Representing World War I: Perspectives at the Centenary

On October 30, 2014, Kathelene Smith, Jennifer Motszko, and I traveled to Toronto to present at an international conference on the centenary of World War One.  Upon our arrival at our downtown hotel, we were met with cool fall temperatures, overcast skies, and Canadians wearing red poppies on the lapels of their winter jackets.  It was a somber sight.  But, it was also a striking reminder of how Canada and the other member states of the Commonwealth of Nations commemorate and mourn the fallen of the “Great War” and subsequent conflicts.  We were struck by this very public and collective act of remembrance.

The three day conference, Representing World War I: Perspectives at the Centenary, was jointly sponsored by Toronto’s International Festival of Authors and the Humber School of Liberal Arts and Sciences.  The conference drew historians, political scientists, literary scholars, and archivists from France, the United Kingdom, Germany, Hungary, Canada, Australia, and the United States.  Presentation topics addressed such issues as: war and national identity, life on the home front, state propaganda, gender and armed conflict, race relations and modern warfare, memorialization and mythmaking, and European colonies and their role in a global war.  With a field of inquiry long dominated by military historians, it was refreshing to see how new research questions and methods have broadened the scholarly discussion of this bloody war.

Each day of the academic conference began with a keynote speaker who pointedly addressed emerging research trends and ongoing scholarly debates.  These opening sessions sparked a great deal of discussion amongst attendees.  The first keynote speaker, Dr. Michael S. Neiberg, challenged the way scholars have explained and taught the causes for the outbreak of the war in Europe in 1914.  Neiberg argued that the scholarly focus on a small number of decision-making elites is terribly misplaced.  While acknowledging the influence of military alliances and critical political decisions, Neiberg provocatively suggested that most Europeans did not blindly follow their leaders nor did they desire war.  The keynote speaker for the second day, Dr. David Stevenson, addressed the origins of World War One through the lens of a prewar arms race and a breakdown of international diplomacy.  Additionally, Stevenson explored the “war aims” of each of the combatant countries.  Through this study of war aims and their impact on the postwar settlement, Stevenson sought to draw connections to the outbreak of World War Two, and the development of the Cold War, as well as the current military tensions in Europe.

Drawing on the rich holdings in Special Collections and University Archives at UNCG, Kathelene Smith, Jennifer Motszko, and I assembled a panel on American women and propaganda during World War One.  We were the sole panel that was made up exclusively of archivists.  In her talk entitled “We Need You: Portrayals of Women in World War I American Red Cross Posters,” Jennifer discussed how women were being actively recruited for service with the Red Cross.  Through an examination of the visual imagery in wartime Red Cross posters, Jennifer argued that the posters themselves reflected the changing position of women in society, from supplicant to participant.   

In the presentation entitled “Every Girl Pulling for Victory: Sacrifice and Social Consciousness during the Great War,” Kathelene examined the ways students and faculty at the State Normal (now UNCG)  responded to the American declaration of war and the mobilization of the home front.  Students took an active role in buying liberty bonds, sewing socks, preserving food, and meeting a labor shortage.  Additionally, Kathelene discussed how the experience of the war energized and rallied students around the issue of suffrage, a natural consequence of the war effort. 

My presentation was based on the large World War One pamphlet collection that resides in Special Collections and University Archives.  Specifically, I was very interested in how American propaganda mobilized women to assist in the cultivation and preservation of food.  The title of my presentation was “’Doing Their Bit’: Food, Propaganda, and the Mobilization of the American Home Front.”   I explored how gender specific representations of “patriotism” and “duty” were used to mobilize women in the private and public spheres that constituted the home front.  I looked at pamphlets that promoted the cultivation of “war gardens,” the preserving of food, and the adoption of new recipes to address wartime shortages of wheat and meat.  I also looked at the state’s efforts to recruit women for commercial agricultural work through the Woman’s Land Army. 

Our session was well attended.  There was a lengthy question and answer session.  Audience members were very interested in how race and class may have impacted American propaganda efforts on both the national level and local level. 

