AERI

Workshop: Becoming and Archivist in a Time of Uncertainty and Unrest: Teaching Introduction to Archives Courses in the Current Climate
2021-07-16 15:00 - 17:00 UTC
WORKSHOP: ‘Becoming an Archivist in a Time of Uncertainty and Unrest’: Teaching Introduction to Archives Courses in the Current Climate
Registration Information:
Register for this session and receive additional information at this link: https://umd.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_qbWZOljHSSahuK7vKmjKBQ.
Speakers:

Caitlin Christian-Lamb (PhD Candidate and Instructor of Record, University of Maryland College of Information Studies)
Marika Cifor (Assistant Professor, University of Washington Information School)
Chelsea Gunn (Teaching Assistant Professor, University of Pittsburgh School of Computing and Information)
Adam Kriesberg (Assistant Professor, Simmons University School of Library and Information Science)
Jamie A. Lee (Assistant Professor and Director of Graduate Studies, University of Arizona School of Information)

Accessibility details:
We are aiming to use AI captioning on Zoom during the workshop.
Abstract:
This workshop aims to address a central issue in the archival community, and one which many AERI participants confront regularly: the question of how to prepare future archivists to enter the field. While discussions of what the balance between theory and hands-on practice should be in an introductory course, how to craft critical and inclusive syllabi, and how to include the multiplicity of key archival ideas remain central in the mind of archival instructors, teaching in 2020 and 2021 has brought additional challenges: changing modes of instruction and/or assignments to incorporate an online-only environment, how to best support students during a pandemic and a sustained period of police brutality and unrest, and how to empower them to enter the profession equipped to confront the current challenges facing the field. Pandemic pedagogy itself offers a challenge for instructors, requiring critical thinking through how to introduce a new cohort of archivists to the world they operate in. Drawing inspiration from the title of Punzalan’s (2017) open letter to archival students, this workshop will consider how the COVID-19 pandemic has affected introductory archival pedagogy, what’s changed and what may be worth holding on to when the crisis moves into its next phases.
Workshop speakers will introduce the major challenges of teaching introductory courses and discuss their own experiences, followed by breakout room discussions and exercises designed to identify priorities in teaching introductory courses. Outcomes of the workshop include establishing an AERI syllabus repository and producing working documents such as crowdsourcing suggested modules, readings, and assignments for introduction to archives courses. The organizers of this workshop envision that this session could establish a regular, ongoing conversation at AERI around introductory archival courses.
Will this session be recorded for the AERI2021 YouTube channel?: Partially

Short Papers: Education (II)
2021-07-16 17:00 - 18:00
SHORT PAPERS: THEME- EDUCATION
Chair: Kathy Carbone
Register in advance for this meeting:
https://ucla.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJ0tdOigqzkrE9c1-kEfCuvehxDhTHpmMkg8
After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.

Papers:
Curricular and Experiential Impacts of the Public Broadcasting Preservation Fellowship
Speakers:

Sarah Buchanan, University of Missouri
Rebecca Benson, University of Missouri
Eric Saxon, University of Missouri
Antanella Tirone, University of Missouri

Accessibility details:
Transcribed, captioned slides provided.
Abstract:
Audiovisual archiving is a national priority with a narrowing technical window of opportunity, especially for audiotape material. GBH, the Boston-based public broadcaster, partnered five graduate archival education programs with a local public media station in order to both expand area representation in the American Archive of Public Broadcasting (AAPB) via original public media programs, and to build audiovisual preservation capacity in the archives and records profession nationwide. Graduate students enrolled in the archival programs could complete a semester-long Fellowship in 2018. Faculty Advisors comprised a cohort of archival educators who each met regularly with the Fellows on their campus, with a Host Mentor at the station, and with a Local Mentor with AV expertise to establish equipment and space for inventorying, cataloging, digitizing, and ingesting local media as a Special Collection in the AAPB – a collaboration between GBH and the Library of Congress. In addition to project documentation and demonstrations, Fellows contributed to the development of lesson plans and curricula on audiovisual preservation in their MLIS degree program. On our campus the Fellowship coincided with the launch of new Archival Studies courses designed to meet students’ expanding career targets and programmatic guidelines of national organizations (SAA GPAS and ALA Standards, and internationally the iSchools’ preservation of information goal). Audiovisual preservation and digitization therefore occupied from the outset a place of prominence in the Archival Studies curriculum that will form the core of discussion in this presentation, and the Fellows’ input ensured that AV archives remain formative to subsequent students’ experience. The presentation will detail campus-specific contributions to the IMLS-funded partnership, including hands-on skills development, training webinars, peer instruction workshops, mentorship, evaluation, future planning, collection growth, and promotion of the primary sources made newly available for research.
Will this session be recorded for the AERI2021 Youtube channel? Yes

