In Fall semester 2025, Denise Khor, Reckonings Project Faculty and Associate Director of Global Asian Studies, taught the service learning course “Asian American Cinemas.”

“We’re so lucky that we have the longest standing Asian American Film Festival in the region right here in Boston,” Khor says. “We do research into the films, into the directors, and how they are part of this broader history of Asian American filmmaking. Throughout the semester we explore how community archiving practices are central to understanding this history. Each October, students in the course attend the festival, where they view films, engage in conversations with directors, and gain firsthand insight into the production, circulation, and exhibition of independent Asian American media.”

Khor’s class of twenty created a timeline, tracing Asian American Resource Workshop’s (AARW) rich history of media activism and grassroots organizing—from its earliest experiments with community-based media and organizing in 1979, to the founding of the Boston Asian American Film Festival (BAAFF) in 2005.

Students learn how to conduct archival research in the AARW collection in the Northeastern Archives and Special Collections, which stewards information going back to the origins of the organization. Students drew on a wide range of historical materials to populate the timeline, including event flyers, film program notes, and organizational meeting minutes. Alongside these archival documents, the project also highlights works that foreground the design practices and creative labor of Asian American artists. These include self-authored comic books, screen-printed posters for community events, and richly illustrated, independently produced calendars featuring Asian American history and culture.

Gregory Lord, Reckonings Assistant Director of Design & Program Manager, conducted several workshops for the students on Timeline JS, a data visualization tool used to create the timeline, and on Omeka S, a digital archiving and exhibit tool.

“It was a chance to put into practice some of the multimedia workflows that we have around community archiving work with open-source platforms,” says Lord. “And to make that a kind of shareable learning resource for folks in the future as well.”

Student Benjamin Yu, third-year politics, philosophy, and economics major, said his favorite part of the course was the timeline project. Yu’s entry highlights a 1982 AARW workshop held in Cambridge, where audiences viewed videotaped testimonies of former Japanese American internees that had been submitted to Congress during the pivotal hearings on redress and reparations. These first-hand accounts contributed to the political momentum that would eventually lead to the passage of the Civil Liberties Act of 1988.

The collaborative nature of the project was a major part of the experience. “Everybody uploaded their own part into the timeline and seeing it come together was super cool,” said Yu.

Khor agreed.

“Part of the learning is to see it in aggregate. It illustrates the truest spirit of independent Asian American filmmaking, like the final project being this collaborative project. And so it’s just such a wonderful experience.”

This collaboration between the Reckonings Project, Professor Khor, students, and AARW is one example of how academia and community can meet to preserve history and reimagine its possibilities.

On March 18th, Joel Mackall of Reidren LLC and Collin Knight of Live Like a Local Tours, along with Dzidzor Azaglo and Uta Poiger from the Reckonings Project, hosted “We Are Boston: A Jam Session for Culture & Memory Keepers”  at the Bruce Bolling Building in Roxbury. This networking workshop brought together about forty community historians, artists, storytellers, and collectors from across generations. Together we envisioned how honoring Boston’s rich community histories contributes to a more equitable future.

Dzidzor Azaglo started the evening by introducing a Sankofa practice. Sankofa is an ancient word in the Twi language of Ghana, meaning “to retrieve” (literally “go back and get”; san – to return; ko – to go; fa to fetch, to seek and take). In essence, if we are to move forward, we must reach back and seek what guides us. Sitting at round tables facilitated by Collin, Joel, and Reckonings students and staff, guests got to know one another by sharing their responses to “Who are you? And what connects you to Boston histories?” This activity is inspired by Mi’Jan Celie Tho-Biaz, an artist and archivist, who uses the Sankofa proverb as a grounding practice to ask “What is your Sankofa story?” The practice of Sankofa became the thread weaving  through conversations among participants, mapping and memory wall activities, and a panel discussion.

Mapping Activity, Memory Wall, Boston Books Look Table

During the mapping activity, guests discussed events, traditions, and places in Boston history that they want to see highlighted and then placed Post-its on a large map of Boston neighborhoods. On the memory wall, participants placed short notes about people they seek to remember and make more visible. And a long table with books about Boston served as another conversation starter.

How Can We All Contribute? –Panel

The evening concluded with a lively panel featuring Ebony Gill (Founder of Boston Urban Archive, Journalist & Storyteller), Ava Tiye Kinsey (Director of Education, Brooklyn Academy of Music & Playwright), and Lisa Simmons (Artistic/Executive Director, Roxbury International Film Festival). Together with the audience, they reflected on the complexity of Boston histories and encouraged everyone to think about the small ways in which we each can contribute to making and revising histories: by recording a grandmother while she is cooking, by talking to someone who has decided to leave Boston, or by preserving family photos and videos.  

The rich discussion featured multi-generational approaches to using creative mediums for community histories and sharing the responsibility of being a memory keeper.

Thank you to all the community members, panelists, professionals, and curious individuals who participated! The organizers are planning another workshop for the fall. 

