TheirStory

About This Project

TheirStory is a "Narrative of the Self" class project dedicated to telling the stories of African Americans whose stories and legacies needed to be told. I came up with the idea of creating a website inspired by beloved and how specific characters have different, real traumatic stories. I realized that real people who faced slavery have stories of trauma and resilience that we all can learn from.

Why These Stories Matter

Each person featured here lived during a critical moment in American history when freedom and rights were not given to African Americans. They refused to be defined by the circumstances of their enslavement or oppression. Instead, they claimed their freedom through challenging the system.

These are not stories of victimhood. These are stories of resilience, stories that you may not have heard before. They need to be told and retold, to give recognition to those who fought for their freedom and established a blueprint of what it meant to fight for one's livelihood.

An Ongoing Project

This collection is not exhaustive. There are countless other stories, equally powerful, waiting to be told. TheirStory is an invitation to expand this archive and tell the stories of countless other African Americans. For now, it is a demo version.