Archives – Page 12

Welcome to Spring!

by SAASC Team

Spring greetings to all SAASC members and iSchool MLIS & MARA students. The Spring semester is in full swing and we already have plenty to talk about!

We are barely four weeks in and our vice-chair, Samantha Hamilton, has put on two great virtual events! In case you missed it: January’s presentation on the Walt Disney Archives (use the Contact form to request access to the recording) and February’s presentation on A4BLiP – Archives for Black Lives Philadelphia (recording to be posted soon).

And we’ve already scheduled the rest of the events for Spring. Check out our calendar for more info and registration links. Our goal is to bring you first-hand presentations of all types of archival environments: corporate, academic, and non-profit as well as collaborations between archival professionals. On the professional development front, we will be hosting the Academy of Certified Archivists in May to help those of you preparing to take the ACA exam this year.

In other news, we’ve got a new addition to the team, Sara Wang! Sara will be taking over as Blog Editor for the Spring semester. You’ll see her first post soon, and if you would like to work with her on a guest blog post, you can reach her via the Canvas group, or send a message via our Contact form.

If you are new to SAASC or new to iSchool, I recommend watching a couple of the other February meetings: the iSchool Student Group Meet & Greet to learn about all the MLIS/MARA-related student groups and the SAASC Spring Member Update.

We’ve got great things planned for you this semester, but most importantly, we need your help to keep momentum going into the Fall 2021/Spring 2022 term. We will be holding elections for all SAASC board positions in April: Chair, Vice-Chair, Secretary, Social Media Coordinator, Webmaster, Blog Editor, and a new role, Membership Director. Stay tuned for more information on each role, the nomination process, and key dates for nominations and voting.

Joining a student group like SAASC in a leadership role is a great way to build meaningful relationships with your fellow students, learn more about your profession, develop collaboration and presentation skills, and create evidence for your ePortfolio. I can’t recommend it enough based on my own experiences as SAASC Chair. Again, you can reach out to us in the Contact form if you can’t wait for more info to be posted and you want to nominate yourself now.

Good luck to everyone this semester, whether you are just starting or deep into your ePortfolio or somewhere in between. The SAASC team looks forward to assisting you in any way we can and making your semester enjoyable.

Alison Quirion, 2020/2021 Chair

Intersectionality in the Archives: Making Black, Queer Voices Accessible

by SAASC Team

On December 7, 2020, the SAASC hosted Bridgett Kathryn Pride, the Reference Librarian for the Manuscripts, Archives, and Rare Books Division of the Schomburg Center at the New York Public Library.

The Schomburg Library was named after Arthur Schomburg who dedicated his life to collecting “vindicating evidence” of the worthiness of black culture to be studied and collected after a teacher told him otherwise. The New York Public Library purchased Schomburg’s collections in 1926.

“Figuras Historicas De Puerto Rico, Vol. 2” ; Eitor: Adolfo R. Lopez; Page 11; Publisher: Editorial Codillera, Inc.; ISBN 088495-188-X. Image dated 1910 and Courtesy of the “Puerto Rican Institute of Culture” which is a government institution.

The Schomburg Library is organized by format with collections represented in:

Art and Artifacts
Moving Image and Recorded Sound
Photographs and Print
Jean Blackwell Hutson Research and Reference
Manuscripts, Archives, and Rare Books

Pride developed the research guide for the Queer Studies Collections which focuses on Black LGBTQIA+ studies within the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. There are 24 collections representing the LGBTQ community at the Schomburg Center. While creating the research guides, Pride was greatly motivated by the lack of black women’s voices in the collections. Her work is guided by the principle of making black, queer voices accessible to researchers.

The SAASC would like to thank Bridgett Pride of the Schomburg Center at the New York Public Library for conducting this fascinating and informative discussion with the students of San Jose State University.

If you were unable to attend the live presentation, you can watch the event here. Remember to subscribe and let us know what you think!

We hope everyone has a safe and relaxing holiday break! See you in 2021!

**Curious about the archival profession? Consider joining the Society of American Archivists and the Society of American Archivists Student Chapter.

Part 2 – Migration is Beautiful: The Mujeres Latinas…

by SAASC Team

The following is part two of our recap of our November 9^th event, the Mujeres Latinas Project. In this post, we recap the Q&A session with Janet Weaver, Assistant Curator, Iowa Women’s Archive (IWA). If you missed the event, please check out the first blog post and event recording. The Migration is Beautiful website, related to the project, is also a treasure trove of materials.

When asked about the biggest challenges in processing and maintaining this collection, Weaver confirmed what we often hear from archivists: resources and time. The centerpiece of the collection is the 112 oral histories, with around 30 Spanish-language interviews. Weaver shared that the time required to transcribe the interviews took much longer than recording the interviews, and the IWA has just recently finished transcribing the interviews collected from 2005 through 2007, allowing them to publish the collection finding aid, increasing access and awareness of the collection.

As part of an academic institution, the 3-person archives team are expected to teach classes, respond to reference requests, and manage the special collections. To help with backlog, the IWA is greatly assisted by graduate students – often from the UI MLIS program student workforce or bring in additional help for special projects such as the Mujeres Latinas Project.

