It’s made the space more alive. My Black students feel seen. My non-Black students get stretched. And the conversations that follow? They’re not only richer but sharper, messier and genuine. The Curriculum Wasn’t Built For Us. So We’re Rebuilding It. It’s never a finished project when you’re learning, reworking, reading. But I know now: representation isn’t an “add-on.” It’s the groundwork. And if education is about opening minds, then let’s start by opening the syllabus.
Oral Traditions: Spoken Word and Poems
Spoken word is where writers/poets perform poems/written works for an audience. This is not to be confused with slam poetry. While both are forms of poetry, slam poetry is where poems are created for a competition. History of spoken word Spoken word, or performance poetry, stems from the Black community. It was a natural progression from the oral traditions of old (many communities have used oral traditions to pass on their history and have used stories as fables). Spoken word found a place in jazz clubs and has since expanded from there. Rap and social issues Spoken word is similar to rap as it also has rhyme and rhythm. Some feel that rapping is spoken word, just to a set beat—both do have the theme of addressing social issues. Simply put, “They overlap—in terms of audience, artists, roots, styles, and approaches—but they are also distinct cultures and communities.” Black performers use their voice to speak out against systemic issues like racism and police brutality. However, this is a narrow range of topics in comparison to poets who can and do explore any number of topics. What’s in a voice A voice is important as it can portray so many different emotions. Black people know their voices and words are needlessly and constantly policed. One common experience is having to code-switch. To assimilate (and to avoid awkward encounters), Black people learned to adapt to their surroundings and change the way they speak. In other words, to avoid being policed, they self-police, which isn’t good mentally. Performance over strict poetry Poems have been used as a vessel for emotions. The rise of authors like Maya Angelou shows that the general public felt a connection to her words. In fact, poems are what earned Gwendolyn Brooks a Pulitzer prize. She was the first African American to be awarded the prize. Both her and Angelou’s poems dealt with the African American struggle and trauma that existed in their day-to-day lives. That vulnerability still exists in spoken word performances. Poets are not only able to voice their poems, but they can act, dance or add anything they feel enhances their performance. Poetry, as many understand it now, is rhyming lines studied in English class. This doesn’t carry over to spoken word. Rhymes do help a piece to flow, but they aren’t necessary. Slam poetry This genre was founded by Marc Kelly Smith. He felt “that poetry readings and poetry in general had lost their true passion, [and he] had an idea to bring poetry back to the people.” Poets doing slam have the opportunity to compete and build up their experience as performers. It also allows anyone to be a judge. This is good because that means that there is no high level of expectation, no rubric to follow. The point is just to entertain and hope that randomly selected audience members enjoy your piece. It is important to remember that slams aren’t the height of spoken word. They exist with spoken word, not above it. Creating community Spoken word is inviting to anyone. It creates a good outlet for people to express their emotions, whether it’s younger people looking to speak out against lived injustices or older people who want to give out words of advice/wisdom. Spoken word provides a community for people who just happen to enjoy creating poems and want to share them with others. Spoken word in Ontario In a Humber Et Cetera article, poet Joshua “Scribe” Watkis says that The Canadian League of Poets didn’t consider spoken word as a form of poetry. It was the actions of award-winning poet Lillian Allen that helped to change this idea. Now, the League and the Ontario Arts Council have created two awards in her name for 2025. Other poets like award-winning artist Dwayne Morgan have also helped to expand the spoken word community for up-and-coming artists. Be sure to read about the other poets in Humber Et Cetera’s article and support artists at slams and open mic nights. If you are someone who is interested in doing spoken word, don’t be afraid to join the community.