Welcome to the Born in Flames Living Archive
WE ARE SO GRATEFUL
YOU ARE HERE
This living archive was launched in the immediate aftermath of a 2012 arson attack on the headquarters of Women With A Vision (WWAV) in New Orleans. The arsonists who firebombed WWAV intended to destroy us. But we know that fire can also be a powerful force for rebirth.
So we began collecting every life-giving ember we could find, starting with the handfuls of photographs, posters, and documents that had not gone up in flames, and then extending to our research as survival to record our presence with one another and with our communities in new ways.
This site aims to preserve WWAV’s 35-plus years of radical, Southern, Black feminist world-making in hopes of igniting dreams anew. And we want to do that with you.
We want to start by inviting you to take a seat with us on the front porch. This is where so much of our work has taken place, and we want you to be grounded with us in the spaces our people call home before you start to explore our stories.
ABOUT WOMEN
WITH A VISION
WWAV was founded in 1989 by a collective of Black women in response to the devastating impact of HIV/AIDS in Black communities. Today, WWAV provides grassroots-level support and advocacy at the intersections of gender, racial, and reproductive justice. Widely regarded as the leading national voice fighting the criminalization of Black women and girls in the South, WWAV programs touch on human rights, sex workers’ rights, reproductive justice, voting rights, and ending criminalization.
Take a moment to imagine yourself seated alongside us on the porch.
Listen to some of the visionaries, past and present, who have made our work possible.
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RELATIONSHIPS
Explore how we analyze racial capitalism and continue to create more livable futures.
See how we have leveraged our theory to push back against racial capitalism and build power.
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Learn more about the Black feminist scholars, activists, artists, and healers whose fire dreams we carry forward ever.
AcknowledgementsThe labor of building the Born in Flames Living Archive has been undertaken collectively, just like everything we do at WWAV. We are grateful to our executive director, Deon Haywood; our longtime board member and researcher, Laura McTighe; and our communications director, Camille Roane –– who together led the process of making the vision for this site reality. We also want to thank the team at Red Cypress, especially illustrator and designer Gabi Hawkins, who brought that vision into digital space, building the infrastructure to care for our stories and all they hold. The Born in Flames Living Archive is among the many offerings we have made through the “The Callie House Project,” which was launched in 2022 through a generous grant from the Henry Luce Foundation. Their support made it possible for us to document these untold histories of southern Black women’s reproductive justice and harm reduction organizing. It is our sincerest hope that this living archive will help grow our movements for Black feminist liberation and inspire us all to work together to build the world that must be.