LifexCode
@lifexcode.bsky.social
An ecosystem of labs, projects, and members doing digital humanities against enclosure. Learn more lifexcode.org. AY 2025-2026 Keyword: FORMATION (Campt, "Loophole of Retreat-An Invitation" 2019)
Three years. Three cities. One question that keeps getting more urgent: who owns Black data — and who gets to decide? WOBD III lands in New Orleans this May 20–22, hosted by the Amistad Research Center on its 60th anniversary. The public evening is May 21, it’s free, and everyone is welcome.
James Earl Jones brings Frederick Douglass’s searing 1852 oration “What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?” to life—forcing a reflection on liberty, hypocrisy, and the ongoing struggle for justice. A must-watch for #FourthOfJuly and everyday. youtu.be/xX-AlsQcZgs?...
James Earl Jones Reads Frederick Douglass Speech "What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?"
YouTube video by Democracy Now!
youtu.be
What can small data tell us about the quotidian impacts of limited scale representation in the aftermath of trauma and erasure? Catch me next month as I present and discuss “Beyond A Haunting,” a project centering histories of indenture and belonging.
Can I even conjure a self, a re-presentation of myself without a reference to my ancestors? “These people are my access to me; they are my entrance into my own interior life” (Morrison, “The Site of Memory” 95) and as I am, they are.
Nadejda Jahi Webb + Yomaira Figueroa-Vásquez: “We bear witness to the geopolitical shifts that have left the worlds most vulnerable populations exposed to the disabling forces of war, white supremacy, genocide, enclosure, famine, disappearance, and destierro.”
[microdossier] in a time of war — [Taller] Electric Marronage
Editors: Dr. Nadejda I. Webb + Dr. Yomaira Figueroa-Vásquez
electricmarronage.com
Zophia Edwards, Fueling Development: How Black Radical Trade Unionism Transformed Trinidad and Tobago (Duke University Press, 2025) Another excellent book indexed by Southwest Humanities is Zophia Edwards's Fueling Development: How Black Radical Trade Unionism Transformed Trinidad and Tobago (Duke…
Zophia Edwards, Fueling Development: How Black Radical Trade Unionism Transformed Trinidad and Tobago (Duke University Press, 2025)
Another excellent book indexed by Southwest Humanities is Zophia Edwards's Fueling Development: How Black Radical Trade Unionism Transformed Trinidad and Tobago (Duke University Press, 2025). In this detailed and crucial study, Edwards offers a compelling reinterpretation of Trinidad and Tobago’s path to social and economic progress—especially surprising given its reliance on oil and gas and its colonial legacy. Through extensive archival research and a Black radical political economy perspective, she uncovers the vital role of what she terms “liberation unionism”—a working-class, multiracial, and inclusive labor movement deeply rooted in Pan-African, anti-imperial, and diasporic principles.
southwesthumanities.com
In "Fueling Development," Zophia Edwards traces Trinidad and Tobago’s democratic and redistributive development success to a specific form of Black radical working-class mobilization she calls “liberation unionism.” Read the intro for free now: buff.ly/94DOWp1
Agreed.
John Warner@biblioracle.bsky.social · 5mo agoStrong recommendation to teaching faculty to just say no to this stuff, even if you are AI curious/enthusiastic. This is meant to reduce faculty autonomy and capture human labor with automation. You're selling out your future self and the profession as a whole. www.insidehighered.com/news/tech-in...
Not sure, we'll succeed in setting up all 4 rituals, but we already got (b) and (c) in the cue, and have done one of (d). ¡Si se puede!
In our dept we're reviving the art of sharing dissertations in progress as a collective. We're aiming for 4 rituals to mark and celebrate a grad's progress together: a) A collective bibliography for their orals/prospectus; b) A chapter slam; c) An open defense; d) An invite back after they leave.
Ooo, I just realized that apple's embedding viz package can be used for even tabular data. The more you know!
Daniel van Strien@danielvanstrien.bsky.social · 4mo ago2 million book titles visualised as an interactive Embedding Atlas. Fiction, History, Science — each forms its own cluster. The trick: mount the same @hf.co Bucket to a GPU Job AND a Space. Job writes, Space reads. No uploads!
Who Owns Black Data at CumbreAfro 2026!!! open.substack.com/pub/lifexcod...
Who Owns Black Data at CumbreAfro 2026!!!
