The Library
A library can be a place of refuge. A library can be an act of preservation. A library can be a place of becoming. This library exists at the intersection of all three.
Coming soon. . .
A community-rooted library and gathering space where stories, knowledge, and cultural memory are preserved, shared, and passed forward. We are expanding access to culturally relevant literature, preserved knowledge, and community-centered learning in Oakland.
Overview of The Library
The Library is Asafa Collective’s liberatory library and cultural archive, rooted in the belief that access to knowledge belongs to everyone and that young people deserve spaces built with their futures in mind. For communities of the global majority whose stories and histories have been systematically excluded from mainstream institutions, The Library serves as both an act of preservation and an act of resistance, expanding access to books, stories, and knowledge that too often remain inaccessible, underrepresented, or erased.
More than a traditional library, this space is being built as a third space for Oakland’s young people and broader community: a place to read, reflect, gather, and grow alongside one another through culturally relevant literature, preserved archives, and communal programming that nurture curiosity, belonging, and imagination across generations.
Here, you will find books that reflect you and your community, alongside those that challenge you to think beyond what you have known. The Library is a place of both comfort and expansion, built to meet people where they are while encouraging them to become architects of possibility for themselves and their communities.
What The Library Offers
The Collection
At the heart of The Library is a curated collection of culturally relevant books and literature centering the stories, voices, and experiences of the global majority. We are intentional about amplifying writers and perspectives that have too often been overlooked, excluded, or pushed to the margins, including Black, Indigenous, Latine, AAPI, and other communities whose stories deserve to be preserved, shared, and celebrated.
We believe all stories are worth telling, while also recognizing some histories and perspectives have long been denied the same visibility, access, and care. Our collection exists as an intentional effort to expand what is available, remembered, and passed forward.
Our reading room is designed as a communal space for reflection, learning, and connection, whether with a book, with yourself, or with the people around you. Community members will be able to browse and read within the space, with future plans to expand into a circulating lending library that allows books to travel beyond our walls and into homes across the Oakland community.
The Archive: Banned & Out-of-Print Books
The systematic banning, suppression, and erasure of books is not new. Throughout history, book banning and controlling access to knowledge have been tools used by oppressive governments to control what communities are allowed to know, remember, and imagine.
The Library responds with an archive.
Our archive is a curated collection of banned books, out-of-print titles, and culturally significant media and materials that have been removed from circulation, deliberately suppressed, or excluded from public access. It is a space dedicated to preserving the stories, histories, and perspectives that others have attempted to erase.
Preservation sits at the center of this work. We are committed to collecting, protecting, and caring for books, artifacts, and ephemera that mainstream institutions have too often neglected or failed to preserve. We believe access to suppressed knowledge is deeply connected to cultural memory, community empowerment, and collective liberation.
The Communal Gathering Space
The Library is not just a place for books. It is a place for community.
Designed as a welcoming third space, The Library exists as a place to gather, study, reflect, create, and think alongside others. It is where our Fellows can come to read, write, work on assignments, or simply spend time in the presence of good company and shared curiosity. It is also where we will host a rotating calendar of workshops, speakers, creative offerings, and community conversations, some created specifically for Asafa Fellows and others open to the broader Oakland community.
This is a space where books are loved out loud, where reading can be joyful, and where curiosity can take any shape. Whether you have loved books your entire life or are still finding your way to the page, this Library is meant for you. We hope every person who walks through these doors feels welcomed, safe, and open to whatever the literature in front of them might unlock.
Why This Library, Why Now
Oakland has been without enough safe spaces like this for too long. Young people in our community have grown up with far too few third spaces, those rare and necessary places belonging neither to home nor school nor work, where they are allowed simply to be. The absence has shaped what they have and have not been able to imagine for themselves.
The Library is being built to help close that gap. It is a space free of judgment and distractions young people may face at school or home, where readers at every level are met with support rather than criticism, where the act of picking up a book is honored regardless of how easily the words come, and where the simple presence of others reading, thinking, and being together is itself the point.
Where We Are Now
The Library is currently in development. We are actively building our collection, cultivating a robust archive, and fundraising for a permanent physical home for this work.
What changes because of this Library is the community itself. When young people have access to books and spaces where they feel safe, seen, and free to explore who they are becoming, their sense of possibility expands. When communities invest in spaces that preserve stories, encourage curiosity, and create belonging, they are investing in their own future.
This is a Library built by community for the community, and every contribution helps shape how far this vision can reach. Whether through financial support, book donations, or helping us share our vision, there are many ways to help us bring The Library to life.
Be Part of the Story
The Library is more than a building. It is a promise to our community that knowledge, stories, and imagination belong to all of us.
Curious about the heart and soul behind this work? Visit our blog to learn more about the vision and the community we are building together.
Your support helps us build a space where young people can see themselves, discover their power, and shape the future.
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Asafa Collective is a California registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit. EIN: 33-4080644