Project Personnel
A Black People’s History of Canada Project is backed by a team of senior scholars and graduate students in the field of African Canadian history, led by principal investigator Dr. Afua Cooper, award-winning historian and author.
Dr. Afua Cooper is a multidisciplinary scholar, historian, author, and artist. Her 13 books range across such genres as history, poetry, fiction, and children’s literature. Her indomitable research on slavery, and Black history has made her one of the leading figures in African Canadian studies, and the authority on Canadian slavery. Her book on Canadian slavery, The Hanging of Angelique: The Untold Story of Slavery in Canada and the Burning of Old Montreal broke new ground in the study of Canadian and Atlantic slavery. Her latest book is The Halifax Explosion.
Dr. Cooper led the “Universities Studying Slavery” initiative at Dalhousie University and was the lead author of the subsequent report Lord Dalhousie’s History on Slavery and Race. These initiatives revealed the connections between the Canadian academy and the Atlantic slaving systems. Furthermore, she has curated and co-curated nine exhibits on slavery, and Black history. Most recently, she was the guest curator for the first national exhibit on slavery, A History Exposed: The Enslavement of Black People in Canada for the National Museum of Immigration at Pier 21. Prof. Cooper was appointed in 2021 as the Canadian representative for UNESCO’s International Scientific Committee Routes of Enslaved Peoples Project, whose main objectives is to mobilize research on the Transatlantic slavery system and its legacies. A celebrated poet, in 2020 Dr. Cooper was Awarded the Portia White Prize, Nova Scotia’s highest recognition for the arts. She is also the winner of the J.M. Abraham Atlantic Poetry Award for her poetry book Black Matters.
Afua Cooper holds an appointment as professor of Black Feminist History in the Department of Historical and Cultural Studies, University of Toronto at Scarborough, and the Faculty of Graduate Studies, St. George Campus. She taught for 13 years in Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences at Dalhousie University, where she held a Killam Research Chair (2021-2024), and the James R. Johnston Chair in Black Canadian Studies (2011-2017).
As a result of her scholarship and praxis, Dr. Cooper was awarded a one-million-dollar grant from the Department of Canadian Heritage to direct the A Black People’s History of Canada project. She is also the founder of the Black Canadian Studies Association, an organization which she chaired for ten years, and the Dalhousie Black Faculty and Staff Caucus.
Afua Cooper earned her Ph.D., in history from the University of Toronto. Her fields of study included African history, Black Women’s history, Islam in Africa, Caribbean history, Canadian and North American history, Slavery and Abolition, Black education, the Black Press, and the African Diaspora.
Adrienne Shadd is a consultant, curator, and author who has conducted research for plaques, films, and exhibits, including ‘I’ll Use My Freedom Well,’ an exhibit at Uncle Tom’s Cabin and Black Mecca: The Story of Chatham’s Black Community. Most recently she has collaborated on the Black heritage of ‘The Ward’ neighbourhood for installation at the new Ontario Courthouse just north of Osgoode Hall, Toronto. She is the author, co-author and editor of several books and articles, including The Journey from Tollgate to Parkway: African Canadians in Hamilton (2010), The Underground Railroad: Next Stop, Toronto! (2002, 2022) with Drs. Afua Cooper and Karolyn Smardz Frost; “We’re Rooted Here and They Can’t Pull Us Up”: Essays in African Canadian Women’s History (1994) and Talking About Identity: Encounters in Race, Ethnicity and Language (2001), with Dr. Carl James. She has also collaborated on the award-winning children’s publication, Freedom (2014), and Early Civilizations of Africa (2015), both part of the Sankofa Heritage Collection, with Rubicon Publishing. Adrienne has been recognized with the William P. Hubbard Award for Race Relations and the J.C. Holland Award for Arts Achievement for her research and writing. She is currently working on a book on Toronto settler and freedom seeker, Deborah Brown.
Interested in Black history and the eradication of anti-Black racism from an early age, Channon Oyeniran’s keen interest and passion in these areas helped her realize that she must do all she can to educate others and raise awareness of the rich history of Black people. She is an honours graduate, with a bachelor’s degree in history and Caribbean studies from the University of Toronto, a master’s degree in slavery studies from the University of Hull, UK, a certificate in adult education from George Brown College, and she is currently undertaking her PhD at Queen’s University. Channon is the founder of Oyeniran Education Support (OyES), an educational organization that helps individuals and institutions align with their intrinsic value and gifts, and nurtures them to greatness. She uses the OyES platform to teach people about the Black experience and Black history in Canada and internationally. Channon Oyeniran was born in Scarborough, Ontario, but is a long-time resident of the Durham region. She currently resides in Pickering with her husband and two sons.
Justin Loma
Manitoba Black History Coordinator
Justin Loma’s professional background is in architecture and planning. He is currently pursuing a Doctor of Design program at the University of Calgary, Faculty of Architecture, Planning and Landscape. His interest is in ancient technologies that have potential applications for mitigating floods and droughts.
His work for the BPHC, though brief, focuses on searching the prairie archives and libraries and learning from oral history the innovative spirit and contribution of the people of African origin to Manitoba, Canada and the world at large.
The people whose spirits and innovations to community building stand tall against the odds of time from the 1700s to the current. He is interested in learning about the various innovative contributions of black people to Canadian society and how black people innovated communities and built their own spaces to thrive in. Despite the hurdles they faced and continue to face from the past and present forces of slavery, colonialism, settler colonialism, racism, discrimination and segregation.
