Black Santa Monica: Reframed and Reimagined
An examination and presentation of what happened, what could have been, what is happening, and the significance of freedom dreaming.
In a UCLA Urban Humanities Initiative Capstone titled "Whitewashing the Beach: Reconstructing the Past to Claim Alternative Futures", urban humanities students discussed reparations, public memory, spatial injustice, and incomplete and silenced archives on the Southern California coast, in the American South, and as far as Berlin. Eventually their conversations evolved into a more focused effort thanks to the knowledge sharing of Robbie Jones, long-time Santa Monica resident, historian, and owner of Black Santa Monica Tours , and Dr. Alison Rose Jefferson, historian, heritage conservation consultant, cultural producer, and author of Living the California Dream: African American Leisure Sites during the Jim Crow Era . The project culminated in a 6'x10' "thick map", which layers Black Santa Monica's history, disallowed potential, significant tenacity, current state, and imagined future.
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“Black Santa Monica: Reframed and Reimagined” highlights and maps Black spaces of resistance and joy in Santa Monica. The research question was, “how can we spatialize and visualize the historically marginalized narratives of the African-American community of Santa Monica?”
With an understanding that archives are not necessarily discovered or visited but constructed, the project argues that Black Santa Monica has and will endure in the future despite its marginalization. Confronting various forms of spatial violence enacted on the Black community in the 20th century--the racist, reactionary response by white, land-owning residents to the arrival of African-Americans in Santa Monica, the project focuses on the role of space and property in those systemic anti-blackness efforts to create and maintain wealth.
The project results in a thick map created by urban humanities students, a palimpsest of past, present, and (alternate) futures. By layering a 1926 land-use map, the 1939 Home Owners’ Loan Corporation redlining border data, and present-day satellite imagery of Santa Monica, the map demonstrates how Black Santa Monica was demolished and reconfigured through city planning and urban policies.
African-Americans have lived throughout Santa Monica, but the project attempts to visualize histories beginning with the “Belmar Triangle” neighborhood, a genesis story of the broader trends of Black displacement in Santa Monica. The research has been divided into the past (the Beaches and Belmar) and the future (1819 Pico and the Beach Club reimagined in 2070).
| Project Type: | Research, Design |
|---|---|
| Credits: | Authors Adam Lubitz Dr. Dana Cuff Katherine Taylor-Hasty Community PartnersDr. Alison Rose Jefferson Amanda Gormsen |
| Timeline: | 2019-22 |
| Themes: | Racial History, Postsuburban City, Thickmapping |