As an active collection, acquisitions for the Mujeres Latinas Project are focused on documents and ephemera rather than museum-type items which require a different approach to processing and preservation. With a few exceptions, IWA also prefers to acquire materials in their original, non-digitized form and use their internal resources to digitize the materials to ensure they meet archival standards.

When presented the question, “is the associated metadata on the records in English, Spanish, or both?,” Weaver was pleasantly surprised and impressed. The answer is that the metadata is currently only in English, but that it would make sense for it to include the equivalent terms in Spanish, and until that moment, was something Weaver had never considered.

“Photograph of the Vallejo sisters in Des Moines, Iowa, 1945.,” Image Source: Migration is Beautiful, accessed December 7, 2020

One of the highlights of the Q&A was the discussion about finding oneself in the archives and the importance of outreach. Weaver shared that she was excited to present the story of Iowa’s Latinas to people beyond Iowa, because history takes on a deeper meaning when you can think about it in the context of your own experience. As Weaver elegantly stated, “we are all migrating constantly and there are connections everywhere, it is a richer world when we are talking to each other.”

Weaver is also focused on integrating the migration stories of Iowa’s LatinX population into K-12 curriculum. Using collection resources, students can learn more about immigration in their own communities and potentially, their own families. A near-term goal for Weaver is to add a “Teaching Resources” topic to the Migration Is Beautiful website, connecting teachers with the collection and providing lesson plans that use the collection to teach the story of immigration.

Looking towards the future, the IWA recognizes that Iowa is in the middle of the next chapter in its LatinX story and encourages the community to save their papers, so those stories can be reflected in history. IWA is coordinating with the Iowa Labor History Oral Project to collect interviews documenting the exploitation of LatinX packinghouse workers during the current pandemic and continues to work with the Iowa League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC).

As my MLIS journey comes closer to an end, I find energy and inspiration in stories like the Mujeres Latinas Project, and in LIS professionals like Dr. Weaver. Giving voice to silenced and underrepresented communities is necessary and urgent work, and as MLIS or MARA students, it is our responsibility to acknowledge and address.

If you would like to learn more about IWA or the Mujeres Latinas Project, you can contact Janet Weaver here.

Hoppily Ever After: Creating An Archive From Scratch

by SAASC Team

Woo-Hoo For Brews!

For #AskAnArchivist day on October 7th, 2020, the SAASC hosted a virtual event with Tiah Edmunson-Morton, the Curator of the Oregon Hops and Brewing Archives (OHBA) at Oregon State University, called Hoppily Ever After: Creating An Archive From Scratch.

Edmunson-Morton is a SJSU School of Information alumna. She became an instruction and outreach archivist at Oregon State University before starting the OHBA. She has been the curator of the archive ever since.

Oregon State University has conducted research on fermentation, barley, and hops since the 1890’s. There was a growing interest in documenting both the history of hop production and the craft brewing movement in Oregon. Edmunson-Morton created a plan and a name then pitched the idea of starting an Archive to her supervisor. Her supervisor loved the idea and the concept went up the administrative channels, obtaining approval along the way. Thus the Oregon Hops and Brewing Archive was born (okay, there was a lot more to it! Watch the event on SAASC’s YouTube channel for the full deets!).

The OHBA mission:

“The Oregon Hops and Brewing Archives (OHBA) is a collecting, documentation, and community archiving project with a mission to collect and provide access to records related to hops production and the craft brewing industries (post-1970) in Oregon. At its core, OHBA’s mission is to provide access to historical materials in both the OSU collections and in outside repositories, industries, or communities. OHBA can act as a portal, engaging with external communities to form partnerships with the heritage and history communities, state agencies, hop farmers, craft brewers, home brewers, and the general community. We want to empower people to see themselves as a part of the archiving process and think collectively about how this project can best serve a variety of people.”

The SAASC at SJSU would like to thank Archivist Tiah Edmunson-Morton for putting together this fun and informative presentation on how to create an archive! For more information visit OHBA and read Edmunson-Morton’s blog where she writes as the Brewstorian for more exciting hops and brewing facts!

Missed the live event? You can view Hoppily Ever After here and all the other exciting archival events the SAASC at San Jose State University hosts. Consider joining the SAASC today!

American Archives Month

by SAASC Team

October is American Archives Month!

Why are archivists and the work they do important? Archivists are often referred to as the Keepers of Memory. They collect and care for collections that hold enduring value to the community they serve. American Archives Month is an opportunity for the archival community to spread awareness of the vital work they do.

So what does an archivist do?

Lisa Lewis, the associate archivist for the Catholic Diocese of Baton Rouge said, “Archivists bring the past to the present. They’re records collectors and protectors, keepers of memory. They organize unique, historical materials, making them available for current and future research.

Another great definition comes from Jacquelyn Ferry of the Wisconsin Historical Society who writes, “Archivists acquire, manage, preserve, and help patrons identify and use historically significant collections of unique materials, such as government records, manuscripts, photographs, films, and sound recordings”.

Over the course of the month we will be exploring various aspects of the archival world including a virtual visit to the Oregon State University Hops & Brewing Archive (created by an SJSU MLIS alumna!), #AskAnArchivistDay, and A Finding Aid To My Soul (a free event celebrating the diversity and commonality of the archivist experience!).

Don’t forget to register for the events and let us know what you think!

Category: <span>Archives</span>