Rosa E. Ficek

Collective Care is a participatory collecting and storytelling project that explores how communities respond to current and recent disasters in Puerto Rico as agents who shape their own history. The project brings together researchers, students, community members, and community-based organizations to record oral histories and develop collections at the University of Puerto Rico at Cayey, the National Museum of American History and in community spaces. The next phase of Collective Care focuses on expanding public engagement with the collections through storytelling projects in the form of a podcast, public art, and data visualizations that encourage audiences to consider climate change through local histories of autonomous organizing. We highlight the experiences of communities in central and northeastern Puerto Rico, as well as the diaspora, in collaboration with local partners the Clínica Legal Psicológica and Ciencia Puerto Rico.