Who We Are
Archives as Muse: a Harlem Storytelling Project was initiated by the CCNY MFA Program in Creative Writing located in Harlem. In 2019 we received a grant from the LUCE Foundation to fund our project that mobilizes compilists – creative writers and storytellers to inform public discourse. While we dig for treasures, uncover facts and histories, the archives serve as inspiration for our own stories. As an MFA Program dedicated to inclusion, excellence, and diversity, we recognize that contemporary writers of all genres engage the archives to research, challenge, and inform their work.
What we do
This project reflects CCNY’s commitment to connect with, serve, understand, and celebrate the Harlem community while enhancing the community’s own tools for memory, research, and creativity.
The CCNY MFA Program of Creative Writing recognizes that we are located at the site of the Harlem Renaissance, the literary, social, and cultural explosion of creative and intellectual work by Black artists, poets, novelists, philosophers, activists, and musicians in the 1920s. We want to dive into that rich literary history and acknowledge our link to this history. We also want to recognize the original peoples who lived in Manhatta (Manhattan) the home of the Lenape tribe.
Our hope is that this website serves as a portal regardless of where you are in your storytelling journey. Whether or not you are a writer, researcher, student or resident of Harlem, the archives belong to you, the community. It is our belief that everyone should have equal access.
How We Do It
We do it through a series of graduate and undergrad archival classes. Our program will train students to:
- collect stories from its Harlem neighbors and local archives and community organizations
- work with librarians and archivists to study and archive these materials; and
- share findings—via gallery exhibits, digital programs, and symposia–with CCNY students and faculty, scholars from around the country and all over the world, and local residents of the Harlem community.
We created a three-year project that will include symposia, interviews, online workshops, and exhibits as well as a resource section that will include links to public archives. We hope to explore Harlem stories and neighborhoods and the dimensions of their changing histories, cultures, and demographics. In doing so we are collaborating with:
We are also collaborating with brilliant archivists, librarians, professors, writers, and artists who are dedicated to bringing the archives alive. In particular, we are indebted to conversations and meetings with the following individuals about archives, access, and the Harlem community: Mary Yearwood, former Director of Collections and Information, Schomburg Center, Cheryl Beredo, Curator, Schomburg Center, Emily Raboteau, Katz Professor in the Humanities and Arts, CCNY, Retha Powell, Associate Director, Publishing Program, CCNY, Gordon Thompson, Professor, English, CCNY, Cheryl Sterling, Professor and Director of Black Studies, Penn State University, Jodi Ann Francis, Associate Director of Black Studies, CCNY and Herb Boyd, Journalist and Professor. Other individuals who contributed are listed below as Contributors. Without their wisdom and recommendations, we would not have gotten this far.
Meet our team
Michelle Valladares
Project Director
Lecturer & Director of MFA in Creative Writing
Elizabeth Mazzola
Professor of English and Department Chair
Sydney Valerio
Project Manager
Contributors
Nelly Rosario
Professor
Lewis Watts
Professor
Mikhal Dekel
Professor
William Gibbons
Professor
Vanessa K. Valdés
Director of the Black Studies Program at The City College of New York
Herb Boyd
Author, Journalist, Professor
Gordon Thompson
Professor
Emily Raboteau
Professor
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Professor Gordon Thompson has a laudable career spanning nearly 24 years of teaching and service at City College, Louisiana State University, and Stanford University. As director of the Black Studies Program, he had a record of administrative leadership, including planning, budgeting for and managing an academic program. As creator, principal investigator, and director of the RAP-SI project of the Black Male Initiative, he demonstrated the ability to successfully organize a staff and build a service-oriented mentoring program. As director of the Langston Hughes Festival Committee, he has been in continuous service to the Committee since 1990. As professor of African American and American literature in the English Department he has demonstrated a strong publication record with scholarly expertise in the area of the African American narrative praxis. Lastly, as a scholar, he has several peer-reviewed publications, is a frequent participant at national and international conferences and is the editor/co-editor of several books.
Emily Raboteau
Dr. Vanessa K. Valdés is the director of the Black Studies Program at The City College of New York-CUNY. A graduate of Yale and Vanderbi
Sydney Valerio believes we are all a living archive of the stories and places our bodies navigate. As a creative, she is fueled by her professional work as an educator and community cultural worker to create spaces and experiences for all parts of the community to engage with and access. 
