AAHA! Virginia · State of Cultural Heritage in Virginia Symposium
Surrender &
Jubilation
A day of reckoning with what heritage means now — and what it must become. One symposium. Two venues. One record.
About the Symposium
Heritage IS Equity.
The Ecosystem.
The State of Cultural Heritage in Virginia Symposium convenes heritage practitioners, community builders, DMOs, HBCUs, and institutional partners to do the work that policy documents rarely accomplish — honest, cross-sector conversation about what African American heritage in Virginia is worth and what it will take to sustain it.
Surrender & Jubilation is this year's theme. It asks us to release what hasn't worked — the siloed approaches, the underfunded initiatives, the missed connections — and to step into what's possible when heritage is treated as the economic and cultural infrastructure it actually is.
The day runs on the CHEWS framework: Culture, Health, Education, Wealth, and Stewardship. Every panel, conversation, and commitment maps back to these five pillars — and to the communities that depend on them.
"Heritage is not a cultural footnote. It is a scarce resource — as real as land, labor, and capital — and it must be treated as one or it disappears."
Keynote Sessions
Two addresses.
One through-line.
Full Program
The day's
schedule.
Panel Sessions
Two conversations.
One through-line.
One morning panel. One afternoon panel. Each brings together practitioners, institutions, and community leaders across the full CHEWS spectrum.
Partnership Café
Lunch with
intention.
The midday lunch is not a break from the work — it is the work. The Partnership Café runs three facilitated rounds, each anchored to a CHEWS pillar. Tables report back. Commitments are made. Connections that would take months of follow-up happen in an afternoon.
Venues
One symposium.
Two locations.
Both venues run the full program simultaneously. The Hampton satellite hub is fully live-streamed and locally programmed — not a broadcast room, but a full participant location.
All keynotes, panels, Partnership Café, and closing session originate here. In-person attendance includes complimentary lunch.
Featured Initiative
100 for the 400
Community Weavers.
The Symposium is the founding home of the 100 for the 400 Community Weavers Initiative — a program honoring 100 people across Virginia who carry African American heritage forward without titles, without headlines, and too often without recognition.
On April 24, one hundred names enter a permanent vault and are read aloud. Their stories become part of the record. Nominations are community-driven and close before the Symposium date.
Attendance
Join us
April 24.
Richmond. Hampton. Wherever you are in Virginia. The conversation starts here.