News & announcements

Dear NWA Colleagues,

You are invited to participate in a survey with the goal of gathering information about policies that describe criteria for the selection of Special Collections resources (i.e. rare and unique archival photographs, manuscripts, ephemera, rare books, and donated born-digital items) for digitization and publication in open access digital libraries. These policies are often known as "digital collection development policies.” This study is being conducted by two librarians at the University of Utah’s J. Willard Marriott Library, representing a cross-departmental collaboration between Digital Library Services and Special Collections.

Please click on https://bit.ly/digcolldevp  to take the survey. 

This survey should take 10-15 minutes to complete and will be open until Monday, November 25th. If you would like additional information about the study, please contact any of the people listed below.

We appreciate your time and participation.

Thanks,

Jessica Breiman, Digital Archives Librarian, University of Utah (jessica.breiman@utah.edu)

Rachel Wittmann, Metadata Strategies Librarian, University of Utah (rachel.wittmann@utah.edu) 

The Society of Southwest Archivists is excited to announce our Call for Proposals for the 2025 Annual Meeting, themed "Liberté. Egalité. Fraternité: GLAM Revolution in a Changing Climate." Our 2025 annual meeting will be hybrid, in Lafayette, Louisiana and virtual via Zoom Events from May 6-10, 2025.

In a decade marked by profound shifts in politics, technology, and the environment, archivists play a pivotal role in upholding liberty and equality within our institutions. We invite proposals that delve into innovative approaches, adaptation strategies, and resilience in the face of challenges affecting Galleries, Libraries, Archives, and Museums (GLAMs). Whether you join us in Lafayette, Louisiana, or participate virtually, we encourage you to contribute to the dialogue shaping our profession's future.

Submit your proposal today!

We hope that our hybrid format for 2025 will make our conference more accessible for various groups. We encourage proposal submissions from non-SSA members. Join us as we explore how archivists can lead the charge in reshaping GLAMs amidst these transformative times.

Find guidelines, a spreadsheet to facilitate collaborations, and the submission form on the SSA Call For Proposals page.

Are you in the early stages of an archives career (2-10 years of experience) and demonstrate excellence in leadership? Do you have an archives colleague that exhibits great leadership skills? Please consider nominating them or yourself for the Society of American Archivists' Mark A. Greene Emerging Leader Award.  

The nomination deadline is February 28, 2025.

Awarded for the first time in 2012 and renamed in 2017, the Mark A. Greene Emerging Leader Award celebrates and encourages early-career archivists who have completed archival work of broad merit, demonstrated significant promise of leadership, performed commendable service to the archives profession, or a combination of the above. Nominees must have more than two years and less than ten years of professional archives experience at the time of nomination. The award is given based on the total experience and contributions of the awardee, including knowledge, leadership, participation, and achievements in the profession.

For more information on award criteria and eligibility, as well as access to the nomination form, follow this link: app.smarterselect.com/programs/...

On behalf of the Mark A. Greene Emerging Leader Award Subcommittee, thank you!

Western Libraries Archives & Special Collections is currently accepting applications for the James W. Scott Regional Research Fellowship. Applications are accepted from individuals in doctoral programs as well as individuals who have finished the Ph.D.

The James W. Scott Regional Research Fellowships promote awareness and innovative use of archival collections at Western Washington University and seek to forward scholarly understandings of the Pacific Northwest. Fellowship funds are awarded in honor of the late Dr. James W. Scott, a noted scholar of the Pacific Northwest region and a founder and first Director of the Center for Pacific Northwest Studies (CPNWS).

Up to $1000 funding is offered in 2025 to support significant research using archival resources at Western. Successful applicants will be expected to:

·         Spend approximately one week examining CPNWS holdings in support of their research.

·         Share a presentation about some aspect of their research during the same calendar year in which the award is offered and accepted. Presentations will be recorded and made available to the public via WWU’s institutional repository, Western CEDAR (format of delivery may vary depending on topic or time of year).

Applications are due by January 31, 2025, with award announcements expected by the end of February, 2025. Applications must be submitted by email to Ruth.Steele@wwu.edu (please include “Scott Fellowship Application” in the subject line), and contain:

·         Cover letter

·         Curriculum Vitae

·         Research plan outlining on-site use of CPNWS holdings and proposed presentation topic

·         Two letters of recommendation

Detailed guides to archival collections at CPNWS can be accessed and searched at the Center for Pacific Northwest Studies.

