Stay on Your Square

In East Durham during 2009–10, Jerome “Unc” Nelson and the original Square One students turn Room 3:19 into a Community Listening project. With a blue binder, borrowed equipment and neighbors willing to share, they learn that holding a microphone does not mean owning another person’s story.

Friendship, family, music and cultural memory shape a project whose trust must be earned more than once. As the students approach their departure in 2011, the work of consent, translation, returning copies and repairing mistakes leaves an unfinished archive for the generation that follows.