Throughout October, we want to bring awareness to important Black figures. By highlighting the challenges that the Black community has endured, we hope to help understand and support the modern community that continues to thrive today.

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Louisa Adjoa Parker believes that the arts are a powerful tool for personal and societal change. She is a writer who lives in the Southwest of England that has English-Ghanaian heritage.  

Louisa has written extensively on ethnically diverse history and set up the ‘Where are you really from?’ project.  

This project gathered stories through participants’ written submissions, online storytelling and sharing sessions. The project was completed in 2020, and can be viewed online at: https://www.whereareyoureallyfrom.co.uk/  

Her work explores themes such as rural racism, identity, home, place, gender, motherhood, grief, violence, Black history, mental health, and marginalisation. 

You can read some of her work below and on her website: https://www.louisaadjoaparker.com/  

“Land, Real and Imagined 

Yes, I am from here, really,  
but also from there. My feet  
connect me to this piece of earth  
which rolls away in green waves,  

this piece of earth inhabited  
by people who do not look like me.  
This is how I wear my skin:  
it tells the story of another place; 

an imagined country  
with dusty roads, hot nights,  
which I have yet to see.  
We all lean into the dark  

towards our ancestors, who lean  
towards us, with bent spines,  
trying to tell us where we are from,  
where we are going.” 

To see more Black History Month profiles, news, resources and events, visit the SU Black History Month hub. 

www.thesu.org.uk/blackhistorymonth