Exploring Jamaica's Liberty Hall and how places hold stories of heritage

In Kingston, Jamaica rests the profound Liberty Hall. Traditionally, a centre that hosted activities for the Jamaica division of Marcus Garvey’s UNIA. Jamaican national hero Marcus Garvey believed in the unification of the African diaspora to better each other's lives on a personal and global level - the concept of Pan-Africanism. 

While a home for Marcus Garvey’s organisation UNIA, Liberty Hall doubled as a home to plays, concerts, dances, elocution pieces, and children choirs. Beyond politics, Liberty Hall was a hub of arts and culture. A culturally rich space that confronted the history of racial stratification. This direct confrontation is what made the space vital for the cultural esteem and wellbeing of Black Jamaicans, then and now. 

The efforts made to preserve Liberty Hall and turn the ground floor into a museum for visitors is a physical reverence of Marcus Garvey’s efforts for the diaspora. This physical reverence is so precious - not just because it provides a space for tourists to learn more about Marcus Garvey and overall Jamaican history but to highlight the integral generational need for a third space. 

Liberty Hall is an example of why it is important to not just have physical third-spaces in the community but how spaces are means of passing down information across generations. Our third spaces hold stories of heritage. 

As technology advances and continues to pervade every corner of our life, the impact of third spaces has become a prominent conversation over the last few years. 

Where can people go to enjoy life outside of work and home? There has been the collective acknowledgement that the youth no longer have youth clubs to attend and bide their time but truthfully even the adults are struggling to find somewhere to go.

Third spaces are necessary spaces which are supposed to welcome and encourage people to be themselves outside of the work environment. Unintentionally, these third spaces often become unintentional storytellers as the places they provide becomes an entity of its own - providing safe space for the community it is in as well as the community that is built from attendees. We breathe life into spaces and in turn they breathe life back into us. 

In the case of Jamaica’s Liberty Hall, it stands alone as a storyteller and archivist. Holding necessary and at times, forgotten stories of heritage (and unity). Stories that build a foundation in the social and racial esteem of Jamaican people. An effort to empower a people whose ancestors were abused and enslaved. 

Liberty Hall, like many third spaces, is more than just four pretty walls. 

These spaces are heritage and their stories are worth protecting.