Jessica Marie Johnson, Kathe Hambrick, Eduard Arriaga, and Alexandre White will present as part of panel, Ecologas de Datos Negros: Archivo, territorio y redes comunitarias
open.substack.com
RECAP: Black Beyond Data at the CumbreAfro in Puerto Rico open.substack.com/pub/lifexcod...
RECAP: Black Beyond Data at the CumbreAfro in Puerto Rico
The Fight for Black Data is Diasporic
open.substack.com
Ecosystem Notes: What's the Plan? Toni Cade Bambara Weekend Events for College Students, Spring Research Celebration Reveal, and more open.substack.com/pub/lifexcod...
Ecosystem Notes: What's the Plan? Toni Cade Bambara Weekend Events for College Students, Spring Research Celebration Reveal, and more
A weekly roundup of happenings across the ecosystem!
open.substack.com
Save the Date! Who Owns Black Data III: The Fight for Black Futures open.substack.com/pub/lifexcod...
Save the Date! Who Owns Black Data III: The Fight for Black Futures
See you May 20th to 22nd, 2026 at the Amistad Research Center in New Orleans
open.substack.com
On April 10th &11th, join us for "What's The Plan?" // Toni Cade Bambara in Praxis Weekend: Lessons in Care, Sisterhood, and Cultural Work open.substack.com/pub/lifexcod...
On April 10th &11th, join us for "What's The Plan?" // Toni Cade Bambara in Praxis Weekend: Lessons in Care, Sisterhood, and Cultural Work
Check out our lineup of events now!
open.substack.com
Find our latest Spotlight Interview with Awa Diagne Lô on our Substack! The polyglot co-founder of the Translation Lab in the DSL encourages us to "be aware of the responsibility to speak, or to stay silent, and how powerful that choice is." Full interview: lifexcode.substack.com/p/dive-into-...
A new Substack post from Zaria Sawdijah El-Fil reflects on how powerful mentorship and recognizing the breadth of labor is in creating community-based digital humanities projects. lifexcode.substack.com/p/the-many-h...
Join us on May 14th to hear from a lineup of dynamic presenters on critical questions on Black Kinship and AI!
Dive into the Ecosystem and meet Zaria Sawdijah El-Fil! K4BL’s Digital Curation Fellow tells us about scholarly confidence, her connections to the American Southwest, and why she starts all of her conference presentations with Langston Hughes. open.substack.com/pub/lifexcod...
Join us at the Who Owns Black Data? Conference on May 14th to hear from a lineup of dynamic experts on Black ancestry, memorialization, and descendant engagement! 🖤 Register here: wobd.blackbeyonddata.org
The WOBD conference is so excited to welcome an amazing roster of speakers for three panels + a keynote dialogue. Check out this list of powerhouse thinkers and doers shaping the conversation on Black data:
Join us on May 14th at Who Owns Black Vol. 2: The Past in Danger for a dynamic keynote conversation featuring Tamara Lanier, Yeshimabeit Milner, Alondra Nelson, and Marisa Parham, with an introduction by Kim Gallon. Register here❗️ www.eventbrite.com/e/wobd2-rece...
What: 𝐖𝐡𝐨 𝐎𝐰𝐧𝐬 𝐁𝐥𝐚𝐜𝐤 𝐃𝐚𝐭𝐚? A̶r̶c̶h̶i̶v̶a̶l̶ ̵R̶e̶p̶a̶r̶a̶t̶i̶o̶n̶s̶ ̵The Past in Danger When: May 14, 2025 Where: Yale University
Everything that's going on won't stop me from being immensely proud to announce the launch of the 8th issue of archipelagos journal. In this special issue we highlight papiamentu and the ABD islands. With deep gratitude for our guest editor Margo Groenewoud. Enjoy! archipelagosjournal.org
archipelagos
A journal of Caribbean digital praxis
archipelagosjournal.org
This spring, Keywords for Black Louisiana hosted an incubator on African and African diaspora history. Thank you to our Scholar Specialists who joined us to think deeply over the course of a Saturday about nation, ethnicity, Blackness and gender!
“Mannie Fresh, aka Elvis Freshley.” Love rap and hip hop? Check out the NOLA Hip Hop and Bounce Archive, housed by Black Beyond Data partner organization @amistadresearch.bsky.social + the Tulane University Digital Library.
“I challenge myself to go to the archive and not presume anything. I don’t presume that Blackness is ‘X.’ What are people of African descent telling me about what it means to be African?” - Jessica Marie Johnson (Associate Professor, History, Johns Hopkins Univ. + Executive Director of LifexCode)