For more information about collections or the application process, please contact Ruth Steele at Ruth.Steele@wwu.edu or (360) 650-7747. Funds will be awarded after a Fellow(s) has conducted research at CPNWS and delivered their presentation.

SAA Privacy & Confidentiality section is hosting a panel Q&A exploring managing access restrictions in archives. Open to anyone, even non-SAA members, this panel is adapted from a session at Archives*Records 2024 for those who couldn’t join. 

A key tenet of archival work is providing access to the records we manage. Yet this is not always a straightforward process. This panel will ask archivists at York University, University of Colorado Boulder, and Minnesota Historical Society to discuss navigating legacy access restrictions, including the process of undertaking an institutional review of access restrictions and lessons learned, the digital repatriation of records, reimagining the role of record subjects in determining access to culturally sensitive records, and how to enact best practices for future acquisitions. There will be planned questions from a panel moderator followed by an opportunity with Q&A on the topic of managing access and access restrictions from the panelists.

Event will be on November 20th at 12:30pm Eastern time. Please register in advance to receive the zoom information. 

Panelists: 

Jennifer Grant is an archivist at the Clara Thomas Archives and Special Collections, part of York University Libraries. In this role, she works collaboratively in a small team to manage the university's private and institutional archival records, both digital and analog. She previously worked as an assistant archivist in the Corporate Records and Archives department of the Law Society of Ontario. Jennifer's current research is focused on labour issues in academic archives. 

Her case study uses three examples that illustrate problematic legacy decision-making about access restrictions on private records in a university archives, this talk will examine strategies for mitigating negative impacts, including workarounds and other solutions, and discuss new and better ways forward to manage access restrictions.

Kate Hujda is the Curator of Manuscripts at the Minnesota Historical Society, one of the largest regional historical societies in the United States. As Curator, Hujda acquires collections and works collaboratively across the institution and within communities to ensure public access and use. Her graduate degree is in music history, and she has worked with a number of artists and arts organizations as an archivist, historian, and curator. 

Her case study will reflect on an ethnography collection with a problematic use restriction and efforts to remove barriers to access and use for the native communities documented in the collection.

Ashlyn Velte is the Senior Processing Archivist at University of Colorado Boulder Libraries. She is responsible for project and collection management, processing, and student supervision. Her research has focused on digital preservation and ethical access to archival collections. 

Her case study will focus on a practical model for tracking collections for access restrictions review for collections with PPII, cultural sensitivity, health data, and classified information. 

Please share widely with your contacts! If you would like an anonymous question of the panelists in advance pleaseuse this form. “

Please share with anyone you think might be willing to participate

Dear colleagues,

We are seeking participants for a research survey to assess the uptake of Linked Data technologies for cultural heritage description in the Galleries, Libraries, Archives, and Museums (GLAM) community. The results from this survey are intended to capture the degree to which Linked Data is being implemented or used by different constituencies, to identify perceptions on added value or pain points of LD, and to infer risks and opportunities for further development in the areas of domain modeling and software development.

This survey will take 5-10 minutes to complete depending on the specific responses. It can be paused at any time and completed at a later point.

Your responses are collected anonymously and cannot be tied to your name or email address. No demographic information relating to your person other than your occupational role will be collected. The data collected in this survey will only be shared in aggregate for research purposes.

10 respondents to this survey will be drawn at random to receive a $30 Amazon gift card.

The survey can be completed here.

If you have any questions, please contact one of the study’s investigators listed below.

Thank you,

Kate A. Bowers (Harvard University, kate_bowers@harvard.edu)
Regine I. Heberlein (Princeton University, heberlei@princeton.edu)
Stephanie M. Luke (University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, smluke2@illinois.edu)

Portland City Archives & Records Management invites you to join our celebration of American Archives Month, Building Bridges: A City Archives Open House, on October 12th, 2024, from 2:00 - 5:00 pm. Enjoy activities such as trivia games and demonstrations of our online archives database, Efiles. Step into our oral history booth to record your story of life in Portland – like a StoryCorps for our city! Bring a photograph or document to digitize at a family archive scanning station.