The Changing Nature of Archival Instruction: Preparing Archivists and Faculty to Promote Student Learning Through Sustained Collaborations
Speakers:

Pelle Tracey, School of Information, University of Michigan
Patricia Garcia, School of Information, University of Michigan

Abstract:
The pedagogical benefits of teaching and learning with primary sources are changing the nature of archival instruction and expanding the role of archivists in undergraduate education. However, archivists report feeling unprepared for the changing nature of archival instruction and the growing expectation that they will support student learning. Thus, as the role of archivists in undergraduate education continues to expand, there is an increasing need to provide professional development opportunities that better prepare archivists to promote student learning and primary source instruction. In this paper, we address the following research question: How does a sustained professional development experience influence how archivists see their role in teaching and learning with archives? In order to address this question, we focus on the experiences of archivists who participated in the “[anonymized] Fellows Seminars,” a five-year research project to develop effective pedagogical practices for undergraduates through sustained engagement between faculty and archivists. We recruited eight archivists to participate via two cohorts. We collected data using a semi-structured interview technique designed to gather qualitative data on broad areas of interest related to the archivists’ motivations for participating in the seminar, views of faculty domain and archival expertise, professional experiences interacting with faculty, knowledge of teaching and learning with primary sources, views on collaborative opportunities between archivists and faculty, and general experience participating in the seminar. Our findings demonstrate that sustained professional development experiences between faculty and archivists affirmed the archivists’ professional expertise, increased their pedagogical awareness, and helped them gain a broader perspective on the impact of their archival work. Our findings also revealed the need to better account for power relations in faculty-archivist relationships when designing collaborative professional development opportunities.
Will this session be recorded for the AERI2021 Youtube channel? Yes

Short Papers: Affect and Emotion
2021-07-16 18:00 - 19:00
SHORT PAPERS: THEME- AFFECT AND EMOTION
Chair: Mario Ramirez
Register in advance for this meeting:
https://ubc.zoom.us/meeting/register/u50kcu-hqzoqE9EtOCCgfDsnePbu4uRGHosJ
After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.
Papers:
Emotional Responses to Archival Work: Preliminary Findings
Speakers:

Christa Sato (Social Work, University of Toronto)
Henria Aton (Information, University of Toronto)
Wendy Duff (Dean and Professor, Information, University of Toronto)

Accessibility details:
We do not have anything in mind but would like to do anything we can to maximise the accessibility of our paper presentation.
Abstract:
As co-witnesses to the lives and stories they archive, archivists and archival scholars have the potential to be deeply affected by records, especially those containing emotionally challenging or sensitive accounts of human suffering and survival. Archiving such records is a productive and important endeavour that is vital to maintaining our collective history. Nevertheless, the impact of such work on archivists has been largely neglected. In response to this issue, in June 2019 Wendy Duff and Henria Aton carried out a pilot research project and presented results at AERI.
In 2020, we began a three-year, SSHRC-funded project in collaboration with the Faculty of Social Work at the University of Toronto (PIs: Wendy Duff and Cheryl Regehr). Drawing from expertise in both disciplines, our research seeks to better understand how archivists are impacted by their work and how institutions support or fail to support their archival workers. The wider objectives of this research are to develop a theoretical model about archives, emotions, and trauma that is unique to archivists; to create open-access tools and educational materials; and to develop a training workshop for archival students and professionals. In our presentation for AERI 2020, we will share preliminary results from interviews with archivists and discuss the experience of working across disciplines in order to produce broader and more rigorous scholarship.

