Jack Godwin presents Struggles for Black Community (A Town Under Siege + From When You Were Black, You Were Out)

Jack Godwin presents Struggles for Black Community (1982) dir. Colin Prescod 76"

"These films were chosen from Prescod’s four-film Struggles of Black Community collection due to how they centre national conversations about racism on the London area. People of various backgrounds can discover the community work that created the city we live in today, and how prior to the internet age there were a wide range of community activists that sought to fight back against oppression, some of whom we may have forgotten. These films both highlight the generational differences between activists of this era, with a variety of compelling narratives revealing the tactics used by Black and immigrant communities to resist physical and political violence. Through a series of interviews taking place at the sites of these conflicts, the film highlights the stories and lessons that could otherwise be lost and forgotten. Seeing them again today, we can see not only where we came from, but look to the present and future with these events as a guide.Struggles for Black Community, made for Channel 4 at the beginning of the 1980s, chart the milestones in Black people’s fight for justice – ‘race riots’ in Cardiff in post-war 1919, Notting Hill in 1958, Powell and the numbers game, the strike at Imperial Typewriters, the death of anti-fascist Blair Peach. They reveal, in these histories ‘from below’, how unities across communities were forged so that Black became a political colour, not the colour of one’s skin, how racism has changed over time and how state institutions have been forced to move in response to Black challenges."

Screenings include:
-From You Were Black You Were Out: A film on Ladbroke Grove
-A Town Under Siege: A Film on Southall

This event is part of wider programme of activity animating the Views on the Atlantic project in collaboration with LFA and supported by Lambeth Council and Brixton BID.