Black Lives, Black Words International Project

Initiated by Nationally Award Winning Playwright Reginald Edmund is comprised of ten minute staged readings from black playwrights speaking to their local communities to explore the black diaspora experience(s) in some of the largest multicultural cities in the world, Chicago, Minneapolis, Boston, Cleveland, Washington DC, Baltimore, London, and more. These cities have had countless reports in the media, all negative, from police brutality to black on black violence but what are the views and other issues most prevalent to those who understand, live and work in the community? Inspired by #blacklivesmatter, this project will give a voice to some of the most contemporary political black writers from both the US and the UK, asking them to explore the question 'Do black lives matter today?' Each will write a ten to fifteen minute play to address the political, economical and cultural as well as the social and academic issues related to the black experiences of the 21st century. This project will serve as a comparative study to raise awareness of the shared and different transatlantic experiences in the black community and evaluate the impact it has had on the black community at large. We are interested in plays that will not only discuss these important issues but also seek to provide solutions to the many problems that our community is struggling with.

http://www.blacklivesblackwords.org/