Black Solidarity Day 1990

Brooklyn, New York: 1990. Offset printed flyer. 8 ½ x 11 in. Very good condition, creased at corners. Item #5863

Flyer for 1990 Black Solidarity Day celebration with performances by X Clan, Isis, Queen Mother Rage, and YZ, at the Boys and Girls High School in Brooklyn. The performers were all members of the Blackwatch Movement, a Black Nationalist hip hop collective. The flyer passionately calls for “One struggle, one people, BOYCOTT!”

The first Black Solidarity Day was held on November 3, 1969, one day before Election Day, fueled by the Black Power Movement and post-Civil Rights era struggles. The day is for African Diasporac people to exercise a moratorium on shopping, spending money or other commercial activities, working, and going to school; instead gathering in community celebrations. The holiday unified New York City diasporic communities, while also drawing attention to the great inequality that African Americans face, despite gains made by the Civil Rights Movement. The original organizers of the holiday were inspired by Douglas Turner Ward’s off-Broadway satirical play “Day of Absence”, which imagines what would happen if African Americans suddenly disappeared from a Southern town, leaving white townspeople to confront the reality of a world without Black people. Day of Absence was famously performed by Black actors in whiteface.

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