Women as the caring cornerstone of the community are in focus for many of the events and activities during the 28th edition of Black History Month in Montreal.
Art and activism will come together in engaging ways as 150 cultural and social events take place in February across the city.
Among them, there will be a commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the Sir George William University protests, one of the seminal moments of black history, not only in Montreal but in all of Canada.
In 1969, West Indian students protested racial mistreatment by their professor, taking over the computer lab on the 9th floor of what is now Concordia's Hall building.
Those pivotal days will be revisited on stage.
“By students, by teachers that wanted to commemorate what happened at Concordia, what happened with the Congress of Black Writers. Those are key moments of our contemporary Quebec history and are never taught in school and changed the course of our life,” said Black History Month coordinator Claire-Anse St-Eloi.
“We don't want to talk about it in confrontation,” added Black History Month coordinator Carla Beauvais. “We just want to expose what happened and how we can learn from those events that occurred and how we can make a difference in 2019 because there’s still stuff going that we can learn from.”
Black History Month begins Feb. 1 with a gala at city hall.
