Who are
kinfolk?
kinfolk /ˈkɪnˌfoʊk/ (noun)
- Our blood relatives
- People, not necessarily related, with a shared experience who have developed a sense of kinship
- Our ancestors, including direct bloodline ancestors as well as the communities that gave rise to our current population
As an organization: Kinfolk is a company of close-knit visionaries. We want to put accessible technology in the hands of the people in order to inspire greater equity through visibility of the monumental figures who came before us — our Kinfolk.
As a concept: Kinfolk are you and me, and Kinfolk represent our shared history. Those who pioneered new ways of expression, learning, understanding, or achieving equal treatment are the real reason we are here today. And our Kinfolk should inspire the continuous pursuit of achieving, accomplishing, knowing, and understanding even more.
We Are
What We Do
Kinfolk creates self-guided and classroom-ready historical curriculums in the form of interactive digital media experiences. These experiences, combined with our events and community partnerships, bring attention to underrepresented historical contexts and grow awareness of inequity and injustice.
Not content to just release outstanding products, we set goals to activate public spaces with historical AR experiences that highlight the contributions and success of communities of color. Visibility, engagement, and invigoration within communities ensures that the ideas we put out into the world can take root and grow into an energetic movement.
Our hope is that the knowledge and experiences we share, and the activism they spur, will help to heal centuries of intentional neglect and oppression. To make an impact, we provide a platform to uplift those underserved by our society's selective and white supremacist historical narrative-building.
We authentically value our community. We root ourselves in the nature of our collaborations, look to empower diverse, inclusive storytelling and design innovative solutions.
Mission
Kinfolk’s mission is to harness emerging technologies to empower stories of Black, Brown, and Queer communities in public spaces through imagination and play.
Vision
An equitable future for all.
Approach
We aim to educate the next generation by writing Black and Brown narratives into American curricula, enhanced through the power of augmented reality. App-based learning using AR not only provides immersive experiences, but it also makes learning accessible and omnipresent. Our transformative experiences challenge inequitable distribution of historical attention, while empowering communities to collaborate.
We Value
ACCESS(ibility)
AUTHENTICITY
COMMUNITY
COLLABORATION
EMPOWERMENT
STORYTELLING
SOLUTIONS
Access is our guiding light for decision-making. We radically seek to improve accessibility to unheard stories, to technologies, to information, and to agency.
Accessibility Through Innovative Technologies Leads to Opportunity
When students use our products and learn about the underrepresented narratives we've selected, many are experiencing something they've never been exposed to before, inherently democratizing access.
Soon anyone with a smartphone will be able to bring our content into their homes. We prioritize underserved communities in our business and product decisions. We believe that the next Bill Gates could be a 12 year old Black girl who lives in public housing, but if she does not have early exposure to innovative tools/content it is not going to happen.
Building a Brighter Future Through
Better Understanding of the Past
Kinfolk's two flagship products exemplify our mission and our commitment to recontextualizing historical narratives and putting underrepresented stories into the hands of the people through accessible means.
Apps+Action = Us
We know better than to assume apps alone will change the world! Our apps are created within a pedagogical framework and as the focal point of a nationwide movement to activate the historian and the dreamer within all of us.
Our work demands collaboration: we collaborate with historical experts, teachers, pedagogical researchers, and those heavily involved in furthering racial justice within their communities. We also partner with museums, historical institutions, community networks, nonprofits and even branded organizations to get everyone involved and fulfill our purpose one project at a time.
Shared Purpose
We believe that a critical key towards achieving racial equity lies in the undoing of the centuries-long dehumanization process at the core of our country’s collective narratives.
To accomplish our goal, we engage with local community partners, targeting Schools, activist groups, museums, heritage sites, and artists who come from (or have historically supported) communities of color.
We are contributing to and, in part creating, a national social movement to uproot white supremacy at its core. We aim to do this by furthering initiatives that directly address inequity, injustice, and systemic racism.
Origin Story
In 2017, our founding members worked on a campaign to advocate for the removal of the statue of Christopher Columbus at Columbus Circle in New York City. To gain momentum for our cause, we began hosting teach-ins and performance art demonstrations. After becoming frustrated with the intractability of those who continue to hold the line of Euro-centered historical dogma, we committed to making the changes we wanted become reality through technology.
We've Come So Far But Have a Long Way to Go
Since 2017, Kinfolk has lived powerfully at the intersection of technology, activism, social justice, advocacy, and education. Through the commitment of a talented team of its founding staff, the organization has been nimble and responsive to the social and political climate resulting from the global pandemic and racial reckoning. Kinfolk has successfully secured partnerships that have been instrumental in developing innovative products, the Unsung and Kinfolk apps, and moving its work forward.
With this success, Kinfolk has also moved into a unique position that’s reflective of the natural intersection of its work. The organization possesses start-up characteristics of both a tech company and a nonprofit organization. This equates to rapid scaffolding of infrastructure, and developing programs and activities, while also envisioning and building future innovation.
We Believe In Our Power To Work Together
Our team is always growing and forging exciting new partnerships with talented individuals.
Collectively, we can be proud of our identifying traits:
- Visionary, dynamic leadership and team
- Strong and innovative storytelling capacity (internal and external)
- Connections and relationships with a network of funders, partners, technologists, artists, ect.
- Intersection of activism, education, and technology and vision for impact on equity, justice, and social change.
- Flexible, nimble, and responsive to changing technologies and landscapes
Join Our
Movement
The importance of our work means it must be able to grow beyond our own boundaries. We want to see our visions and purpose come to life through engagement with our products as well as partnerships in communities and behind-the-scenes.
There's Lots of Ways to Help Our Cause:
- Contribute historical content for the Kinfolk app
- Donate to our 501(c) organization
- Partner with us for an event, project, or initiative
- Become an investor
Kinfolk Is You. Kinfolk Is Me. Kinfolk Is Us. And Kinfolk Are the People Who Brought Us Here.
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