The 2014 death of unarmed Black teenager Michael Brown by a police officer in Ferguson, MO ignited an uprising that inspired global protests against anti-Black state and structural violence. St. Louis “artivists” (artist/activists) were vital in birthing a 21st century black liberation movement, as their work in the streets and studios created and archived meanings of Black death, defiance, and enduring life and joy. Seven years after Brown’s death and after the 2020 summer of Black death – Covid-19 and police killings of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery and others – this roundtable brings together activist and academic contributors to the AE Forum, “@Ferguson: Still Here in the Afterlives of Black Death, Defiance, and Joy.”

Inspired by activists’ collaborative and bold practices during the uprising, @Ferguson challenges conventional academic journal and writing practices by engaging in a coproduction process that weaves together a multi-authored collage of essays, artworks, photographs, personal narratives, and poetry. This roundtable continues @Ferguson’s political, ethical and aesthetic provocation and echoes the longstanding call to decolonize anthropology. We ask how anthropology can forge enduring and equitable partnerships to contribute to abolition and antiracist movements in communities we call home. What is the ethical duty and what violences do we commit when our research is focused on Black death, brutality and grieving? What can we learn from activists’ practices of archiving life? This roundtable aims not to offer conclusions but to ask how anthropology can avoid perpetuating epistemic violence and challenge anthropology’s attachments to “disciplined” white practices.