As we were preparing to return to North Carolina, I was listening to a news commentator discuss the upcoming Remembrance Day activities in Canada.  While noting the centenary of the outbreak of World War One, he declared that this year’s commemoration (and the wearing of a poppy) took on extra meaning due to a recent terrorist attack at Canada’s National War Memorial and to the fact that the nation was beginning airstrikes on the Islamic State in Iraq.

Society of Georgia Archivists annual meeting

The annual meeting of the Society of Georgia Archivists took place November 6-7 in Athens, GA. The meeting theme was "Plans and Strategies for the Future of Archives." A primary focus of the meeting was discussion of issues related to born-digital archival records. There were small group discussion sessions and formal paper sessions focused on the challenges of acquiring, managing, and providing access to these types of records.

As part of this focus, Richard and I presented a poster and product demonstration for BDRM (born-digital records management system). We discussed our development workflow, user training, and product specifications.

Interestingly, many at the meeting were particularly interested in how we got the development project started in the first place -- the internal advocacy and planning we did that ensured a sustained collaboration across departments.

Society of American Archivists annual meeting in DC

For most of the week of August 11th, I attended the Society of American Archivists annual meeting in Washington, DC. We had a record-high attendance at SAA of over 2500 archivists from academic, government, corporate, museum, and other types of archives. I was able to attend some great sessions and fun events, including a Wednesday evening trip to Ben's Chili Bowl for a lecture on African American history in Washington, DC.

On Thursday, I hosted a discussion session with incoming SAA president Kathleen Roe and SAA Executive Director Nancy Beaumont. Titled "SAA Now and in the Future: A Town Hall Conversation with SAA Leadership," this session allowed members to ask questions about SAA's newly-adopted strategic priorities, recent (and upcoming) changes to the annual meeting, and development of new committees and task forces.

One of the new committees discussed was the Committee on Public Awareness, which I was appointed to earlier this summer. COPA also established an informational table at the annual meeting to begin building member awareness of our activities and ask for feedback on answering the question "what does an archivist do?" We were also mentioned at the Saturday afternoon business section, where President Kathleen Roe challenged all present to experience "a year of living dangerously" and advocate vocally about the power of archives and the importance of archival work.

The meeting of the Reference, Access, and Outreach Section was another conference highlight. This was my first meeting after being elected to the RAO steering committee for FY15. Instead of a traditional meeting, we held an "Idea Swap," where people participated in three 15-minute, moderated small-group discussions on a number of pre-selected topics. I was able to join discussions on outreach to faculty, providing access to born-digital records, and using social media for marketing and outreach.

Other sessions I attended included one focused on developing online tutorials for records management training (featuring a couple of speakers from our State Library and the State Archives), one focused on the use of primary sources in the sciences, one on the value of collecting and using science fiction archival collections, and one on partnering with allied professions/organizations to advocate and build awareness for archives. I was also able to meet up with friends and former professors at the annual Texas Roundup (the UT alumni event held during each annual meeting).

On a related note, I encourage all tenure-track or tenured faculty to check out the Scholars' Travel Fund, available through the Office of Research and Economic Development. The fund supports faculty who are presenting, serving as chairpersons, or participating as panelists at scholarly meetings in the US.

Code4Lib Preconference: Archival Discovery and Use

On Monday, March 24, I attended a day-long preconference on Archival Discovery and Use, held as part of Code4Lib 2014 in Raleigh. This workshop proved interesting for a number of reasons, not the least of which being that it wasn't being led by archivists but by two technology/development librarians. This allowed the archivists in the room (about 1/3 of the 30+ people in attendance) to hear how others understand archival use.

Throughout the day, we had short (10-15) presentations followed by 20-30 minute group discussions, with each group focusing on the presentation from a different angle. Presentation topics ranged from the effectiveness of archival finding aids to integration of finding aids and digitized components to crowdsourcing as a means of enhancing archival description. My group was tasked with questioning the presentations from a point of view related to assessment -- how do we measure the effectiveness of our practices and programs, and how do we interpret user data to inform our work/development?

