February 3, 2024.
Stepping off the plane into warm, humid, Caribbean air, I felt myself relax. To survive the NYC winter, you have to grit your teeth, and there’s pride in that. We claim it makes us stronger. More resilient. On that winter day last February, I realized I had been holding so much tension. I was tensed against the harsh weather, tensed against the political climate in the United States, tensed against the reality of facing the climate apocalypse – and it was taking a toll on me. Arriving in Barbados, the tension began to leave my body, day by day, and that was the true power of being in community, full of warmth and connectivity, where I could be myself.
The 2024 Black Feminisms Forum brought together four hundred Black Feminists from across the globe. The gathering was intersectional, trans-generational, multilingual, and Afro-futuristic in every way. As filmmakers, we weren’t simply observing the event. We were asked to be active participants.
One of the stated goals of the forum was to reimagine a future that centers Black femme and gender expansive people. A future where we win, and we are able to actualize the world we’re dreaming up. Living at this convening in Barbados for four days felt like living that dream. Every direction I turned, I witnessed fellow Black Feminists embodying that future.
As a filmmaker documenting the event, I sat in on discussions such as “Revolution Interrupted” where elders who have lived through real revolutions spoke of their experiences, including Peggy Antrobus, an 89 year old feminist activist from Grenada, as well as “Climate Justice Now” where activists from countries at the forefront of our climate impacted future discussed actions they are taking to avert disaster.
The assignment was to distill four days into five minutes – a nearly impossible task. When I interviewed attendees and filmed breakout rooms on topics like fighting fascism, the global border crises, or heard from the next generation of young Black feminists, I felt as though every minute of footage was required viewing. Forget a five minute piece – sit down for a four hour master class.
One of the most impactful moments of the weekend was a ritual of remembrance we participated in at dusk, looking out across the Atlantic ocean.
The resort stands next to the ruins of Sam Lord’s Castle. Local legend speaks of Sam Lord as a pirate who pretended his castle was the island’s capital port to steal from ships landing in the bay. The historian Fiona Compton, of Know Your Caribbean, researched the real Sam Lord, and found that over 700 Africans had been enslaved at the castle.
For the ritual of remembrance, Fiona read out a list of just a fraction of the names of women and girls enslaved at Sam Lord’s Castle to honor their lives.
Filming this ritual on the beach next to the crashing waves of the Atlantic, with the celebratory sounds of hundreds of Black women, girls, and gender expansive people in the distance, encapsulates what participating in the Black Feminisms Forum meant to me. There is so much pain we as Black Feminists need to navigate on the road to creating the world we want to see. By witnessing each other, sharing our stories, and fostering intersectional connections, we can create that future, together.
