Sorrow as Artifact: Radical Black Mothering in Times of Terror-A Prologue

To think of sorrow as artifact is to consider the way that sorrow, as grief, as mourning, as longing, as suffering—is the residue, that is, the trace left behind in the wake of tragedy. As anthropologists, we typically think of artifacts as those cultural relics that we investigate from the past or present. They are things that people leave behind that leave clues as to who we are and what life means to us. Thus, to think of sorrow as artifact within the context of a discussion of Black mothering is to consider sorrow as something more than just an emotion of sentience; it is the aftermath of our social moment. Sorrow as artifact thus provides clues into what it means to mother as Black women in times of terror.