In these small group discussions, it became clear that the archivist's notion of the archival researcher and his/her needs doesn't always match that of the technology folks. One prominent question framed most of our conversations: should discovery systems be optimized for those conducting in-depth research in the archives (an audience which varies based on your archives' focus), or do we need to present our archival finding aids and digital collections in a way that best reaches the masses and garners more hits (an approach driven largely by analytics)? Most archivists in the group advocated for a focus on the former, while most of the developers and digital collections librarians advocated for the latter.

The framing of the discussions as well as the ensuing conversations reiterated the need for archivists to be (very) vocal in terms of advocating for their researchers in the development or use of technologies aimed at enabling archival discovery. Of course, this is predicated on understanding your users' needs and workflow. This requires a focus on assessment -- particularly qualitative assessment -- as well as an understanding by all staff of who the primary audiences for archival discovery tools are in your particular archives. If archivists don't prioritize this type of user assessment, who will?

3 Archivists, 3 Conferences, 3 Presentations...

Let me set the scene. It's mid-October, the days are getting sorter and the leaves prettier.  Three archivists set out to do the impossible: give three unique presentations at three different conferences in less than one week....

October 16th brought Keith Gorman, Kathelene Smith, and I to the North Carolina Library Association conference in Winston-Salem for our first presentation with Curtis Rogers from the South Carolina State Library.

Evolution of the South Carolina Literary Map
Dr. Curtis R. Rogers

Curtis' portion of the presentation was titled "Evolution of the South Carolina Literary Map."  He gave an overview of the history of South Carolina Literary Map, which began in the early 2000s as a class project in the School of Library and Information Science at the University of South Carolina.

The project had stagnated in the last decade, having outdated information as well as hard to navigate features.  Curtis worked with SLIS at USC to launch a revamped site (www.scliterarymap.org) which went live just days before our presentation. 

He then discussed future plans for sustaining the project, which included having a 'memorandum of understanding' with SLIS to define roles and responsibilities of each party and creating an author submission form for users to suggest writers to be added to the map.



The North Carolina Literary Map:
How to sustain online projects once they are launched


Keith, Kathelene, and I presented on sustaining the North Carolina Literary Map (http://library.uncg.edu/nclitmap).  We discussed the push for state online literary maps from the National Center for the Book as well as the differences in mission and institutional support between our map and other state map projects. 

Research of other online literary maps lead us to some surprising discoveries.  Of the 22 state maps, only 6 had been updated in the last 2 years.  Sustainability is definitely an issue with these projects!

In seeking to sustain the North Carolina Literary map, we set the foundations for sustainability by identifying the map's audience, securing funding, and promoting outreach.  We then redesigned the website and enhanced search functions.  And finally, we are continuing to evolve by adding new collaborators to our advisory board who can assist with funding and assessment.

Reception at the Upcountry Museum,
 Greenville, SC

Following our brief stop at NCLA, we headed to Greenville, SC for the Tri-State Archivists Conference, October 17-18.  This conference provided a rare meeting among archivists from North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia.  Kathelene and I served as the Programming Chairs for the Society of North Carolina Archivists.  Kathelene also headed up Local Arrangements for North Carolina.  I oversaw the call for panel proposal and worked with speakers and presenters to schedule the entire two-day conference.  Kathelene worked tirelessly to ensure registration, catering, and venues were organized and ran smoothly throughout the conference.  She also single-handedly organized a lovely wine and dessert reception for conference participants at the Upcountry Museum in Greenville.

But organizing the conference wasn't enough for us...we needed to present as well!  Keith, Kathelene, and I, along with Gene Hyde from the University of North Carolina at Asheville presented current students, recent graduates, and those re-entering the job market with tips for creating quality cover letters and CVs as well as important considerations for each step of the interview process. 

