Black Public Media Fights Back, Acquires New Film

Black Public Media (BPM), the Harlem-based national media arts nonprofit, is doubling down on its mission to fund and support stories about the Black experience despite recent funding challenges. BPM has acquired We Call Each Other, the debut short film byChicago director Sarah Oberholtzer,for its AfroPoP Digital Shorts series. The film, which has been released on Black Public Media’s YouTube channel ahead of Kwanzaa, brings to life the Kwanzaa principle of Ujima (Collective Work and Responsibility), observed on December 28. 

We Call Each Other is an emotionally rich drama of a fictional community facing drought and environmental racism. Against the backdrop of long-standing environmental racism and chronic drought, the film’s protagonist Naullin faces a personal dilemma when someone steals the liquid fertilizer he uses to tend his at-home garden. The short film, which weaves nonfiction recorded audio into a scripted story, features residents who lean on one another to create safety and redemption far outside the criminal justice system.

The December/January episode of AfroPoP Digital Shorts comes to streaming as BPM deepens and expands its long-standing efforts to ensure that Black stories like We Call Each Other remain available on public media despite Congress snatching back $1.8 million it had allocated earlier this year. The funding was rescinded when the Corporation for Public Broadcasting was gutted by the federal government. In response, BPM launched the Black Stories Production Fund, supported by an unprecedented grassroots fundraising campaign to raise $9 million over the next two years — ensuring that Black stories are never again subject to political interference or chronic underinvestment.

“For more than 45 years, Black Public Media has helped bring important stories like Sarah’s to audiences nationwide — stories rooted in community and responsive to the issues shaping our lives,” said Leslie Fields-Cruz, executive director of BPM. “Public media is stronger when Black story tellers and the full breadth of Black experience are centered in the conversation.”

We Call Each Other grew out of four years of community organizing work by Oberholtzer (they/them), an advocate for divestment from policing and militarization in favor of people-centered infrastructure. Their stand-alone film is a part of an anthology-format short film series imagining community outside of carceral strategies for public safety.

The film is directed, written and produced by Oberholtzer; Johnaé Strong is producer. Executive producers are Aymar Jean Christian and Kristiana Rae Còlon.

Watch We Call Each Other on Black Public Media’s YouTube channel.

Donate to the BPM’s Black Stories Production Fund this Giving Season at: https://secure.everyaction.com/IkFxVSdjX0qpQkceW1r27g2. For more information about BPM, visit blackpublicmedia.org or follow it on social media at: @blackpublicmedia (IG, FB, TikTok and LinkedIn).