Featured speakers from the Albina Music Trust will discuss their community archives dedicated to the restoration of a Black community’s historic musical culture that amplifies the legacy of Albina’s musician community. Catch Albina Music Trust at 3:30 pm and join a behind-the-scenes tour of the City Archives at either 3:00 pm or 4:15 pm. We are also excited to welcome Vanport Mosaic, Oregon Queer History Collective, and Don’t Shoot PDX as community partners!

CALL FOR PAPERS

ALASKA HISTORICAL SOCIETY ANNUAL CONFERENCE

CORDOVA, ALASKA • OCTOBER 9-12, 2024

JOIN US IN CORDOVA, ALASKA

Located near the mouth of the Copper River, the site was a crossroads of trade and interaction among Eyak, Tlingit, Ahtna and Chugach peoples when Europeans sailed into Prince William Sound in the 1700s. Founded in 1909 as a railway terminus to deliver copper from the Kennecott Mines, Cordova also was near Katalla, Alaska’s earliest oil field. Fishing is the town’s major industry today.

OUR THEME

This year’s theme, “Rights and Responsibilities,” speaks broadly to Alaska’s history of determining which people and groups should have rights, and what responsibilities are attached to those rights. Disputes over rights and responsibilities have spanned Alaska history, including voting rights for women and Alaska’s Native people, fish traps and limited entry fisheries, subsistence rights, taxation, the Alaska Permanent Fund and responding to the Exxon Valdez oil spill.

OUR PROGRAM

The conference will open with a Wednesday reception, with papers presented the following three days. Friday’s focus is on Prince William Sound topics and speakers. While presentations that address the conference theme are encouraged, the society welcomes proposals for papers, panels, roundtables, films or workshops on any aspect of Alaska history. The theme echoes the upcoming year’s National History Day theme, and students and teachers are especially encouraged to participate.

OUR KEYNOTE

This year’s keynote presenter is former Alaska Lt. Gov. Fran Ulmer, an international climate change expert. She brings a broad perspective on Alaska’s history by virtue of her extensive public service as a policy analyst for Gov. Jay Hammond, Juneau mayor and state legislator.

SHARE YOUR RESEARCH

To propose a presentation, please email a title, proposal of 100 words and two-sentence biography to members@alaskahistoricalsociety.org. Typically, presentations are 20 minutes in length. Abstract submission deadline: May 31, 2024.

Free webinar from the Opioid Industry Documents Archive! See especially Day 2 on the challenges and opportunities of managing and providing access to massive digital collections, with speakers Laurie Allen (Library Congress), Rob Sanderson (Yale) and Ben Lee (UW). But other days will show archives in action to understand history and affect policy.

Registration is required—see event page: https://oida-resources.jhu.edu/oida-national-symposium-2024/.

The Native American Collections Roundtable is accepting nominations for three open board positions: Fundraising Coordinator, Scholarship Coordinator, and Outreach and Media Coordinator. The NACR has been active since the 2012 NWA conference. Their mission is to provide a local forum in which archivists and cultural heritage bearers can collaborate, discuss, and disseminate information related to the support of Indigenous histories through care of, and access to, Indigenous Native American archival collections in the Northwest. 

For more information, or to nominate yourself or others to the open positions, check out the NACR Blog Post.

A part of the Roundtable activities is funding and providing scholarships to individuals working with, or aspiring to work with Native American Collections for attending the NWA conference. This year they will be funding 4 full scholarships. Here are some reflections from last year’s scholarship recipients: Tracy Nishimoto, Amy Valentine

Not ready to dive into a board position yet? You can still help the NACR with their fundraising efforts at two upcoming events during the NWA Annual Conference

• Trivia Night: NACR will host a trivia night on Thursday, May 9th (during the NWA conference) at Post Street Ale House. There will be a requested donation for participation.
  
• Silent Auction: NACR is still accepting items for their 6th Annual Silent Auction. If you have items you would like to donate (preferably ones that support tribal and indigenous entrepreneurs), email nwanac@gmail.com with a picture and description by April 12th. Otherwise, be sure to participate in person or online during the NWA conference in May.