When you think about literacy, board games might not be the first thing that comes to mind. Ujamaa Community Bookstore director of literacy programs Adam Henze wants to change that.
Through its weekly Wednesday game night, the bookstore on the city’s west side hopes to promote literacy, help kids, teens and young adults build social skills and financial literacy, and provide a place to have fun free-of-charge. Game nights, from 4 to 6 p.m., are open to families with children of all ages, but many of the participants who show up weekly are in their teens to early 20s.
The bookstore, which is an initiative from Flanner House, opened in 2021 and roughly 90% of the books on the shelves are written by Black authors. Game night at Ujamaa gives families the option to bring their own games to the store, or to find new board and card games to try out.
The endeavor started in January thanks to a collaboration between Henze, Asra Wasik and Eric Jenkins. Wasik and Jenkins, both 22, are members of Flanner House’s Farming, Education, Employment and Distribution (F.E.E.D) Program and bonded over a shared love of tabletop roleplaying games.
The pair wanted to create a space for fellow game-lovers from all skill levels.
“We’d been talking a bit about tabletop games on our break back in October or November, when Adam was setting up his literacy programming,” Wasik said. “He came to us and pitched that maybe we could run a game night, and around December, he came back to us with the formatting and outline of how the literacy stuff would work. We got Wednesday nights and we’ve been going since.”
Though not traditional literacy, Henze said children and teenagers can gain valuable skills from playing games with friends.
“Some of our guys are at the Uno level, but those are literacy practices, too,” Henze said. “By learning new games with new rules, we’re able to practice things like social communication skills. If they play Monopoly, it teaches financial literacy skills. This is all literacy.”
Wasik and Jenkins have a small group of about five people who join them each week, and Henze said he’s seen roughly a dozen people fill the small bookshop for Wednesday game nights. Wasik said they hope more people start joining them as the weather starts to warm up.
Ryan Freeman (right) converses with Keondre James during a game night. Credit: Nate Pappas for Mirror Indy 
Keondre James, Kayden Smith and Aidan Smith set up a game of Jenga. Credit: Nate Pappas for Mirror Indy 
Ujamaa Community Bookstore at 2424 Doctor Martin Luther King Jr. St. Credit: Nate Pappas for Mirror Indy 
A stack of game check-out forms sits on a table during a game night. Credit: Nate Pappas for Mirror Indy 
People play games on Wednesday, March 13, 2024. Credit: Nate Pappas for Mirror Indy 
Games sit on a shelf. Credit: Nate Pappas for Mirror Indy 
Asra Wasick listens as he and others play Pathfinder, a tabletop roleplaying game. Credit: Nate Pappas for Mirror Indy
Game night, along with other Flanner House programming, is a rare find these days: it’s something fun, family-friendly and free.
“We have a community of people who return,” Jenkins said, referring to the benefits of having a free community space like Ujamma and Flanner House.
“It sucks, because a lot of stuff is gated behind the purchase of a ticket as well as your age,” Wasik said. “…Having a place that accepts people of all ages, backgrounds, skill levels and having a place that’s low-commitment helps people feel like they can come back.”
In the future, Wasik and Jenkins hope to expand game night to include gaming tournaments and classes on how to make your own role-playing games. Along with Wednesday game nights, Ujamaa hosts a hip-hop night on Tuesday nights and a spoken word night on Thursday nights.
Henze hopes these events help encourage children and teenagers to think differently about the role literacy plays in their lives.
“We’re just trying to show that literacy — reading and writing — is relevant in their life,” Henze said. “If it’s a board game or hip-hop song, they’re like, ‘Oh, that’s something I read all the time,’ and they see that they live in a literate world, too.”
A correction was made on March 15, 2024: An earlier version of this article stated the wrong location of Ujaama Bookstore. It is on the city’s west side.
Mirror Indy reporter Breanna Cooper covers arts and culture. Reach her at breanna.cooper@mirrorindy.org. Follow her on X at @BreannaNCooper.
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