 

Keith beginning our talk on Career Planning 101 

Keith began by giving a survey of the archival field and informing participants of relevant literature.  Gene Hyde showed the results of a ACRL survey conducted in 2010 titled, "Academic Library Search Committees: What They Want You to Know."  The survey gathered qualitative and quantitative data from academic librarians through the United States.  Results confirmed what we and others involved in the search committee process had know only anecdotally until then; mistakes in cover letters and resumes greatly impacted whether or not candidates were asked for an interview.

Kathelene gave considerations for creating cover letters and resumes, including practical advice such as spellchecking the documents and avoiding confusing fonts and colors.  I presented the real-life example of my recent job search, citing examples of how I tailored my cover letter and CV to highlight how I fit the qualifications listed in the job posting.  Keith talked about both phone and in-person interviews, giving tips for how to prepare and successfully navigate the process.  We concluded by working one-on-one with those who had submitted cover letters and resumes to us prior to the conference, giving personalized

On Monday, October 21st, Kathelene and I set out to once again promote the North Carolina Literary Map.  This time we presented with Gail Buckner at the North Carolina Association for Elementary Educators (NCAEE) Conference.

As part of the 2012-2013 LSTA grant for the NC Lit Map, Gail had worked on creating lesson plans

A slide from our NCAEE presentation

which integrate using the map with various learning objectives.  We spoke about the history of the NC Lit Map, demonstrated how to effectively search for books and authors, and showed participants how they could use the newly developed tools in their classrooms.




This was a busy week in October...we are all still recovering...



Presenting at the Tri-State Archivists Conference

For the first time ever, the Society of North Carolina held its 2013 annual meeting in conjunction with the Society of Georgia Archivists and the South Carolina Archival Association from October 17-18 at Furman University in Greenville, SC. A number of UNCG Libraries staff members attended and presented at the conference.

On Friday morning at 9am, Richard Cox and I co-presenting on "Collaborating for a 21st Century Archives." I spoke about ways in which archivists can work effectively with library IT staff in order to truly document and provide optimal access to modern archival records. Richard then talked about the development process for our born-digital records management (BDRM) tool, and did a quick demonstration of the tool's key capabilities. We had about 70-80 folks attending our session, and we fielded lots of questions (and some queries from others about how they can use BDRM!).

Yes, that's a corgi photo on the slide

Also, as the second part of our time slot, Rachel Trent from the State Archives and Kathleen Kenney from the State Library discussed the State of North Carolina's efforts to manage the permanent records produced via social media (for instance, the Governor's official Facebook page). Of particular interest to me was their use of a newly-developed product (from a Durham-based start up) called ArchiveSocial. As we proceed in our effort to manage born-digital records across campus, tools like ArchiveSocial will come in handy in documenting some of the campus's most visible social media outlets.

The conference also presented numerous opportunities to talk with colleagues from across North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia. I'm a member of both SNCA and the Society of Georgia Archivists, and I always enjoy learning more about what's happening in our neighboring states. Our Thursday evening reception at the Upcountry History Museum was fun (in spite of the fact that the "Snoopy Soars with NASA" exhibit was closed because our reception was outside of their normal operating hours). And, for those who have not visited, downtown Greenville is quite nice -- lots of good restaurants and shops.

Beth Ann and her 2013 SAA annual meeting in New Orleans

August means that sweating archivists from academia, government, historical societies, museums, and non-profits come together for the annual meeting of the Society of American Archivists. I lived in New Orleans from 1999-2001 while attending the University of New Orleans for an MFA, and had not been back there since. I was eager to see the city again while at the same time really dreading the humidity.  Thanks to the freakishly cool weather patterns, it was humane enough to venture outside the conference hotel to meet up with my old friends po'boys, beignets and cafes au lait, muffalettas, raw oysters, and seafood gumbo.

When I wasn't eating, I spent a lot of time networking with other archivists who work with women's collections, military collections and oral history collections.  I am very motivated to bridge these different worlds and work to break out of the silos archivists of specialized collections can find themselves in.