The invitation to “go back and fetch It,” as the Sankofa proverb calls for, is one that we all must do together. It’s an invitation to remember the past as a way to move forward. 

You can check out the panel discussion here.

Reckonings Community Liaison Dzidzor Azaglo moderated a joint event with Twelfth Baptist and Unite Boston for the Sankofa Storytelling Showcase on Mar 26, 2026. As Unite Boston put it, “We were blessed by live storytelling from Mrs. Alma Wright, Rev. Charmayne Cooke, and Deacon Robin Nobles, along with moving poetry from Rose J. Percy and music by Jaronzie Harris and Minister Isaiah Biggs. Through story, song, and shared reflection, the evening beautifully bridged past and present—inviting us to listen deeply, honor the wisdom of these elders, and discern how we carry forward the work of truth, healing, and reconciliation in our city.”

Reckonings Artists-in-Residence Lani Asunción and Joanna Tam brought community members and students together for “Awakening the Dragon: Role Playing Guide,” an immersive experience that incorporated living history, archival exploration and interactive engagement. During the April 3 workshop, the audience heard from Veera Mahadomrongkul, who presented on the history of the  Ohana New England (ONE) Dragon Boat Club in Boston. Mahadomrongkul also introduced the Dragon Boat Museum, whose mission is to preserve the vibrant dragon boat history in New England. Attendees were able to experience the feeling of paddling on a dragon boat by sitting on a rowing machine attached to a paddle. Asunción and Tam curated an activity for participants to engage with dragon boating archives with designs by Chen Luo.

Stay tuned to see  Asunción and Tam’s work exhibited at Northeastern Gallery 360 this fall. Additionally, on August 1, Asunción and Tam will support the land portion of the “Beasts from the Easts Classic” race, hosted by ONE: the Fort Point Dragon Boat Festival will feature arts and cultural programming. Learn more about the August 1 event here.

On April 9 at Snell Library, four Wampanoag community leaders from Mashpee and Aquinnah held a highly educational exchange with the audience at a one-day workshop facilitated by Reckonings Faculty Affiliate, Distinguished Visiting Professor in Residence, and award-winning poet Gordon Henry. Panels of Henry’s students and scholars from Northeastern and the Boston area rounded out the day.

A full house listened enthusiastically to Godwin Louie’s and Jonathan Suazo’s bands at Boston Jazz Square Activation’s 2nd annual International Jazz Day Celebration on April 30 at Union Church. A place that 60 years ago featured Duke Ellington’s Sacred Concert now holds concerts that celebrate the past, present, and future of jazz in Boston. Audience members were invited to look at new posters on Boston Jazz Square history, including one on Duke Ellington’s 1966 Sacred Concert at Union, one on the long history of Estelle’s, and a third on LuLu White in the late 1970s.

Please save the date for the annual Charles River Jazz Festival on Aug 8, 2026.  The Reckonings Project will be hosting a storytelling tent along with a pop-up poster exhibit on Boston jazz venues and musicians. Please see the Boston Jazz Foundation website for more details.

Date: Thu May 28, 2026
Time: 5:30 – 8:30pm
Location: Institute of Contemporary Art

Honoring the legacy of the Cultural Café program series presented at the African American Master Artists-in-Residence Program (AAMARP), this evening, offered in conjunction with the “Say It Out Loud Exhibit” at the ICA, invites poets, storytellers, and singers to do what our elders always knew to do: speak the names, carry the songs, and return to the well of memory. Since 2002, the Cultural Café has served as an alternative independent cultural forum for film, music, poetry, and cultural exchange that addresses social issues of people of African descent and their relationships with other cultures. The goal of the Cultural Café is to strengthen broad social consciousness in greater Boston’s African Diaspora community around the experiences of African Americans and other African descendent groups.

Date: Wed June 24, 2026
Time: 3:00 – 4:30pm
Location: Virtual Workshop (Zoom)

Are you interviewing people in your neighborhood, family, or friends for a project? Have you thought about where and how the interviews will be presented online? Oral histories are living documents and they deserve platforms as intentional as the people who contributed to them. Whether you are working with stories for a neighborhood project, a family archive, or a larger research initiative, you will leave this workshop  with practical skills to bring your interviews online with care and purpose. Participants will discuss transcripts, audio and video formats, indexing an interview, and the kind of materials that might make an oral history more accessible and meaningful to the audience. This hands-on virtual workshop will present examples of curated oral histories using Omeka S, a free and open-source tool used by museums, libraries, and community organizations to publish and preserve digital collections. No prior experience with Omeka S or other tools is required.

Dates: Aug 1, 2026

Location: Fort Point Channel

Stay tuned for the Beasts From The East Dragon Boat Classic race, which will feature the Fort Point Cultural Festival, hosted by our artists-in-residence.

Date: Sat August 8, 2026
Location: Hatch Memorial Shell on the Charles Esplanade

Stay tuned for the annual Charles River Jazz Festival hosted by the Boston Jazz Foundation in collaboration with the Reckonings Project and other partners.