Mural Assignment

I am currently a senior at Saint Joseph’s University taking a civic media course. Through out the semester, we have been talking about different kinds of civic media, one such example is murals. The real question to answer first is, what is civic media? Civic media has many different definitions. It can be defined as “any media that makes citizens and government responsive and accountable to each other in shaping the future of any community.” My favorite definition as defined by MIT is, “any form of communication that strengthens the social bonds within a community or creates a strong sense of civic engagements among its residents. Civic media goes beyond news gathering and reporting.” As I mentioned before, murals are a great example of civic media. Our class took a trip into the city of Philadelphia and explored the different types of murals present in the city and how they exemplify the definition of civic media. In total, we took a look at 10 different murals in the city but I want to talk about the 4 that stuck out to me the most and that I felt exemplified civic media.

This is a photo of one of the murals we took a look at. This mural is entitled “FACT” (Fathers and Children Together) and is located at 55th and Woodland in Philadelphia. This mural is on a wall in a generally African American populated community. This mural is addressing the issue of the mass incarceration of black males and taking them away from their children. When this happens, it sets the children up for failure and to possibly follow in their fathers foot steps because they grow up without a father figure in their lives. This mural helps these fathers reconnect with their children and to help their kids choose a better life, to go to school and not to end up like they did. This mural was put together by the City of Philadelphia Mural Arts Program the United Community Action Network and the F.A.C.T. program created this mural. I feel this mural fits the definition of civic media because it brings the residents of the community together over a common problem and helps them to find a solution. This mural truly strengthens the social bonds of the community.

The picture above as well as the 2 pictures to the left were taken from the second mural that we visited. This mural is entitled “AIDS Southwest” and is located 1403 South 54th. This mural is also located in a predominately African American area and is aimed to bring attention the AIDS epidemic. There is a big problem with AIDS as everyone knows but this mural focuses on keeping AIDS being passed on to children from birth. I think this mural really captivates the meaning civic media because it brings community together to solve a common goal of stopping the transmission of the AIDS virus.

These murals show a pregnant woman embracing a man and in another picture what seems to be a woman holding a child who looks sick from the virus. They show the pain that families go through when dealing with this tragedy.

This mural is entitled “Building Brotherhood” and it is located on 40th and Chestnut. This mural was a year long project created by the city of Philadelphia Mural Arts Program and the Department of Behavioral Health and Intellectual Disability Services. This mural was created to inspire black males to form a bond and build relationships with other black males to help cope and overcome the hardships their race have faced in society. This is a great example of civic media because it was created on the side of a building and it bring together the community to help the minority rise up together. To create a brotherhood amongst the community is the main goal. This was one of my personal favorites on the tour just because of the size and message displayed by the image.

This final mural is entitled “Our City, Our Vets” and it is located on 42nd and Woodland. This mural was created by service providers and members of the community to bring returned veterans into a place where they feel comfortable to form relationships with people of the community and talk about their experiences. This mural was created on a wall where many people can see this in the community. In fact it was created on 2 walls 1 wall representing the returned soldiers and the other the soldiers still in Iraq. It portrays 2 different worlds. This mural really represents the meaning of civic media because it brings the community together to help the troops that are fighting for our freedom. It gives them a safe haven to open up and talk about their experiences and how it has affected them.

After visiting all of these murals in the city of Philadelphia, I really got a better grasp of what civic media is and how these murals are examples of different kinds of civic media.