When you’re planning a vacation for your family, you want to give them more than just swimming pools and backdrops for Instagram photos. You want to enrich their minds and engage their imaginations. If you can teach them about their heritage, show them examples of Black excellence and inspire them, as well as giving them a chance to relax and have fun, then you’re giving them something they can value for the rest of their lives.
Paris has much to offer when it comes to our rich cultural history. From literary triumphs to icons of the jazz age, this city has much to offer when it comes to our history, if you know where to look. Are you planning a trip to the City of Light? Here are a few points of interest to add to your itinerary for an educational and inspiring tour of Black Paris.
Embrace La Négritude.
“La Négritude” was a literary movement which started in the 1930s, inspired by the Harlem Renaissance and led by poets Aimé Césaire, Léon Damas, and Léopold Sédar Senghor. It celebrated the embracing of African and Caribbean culture and rebelling against French assimilation. The movement gave birth to numerous literary masterpieces, such as James Baldwin’s Go Tell It on the Mountain. Visit the Café de Flore, where Baldwin wrote this book, and stroll the legendary streets of St. Germain, which was the center of the artist community at the time and a favorite haunt of Miles Davis.
Dance in the footsteps of Josephine Baker.
A civil rights activist and member of the French Resistance in WWII, Josephine Baker is most remembered as one of the most famous and influential dancers ever to grace the stage. Ridiculed for being “too dark” in the United States, she relocated to Paris in 1925. She became an icon of the jazz age after dancing in “La Revue Nègre” at Théâtre des Champs-Elysées – which is still open today. Paris welcomed and celebrated her and takes great pride in the fact she lived there. You can also visit a square named for her, “Place Josephine Baker,” in Montparnasse.
Celebrate Africa in La Goutte d’Or.
The name La Goutte d’Or literally translates to “The Drop of Gold,” and this area is certainly a treasure. This eclectic neighborhood is a little piece of Africa in the middle of Paris and has been for the past 150 years. Shop the open-air markets of Marché Dejean and Marché Barbés for fresh veggies, as well as African and Caribbean food staples. Find your new favorite outfit at Rue des Gardes, a street filled with independent designers and retailers. Spend the day in this vibrant neighborhood and celebrate African heritage.
Worried about finding all of this on your own? We’ve got just the thing: sign up for a tour with Ricki Stevenson’s Black Paris Tours. Ricki and her group of guides offer full-day tours, partial-day tours, and even limited mobility tours dedicated to Black history in Paris. It’s a unique way to learn, explore, and even make new friends along the way. You can also get in touch with her to arrange a private tour for your group.
Paris is a city with no shortage of things to see, experience, and explore. In between trips to the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre, and visits to the patisserie for fresh croissants, be sure to make time to appreciate and celebrate Black culture in the City of Light, and give your kids something to be proud of and remember for years to come.
