Black Girls’ Handgames

The D.C.-based arts organization Black Girls Handgames Project is dedicated to remixing and repurposing classic (pre-electronics) children’s games, many of which originated in communities of color. Cofounder OnRae LaTeal explains:

The children’s handgame “Miss Mary Mack,” for instance, played here by the great folksinger Ella Jenkins (with some assistance from . . . Barney), dates back to the 1800s.

In the book The Games Black Girls Play: Learning the Ropes from Double-Dutch to Hip-Hop, Kyra D. Gaunt suggests:

In black girls’ play, “black” may be symbolically associated at some level with one’s ethnic identity — dressing oneself in blackness, so to speak.

R&B singer Rufus Thomas remixed “Mary Mack” into “Walking the Dog” in 1963:

Black Girls Handgames Project’s version:

For more, see the Smithsonian Folklife Festival’s blog, here:

https://festival.si.edu/blog/black-girls-handgames-project

And the BGHP’s Facebook page, here:

https://www.facebook.com/handgamesproject/