Presentation

Digital Readiness and Access Transformation

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Abstract

Digital readiness and community involvement involve new tools, new ways to collect and interact, and reparative language and skills that build new centers of practice. Join four digital projects practitioners to learn about access in varied cultural heritage environments. Accessible language, accessible memory worker training, accessible viewing of digital materials: who has access to the archives? To embody access within the space of the institutional archives is to confront and actively resist the values of white supremacy. Preserving and re-prioritizing the collection of marginalized narratives creates avenues of access to the archives.

Hear from a local history solo archivist, a public librarian, a historical society archivist, and a digital readiness educator what “access” means in these contexts. Elizabeth Morris of Bensenville Community Public Library, Stevie Gunter of Denver Public Library, Nancy Webster of the Highland Park (IL) Historical Society, and Kristen Whitson of WiLS/Recollection Wisconsin will each share their own experiences with increasing access to archives through grants, training, embracing new digital tools and applications, and reparative processing and language. Our responsibility as memory workers is to listen to the voices of marginalized communities in order to facilitate access to their own community and cultural heritage. Only by constant practice of new language found through interaction with those communities will we overcome our own bias and assumptions.

You will learn about documenting historically underrepresented or marginalized groups, and how community relationships impact every aspect of archival work, from metadata to outreach to practitioner training to organizational principles.

How to Cite:

Morris, E., Whitson, K., Gunter, S. & Webster, N., (2022) “Digital Readiness and Access Transformation”, MAC Annual Meeting Presentations 2022(1).