Building Belonging: Archives and Architecture as Means for Black Reparation
Author(s)
Lubitz, Adam
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Abstract
The photograph and the drawn map as media offer us an ability to travel through time: by their very nature as objects that look into history, but also as a means for informing the future. While typically employed as a before-and-after comparative tool, even as a triumphalist statement of how the present is built from what was previously mere speculative design, a photograph can also capture a fleeting, exact moment of disaster or immediate change, and in doing so provide evidence of a specific and systemic crime thats been committed. Using an analysis of the photograph and the map as “tangible” heritage objects, or remnants in lieu of extant, let alone in-situ built fabric, this paper seeks to examine the various means of telling the more complete story of the mid-20th century Black beach communities in Santa Monica, California, as a means toward potential reparations. Taken as an initial case study, this location has been selected because of contemporary conversation regarding Black reparations in California. In doing so, this paper contests conventional heritage practices with regards to the necessity of these long-overdue reparations for displaced communities. By using some of the few documents available to overcome the deficiency of the archive in such histories, this paper sheds light on these communities who lost their homes during what was claimed to be a slum clearance.
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Date
2025-03
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Text
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Proceedings
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