Dreams matter. When you were a child, what were your dreams and aspirations? Whatever your dreams were (and still are), dreams are vital for stimulating, nurturing, and sustaining children’s self-explorations, joys, pleasures, curiosities, creativities, overall social-emotional well-being, and love of learning. As two children of Black parents, we were taught how dreams and dreaming were foundational to the Black community. Black dreams are damn-near magical. They can break generational curses, (re)make social worlds, make us visible, help us heal from past oppressions, and envision Black futures beyond the structures imposed upon us. Our parents (and ancestors) undeniably knew how valuable Black dreams were, especially living in a country that seldom held us at the forefront of its mind.

Black dreams are also radical, because they set afire philosophical worldviews and social constraints imposed upon us. A product of “a collective consciousness informed by the historical struggles for liberation” (Robinson, 1983), Black radical imagination has been a necessary and sustaining force for Black activism and liberation, because it has united Black communities across spatial-temporal boundaries. For Black children to possess Black radical imagination provides them the fundamental right and agential subjectivity to live unbounded lives—pursuing rest, joy, leisure, cultural recreation, and personal satisfaction. So, growing up, we were always taught to dream BIG and never let anyone defer our dreams. Black dreams, in essence, make us. Black dreams matter.