¡Despierta Boricua! In The Archives
Puerto Rican History and Activism at Yale University
A one-day hybrid symposium held on the Yale campus and streamed online to celebrate the completion of the first stage of the Despierta Boricua, a 50 year old student organization at Yale, archival and oral history project with Sterling Memorial Library.
The goal of the Despierta Boricua in the Archives is many-fold: to document the history of one of the earliest Latinx Student organizations on a U.S. university campus; to centralize documents that would be accessible for research by scholars and community members; to raise the visibility of Puerto Ricans both at Yale and in New Haven, a prominent migration hub for this population; to activate networks of Despierta Boricua members, current and past; and to raise awareness of the achievements and ongoing challenges of Puerto Rican/Latinx students in elite institutions.
Scope
Logo | Identity System | Event Branding | Motion Graphics
Logo and Branding Strategy
During the discovery phase, our team explored the juxtaposition of Puerto Rican students researching their radical histories within the confines of Yale's gothic architectural landscape. From this emerged a visual lexicon of iconographic forms of gothic pathways and windows, suggesting a historical "framing" by which we can look into the past and present. Yet at the center of the branding is the symbolic draping of the Puerto Rican flag over Sterling Memorial Library - a nod to the Puerto Rican nationalists who placed the flag across Lady Liberty’s crown in 1977.
The red orange and sky blue colors where intended to reflect the Puerto Rican flag colors, with subtle changes. The typeface Grotta was selected for its strong geometric accents and sharp contrasts in its form, a rather unconventional typeface in the world of academia, again reinforcing juxtaposition.
¡Despierta Boricua!, a chant for Puerto Rican liberation, one that echoes through the gothic hallways of yesteryear and into the present. Juxtaposition creates new perspectives and intellectual knowledge that can help shift the dominant paradigm towards one that elevates the Puerto Rican experience at Yale to (re)affirm this rich history.
