As COVID-19 and seasonal flu activity is on the rise, Black Public Media (BPM) is set to release two projects it commissioned targeting vaccine hesitancy in Michigan and North Carolina. The short film A Little Off the Top: Vaxxed Up by William D. Caballero and the three-episode Spanish language podcast Me Vacuno Porque… (I got vaccinated because…) by Antonio Alanis will premiere Monday on the Black Public Media (BPM) YouTube channel, www.youtube.com/@BlackPublicMedia. BPM media is a national media arts nonprofit dedicated to creating and producing media content about the Black experience.
The Fayetteville, North Carolina-raised Caballero, now a Los Angeles resident, created a hip hop-infused animated digital short — part narrative, part documentary — about a group of Black and Latino barbers offering words of encouragement to a vaccine-skeptical teenage client; A Little Off the Top: Vaxxed Up is the second webisode in a series, which is also funded by Black Public Media.
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Alanis, a Mexican-American artist from Durham, North Carolina, directed a visual podcast series featuring Hispanic/Latinx community members and leaders from across the state discussing myths as well as true information about vaccines and offering solutions on how to increase vaccination rates in North Carolina’s Spanish-speaking Latinx community.
The film Well by Michigan-based filmmakers Toni Cunningham and Eden Sadolboro of Reel Clever Films LLC premieres on the BPM YouTube channel in early 2024. The project depicts one Black family’s fight to remain healthy through a half century of crises in America, including the Tuskegee experiment, Flint water crisis and COVID-19.
The creatives were awarded a total of more than $160,000 in funding after participating in BPM’s Black Media Story Summit – Michigan and North Carolina in March. BPM story summits bring together creatives, film and television industry executives, thought leaders, community stakeholders, and others to explore innovative approaches to media story development on critical issues facing Black people in America. Past summits have covered such issues as mass incarceration, environmental justice, health and immigration.
This year’s summit grew out of the three-year partnership (begun in the fall of 2021) between BPM and the National Network to Innovate for COVID-19 and Adult Vaccine Equity (NNICE). NNICE, which is funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) as part of the National Partnering for Vaccine Equity Initiative, engaged BPM through its grantee, Michigan State University, to host virtual Black Media Story Summits on vaccine equity and to award production grants to media makers with the most compelling production proposals.
“These artists have created some compelling and informative work for their communities that I hope will support the local community health professionals in their mission to get more Black and brown people vaccinated,” said Qiona Woffard, BPM special programs manager.
“Black Public Media is a true leader in elevating Black and Latino stories and voices that highlight systemic challenges and disparities. We are so pleased to have them as a partner in our work to improve COVID-19 vaccine equity,” said Dr. Heatherlun Uphold, assistant professor, Charles Stewart Mott Department of Public Health, Michigan State University.
For more information on Black Public Media, visit blackpublicmedia.org, and follow the organization on social media at @blackpublicmedia on Instagram and Facebook and @BLKPublicMedia on Twitter.
