Since the start of the pandemic, I’ve been examining how my studio and educational
practices can exist digitally to create new possibilities for information access and community building.
In June of 2020, I created a Google Docs “website” called “Black Wellness Field Guide”. This is a self-care guide promoting the advancement of mental, social, and physical wellness for Afro-diasporic people. For Non-Black people, the Guide lists numerous resources to use and financially support in service of dismantling long-term white supremacy. Visitors are also invited to submit resources and recommendations of their own through a Google Form linked inside the Guide.
From school classrooms to administrative offices, the Google Office Suite (consisting of popular applications like Docs, Slides, and Sheets) has provided internet users with a standard for group project management. With platforms like these strongly tied to productivity metrics and collaboration in service of capitalism, I’m interested in creating web-based, social resource hubs that play with the limitations of these everyday tools. This project was the first attempt at this line of inquiry by experimenting with how these apps can be used as artful and visually engaging learning resources.
This document has three main parts: An introduction with prompts, questions, and worksheets, a resource directory that compiles links to a wide array of subjects tied to different facets of wellness and self-maintenance, and a rolling open call for contributions to resources.
The “prompts” section of the Guide includes worksheets and activities that I designed myself.