Expanding Creatorship: Archival Affect and Networked Creation
Speaker:
Bethany Radcliff, University of Michigan School of Information PhD student
Accessibility details:
AI captioning (via zoom), or whatever the preferred method is! And I will include alt-text for any images.
Abstract:
In this work-in-progress paper presentation, I will discuss my recent master’s report, which I am revising into an article that I plan on submitting to a journal soon. I hope to invite feedback as I work on this revision. I will discuss the limitations of creatorship alongside archival power and lingering notions of neutrality obscure the nuanced, creative, and affective contributions of the archivist, whose decisions influence the way collections come to exist as sources of information. Affect is a “force” that is “unruly,” and is “deeply implicated in how we live, form subjectivities, connect and disconnect, desire, take action, and practice difference, identity, and community” (Cifor 2021, para. 1). Tracing affect and its movement into the archival realm, I argue that the archivist’s creative contributions are recognized through an understanding of their affective experiences. Kathleen Stewart’s (2007) Ordinary Affects alongside feminist new materialist theory provides a framework for understanding affective experience in archival processing. This complicates creatorship, making the archivist a co-creator in a network of creatorship which I argue is seen clearly through work in personal archives. Through interviews with six archivists who work at memory institutions at the University of Texas at Austin, I learned that affective moments are interwoven in archival work, and often contribute to the way a collection exists in the world, but co-creative networks of creation complicate this. Bringing awareness to traumatic or sensitive affective experiences makes a place for training and protection in the archival profession. Better understanding the affective impact of archival collections and capturing this experience adds a meaningful layer to memory work. Recognizing affective experiences makes place for an archival future that pushes against the patriarchal power of archival authority and makes a place for preserving more fluid and diverse memories.

Panel: Community-Driven Archives Initiative: BIPOC and Queer Solidarity and Collective Power
2021-07-16 19:00 - 21:00
PANEL: Community-Driven Archives Initiative: BIPOC and Queer Solidarity and Collective Power
Please register in advance for this session: https://asu.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_HtDkc5eJRpOyHsSGrWxa0w
After registering you will receive a confirmation email with details about joining the meeting.
Speakers:

Alex Soto – Assistant Librarian, Labriola National American Indian Data Center, Arizona State University (ASU) Library
Nancy Godoy – Associate Archivist, Chicano/a Research Collection, and Interim Head of Archives, Arizona State University (ASU) Library
Jessica Salow, Project Archivist, Community-Driven Archives Initiative, Arizona State University (ASU) Library
Lourdes Pereira (Hia-Ced O’odham and Yoeme), ASU Student Archivist, Labriola National American Indian Data Center, Arizona State University (ASU) Library

Accessibility details:
We’ll be using zoom to record our panel presentation. We’ll make sure the recording and powerpoint presentation meets ADA requirements.
Abstract:
Archival repositories in America, especially in Arizona, are dominated by white narratives that promote white supremacy, settler colonialism, and dehumanize Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) who have lived on this land for centuries. The Community-Driven Archives (CDA) Initiative and Labriola National American Indian Data Center at Arizona State University (ASU) Library is actively addressing inequities and erasure by empowering BIPOC and Queer communities through educational workshops and events. We promote life-long learning by showing people how to preserve their own history for future generations and create intergenerational and intersectional safe spaces that encourage community healing, acknowledge historical trauma, and begin to change patterns of anti-blackness, racism, homophobia, and transphobia, all products of colonialism within BIPOC and Queer communities.
Moving beyond archival theory, this presentation will share our lived experiences as BIPOC and/or Queer archivists at a predominately white academic institution as well as how we are decolonizing archives by promoting solidarity, equity, justice, and sovereignty. Our CDA teams and community members are challenging the way historical records are created, redefining what an archive is, what should be included, who should have access, and how cultural protocols influence community archives. We seek to show how academic institutions can center community needs and knowledge, implement CDA theory and practice, and dismantle power structures that dehumanize BIPOC and Queer communities.
Will this session be recorded for the AERI2021 Youtube channel? Yes

EVWG Working Plenary
2021-07-16 21:00 - 23:00
Ethics and Values Working Group Plenary
Here are the plenary Zoom meeting details:
Topic: AERI EVWG Plenary
Time: Jul 16, 2021 09:00 PM Universal Time UTC
Join Zoom Meeting
https://lsu.zoom.us/j/9903423084?pwd=[REDACTED]
Meeting ID: 990 342 3084
Passcode: [REDACTED]
Over the last several years, the Ethics and Values Working Group has collaborated on the formation of codes of conduct and processes of care at AERI. While the last year has put a pause in this conversation, we strongly feel that ethics and values are a priority for AERI and that the whole AERI community should have input in how these are expressed and enacted. While we do not expect to have any definitive answers by the end of Friday’s plenary, we do hope that we can keep this conversation going towards tangible results.
For this plenary, our plan is to have a wider discussion about AERI as an ethical and accountable community. To get this process started, we will first discuss the existing materials that have been developed thus far, most importantly the drafts of the Code of Conduct and Processes and Practices. If you can, please take a look at these linked documents and please make any comments on them. This is a collaborative process, and we welcome your input!
