Social Justice Fund: The Black Unicorn Library and Archive Project

The Social Justice Fund awarded $25,000 to The Black Unicorn Library and Archive Project in 2021. The organization was created because there are not enough spaces to celebrate beauty, seek refuge from the world’s brutality and educate. 

The Black Unicorn Library and Archive Project is a Black, queer, feminist-led and serving community library and archive that centers the lived experiences of BIPOC communities, including trans and gender nonconforming people. Black Unicorn Project takes a narrative justice approach to its work at the intersection of literacy and liberation. It honors the influence of storytelling and the application of Black literature on present day calls for systemic reform. The Black Unicorn Project believes that nurturing the love of reading is resistance against a racist legacy of forbidding Black communities from becoming literate, and that reading paves the way for Black people to create new worlds and ways of being that center on joy in place of brutality. Black Unicorn Library plans to discover and reveal Pittsburgh’s Black LGBTQ history through different collaborations and programming. 

The Social Justice Fund focuses on providing support for organizations engaged in advocacy, mobilization and healing work. Since its launch in 2018, SJF has awarded many organizations with necessary funding.