Documenting the lives of Black Americans in the age of COVID
Tracie Jones turned to a librarian friend, Sarah DeMott, for help documenting the experience of Black Americans in the age of COVID-19. A few Zoom sessions and emails later, Jones and DeMott created Black America and COVID-19, a library guide that aims to serve as a historical record and shed light on the pandemic’s impact on African Americans, who are twice as likely to die from the disease than whites, according to the COVID Tracking Project. “In 10 or 15 years from now, researchers and the general public can look at the guide and learn from scholarly and non-scholarly pieces what it was like to be a Black person in the time of COVID-19,” said Jones, the director of diversity, inclusion, and belonging at the Graduate School of Education. “It’s an important record. The racial disparities of COVID-19 are something we need to talk about as a larger community.” The guide began taking...