Weeksville Heritage Center in Crown Heights is showing a documentary about two moments in 1960s Montreal that drew Black students and activists from across the Caribbean, Canada and the United States. Weeksville Watch Night: True North is on Thursday, November 12, from 6 to 9 p.m. at 158 Buffalo Avenue. Admission is free, with an RSVP on the center's site.

The film

True North is directed by Michèle Stephenson. It looks at two events of the 1960s that get little attention today, the Congress of Black Writers and the Sir George Williams Affair, in which Black students and activists in Montreal challenged institutional racism. The film argues that the two events made Montreal a meeting point for the global Black liberation movement, and it tells the story through archival footage that has not been shown before and through the people who were there.

The evening closes with a conversation with Stephenson after the screening.

About Watch Night

Weeksville Watch Night is the center's ongoing series of films and conversations. Each evening brings together filmmakers, artists, historians and neighbors around a film on Black history, political struggle and cultural memory, followed by a discussion.

Weeksville Heritage Center is a historic site and cultural center in Central Brooklyn devoted to the history of Weeksville, the 19th-century Black community that grew up in what is now Crown Heights. Its campus includes the Hunterfly Road Houses, which are open for tours.

Also at Weeksville this month

  • Before It's Gone: Archive to Survive, a free book launch and panel on preserving the history of Black and Brown Brooklyn, is today, Saturday, November 7, from 3 to 6 p.m.
  • Sip, Tour and Connect, an open house for K-12 teachers and school administrators with a tour, wine and light bites, is on Wednesday, November 18, from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m.

Visiting

Weeksville Heritage Center is at 158 Buffalo Avenue in Crown Heights. Its regular hours are Tuesday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Saturday from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.; it is closed Sunday and Monday. The A and C trains stop at Utica Avenue, and the 3 and 4 stop at Crown Heights–Utica Avenue, each a walk of several blocks. The center can be reached at 718-756-5250.

The screening of True North is free, but space is limited, so RSVP on the event page before Thursday.

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