webdubois: W.E.B. Du Bois Challenge plots

W.E.B. Du Bois (February 23, 1868 – August 27, 1963) was an American sociologist, socialist, historian and Pan-Africanist civil rights activist (Source: Wikipedia). At the 1900 Paris Exposition, his team made a historical display. They presented in many charts the situation of Black people in Georgia and the US in general. To draw the attention of passersby, they balanced bold aesthetics with elegant solutions for better readability. The timelessness of these posters provoked Anthony Starks, Allen Hillery, Sekou Tyler, and Chimdi Nwosu to create and mantain the #DuBoisChallenge. The proposal was to reproduce Du Bois posters with any tools whatsoever. So, I chose ggplot2 and its many extensions. Furthermore, I used this opportunity to present data on racial inequality and Black achievements in my homeland, Brazil.

Explore the gallery:

Compare the pairs of pieces (from Du Bois' and myself), see which packages were used, and download the data and high-resolution versions of the plots. Access at the Du Bois Gallery

Do it yourself!

These are the fonts I used:

• Teko font: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/www/fonts/Teko.ttf
• Font Awesome 6 Brands: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/www/fonts/FA6brands.ttf
• Font Awesome 6 Solid: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/www/fonts/FA6solid.ttf

2024

Week 06 - Occurrence of Afro-Brazilian terms in Sambas

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2024/week06/week06.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1769700309545165038

Week 05 - Occurrence of Afro-Brazilian terms in Sambas

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2024/week05/week05.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1766445893258014994

Week 03 - Percentage of Blacks in extreme poverty

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2024/week03/week03.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1761437253446803615

Week 01 - Black Population of Bahia by immediate region

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2024/week01/week01.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1754821135126917301

2023

Week 10 - Migration in the Brazilian states

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2023/week10/week10.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1645542687142027265

Week 09 - Finances of Black candidatures for Mayor by sex in Brazil

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2023/week09/week09.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1643638826386980868

Week 08 - Graduates by race in Brazil

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2023/week08/week08.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1640354194895917059

Week 07 - Higher education enrollments by race and field

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2023/week07/week07.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1638187571271331840

Week 06 - Incarcerated people by race in Brazil

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2023/week06/week06.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1636375321523154945

Week 05 - Rio Samba Schools parade winners

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2023/week05/week05.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1633109934890991616

Week 04 - Distribution of Blacks in Brazil

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2023/week04/week04.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1630575810380804100

Week 03 - Homicide victims by race and sex

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2023/week03/week03.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1629131002743250945

Week 02 - Real average income of Black Brazilians

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2023/week02/week02.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1625930883755540496

Week 01 - Income and expenditure of Brazilian families

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2023/week01/week01.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1646694577183637506

2022

Week 10 - Proportion of Blacks and non-Blacks candidates and elected for the Lower House of the Brazilian Congress

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2022/week10/week10.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1514299766271721475

Week 09 - Occupied Blacks per 1000 people by educational level in Brazil

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2022/week09/week09.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1511072124357775367

Week 08 - Rate of homicides of Blacks by per 100K people

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2022/week08/week08.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1508975839618215940

Week 07 - Capital of candidatures for the Lower House of the Brazilian Congress by race and state

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2022/week07/week07.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1506334651538972681

Week 06 - Illiteracy rate of Black people in Brazil

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2022/week06/week06.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1503890070029451270

Week 05 - Participation in managerial positions by race in Brazil

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2022/week05/week05.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1501323176088780800

Week 04 - Real income of Black people whose main work is informal

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2022/week04/week04.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1498459321243475968

Week 03 - Access of Black people to a personal mobile phone and internet in the states of Brazil

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2022/week03/week03.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1496229656902926336

Week 02 - Real monthly income per capita of Black households in Brazil

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2022/week02/week02.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1493768750755041285

Week 01 - The Afro-Brazilians

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2022/week01/week01.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1516517164727119877

Week 00 - Cumulative aerial victories credited to pilots of the Tuskegee Airmen

💻 Code: https://github.com/IcaroBernardes/webdubois/blob/main/2022/week00/week00.R

🌍 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IcaroBSC/status/1491559819656024071

💬 About this plot: The first plot I did was for both the TidyTuesday and the Du Bois Challenge. They provided us with data about pilots from the Tuskgee Airmen. Seeing the data and the originals from Du Bois, I decided to make a line plot of the number of enemy planes downed by the pilots. The poster I took inspiration from had two periods represented by one line completely in black and another with black borders and the same color as the paper. ggplot lines geometries (like line, step, etc.) do not have a "border" option. Since I didn't know about ggborderline, I had to give the illusion of a border to my lines. I created this illusion by placing two lines in the same coordinates, one thicker in black behind another that was lighter and had the background color. Then, I browsed Wikipedia to find context about the numbers of the Tuskgee. These labels were glued to the poster in the original, so the grid is hidden behind them. ggtext helped me to replicate this effect by creating a box behind the texts in the background color. To make the grid I created a sequence of lines in red and colored the first and last in black. Same thing for the legend in the left. The most interesting detail in it is the repeated icon for the "downed planes". For that I used emojifont.