Tuesday August 13:

After throwing my suitcase into my hotel room, I took a taxi uptown to attend the pre-conference Women’s Archives/Women’s Collections:  What does the Future Hold at the Newcomb College Institute at Tulane University. Newcomb college was the women's college for Tulane, and I really enjoyed looking at the archival exhibits at Newcomb.  I had the opportunity to network with a lot of great women and swap some business cards!

 
Here's what I learned:
The Impact of Technology on Women’s Archives and Collections— Born-Digital, Digital Humanities, Digital Initiatives, and Social Media
Presenter: Leslie Fields (Archives and Special Collections, Mount Holyoke College)

Documenting Diverse Communities
Presenters: Danelle Moon (Special Collections, San Jose State University; Kelly Wooten (Sallie Bingham Center, Duke University); Courtney Dean, Stacy Wood, and Angel Diaz (together discussing the June L. Mazer Lesbian Archive at UCLA); Natalia Fernández (Oregon State University Libraries)

Women’s Collections Roundtable Dinner: A Celebration of our History 
Presenters: Elizabeth Novara (University of Maryland), Alexandra Krensky (History
Associates), Lucinda Manning (Independent Archivist), Fernanda Perrone (Rutgers University), Tanya Zanish-Belcher (Wake Forest University)



Wednesday August 14:
Wednesday was "military day". I went on a repository tour to meet the curators and was shown behind the scenes at the WWII museum (http://www.ddaymuseum.org/).  If you look closely at the url, you will notice a telling clue about the museum's history. Originally, begun as the D-Day museum, Congress re-designated it to be about all U.S. involvement in WWII instead of just 6/6/1944.  The museum's holdings include a lot of REALLY LARGE OBJECTS such as planes, boats, jeeps and tanks. The curators told me that they collect everything except live ordnance and human remains, and that they also cannot fit any more Nazi flags into the collections.  I spoke to the curators about the WVHP and business cards were exchanged.

I also took a short tour about a PT boat restoration (http://www.nationalww2museum.org/see-hear/collections/artifacts/pt-305.html).
Later that day was the Military Archives Roundtable (MART) meeting. This is a new roundtable just getting off of the ground and I am part of the small social media and newsletter committees.

To continue the networking after the meeting, I joined the other MARTs at Mulate's, a cajun restaurant. More business card swapping.

Thursday August 15:
Thursday was "Oral History Day" as well as taking in a few instructional sessions. I attended the Oral history section networking brown-bag lunch and then oral history section meeting. Networking and card swapping ensued.

Sessions:
Hurricane Katrina: Disaster Recovery and Documentation in Archival Collections. Hurricane Katrina serves as a prism for examining a variety of archival issues. Subjects discussed included disaster recovery inside an affected repository; development of a large-scale digital collection preserving firsthand accounts, images, blogs, and podcasts; and management of constituent case files in congressional papers.

Lights, Camera, Archives! Working with the Media and Moviemakers
This session features archivists who have worked with documentary filmmakers, worked with television or movie productions, or made a media appearance. Each presenter briefly describes her or his repository’s holdings, the project/issue that is relevant to this topic, and one lesson learned.   (This was a very useful session for me as I have worked with filmmakers using the WVHP  as well as having been interviewed for television.)

And then was the Exhibition Hall opening/Happy Hour where I asked my new friend Ivan the Danish collector of books and ephemera on human sexuality to post for a photo with me. I'll network (a.k.a. schmooze) with anyone.

Friday August 16:
The first order of the day was locating the Ignatius G. Reilly statue on Canal Street (See the classic novel A Confederacy of Dunces).                                                                                          

After that victory was the session Advancing the Ask: Proactive Acquisitions for the Modern Age
The panelists share actual experiences from archivists who work to proactively identify, appraise, and acquire archival materials. They explain strategies and successes in reaching out to donors who are not necessarily cognizant of their role as record creators or of the value of their records to an archives. How can archivists educate donors and use new techniques and tools to gather evidence of  significant events and changes in their communities?

The rest of the day was "Women's Collections Day #2". I met with other members of  the Women’s Collections roundtable and worked to develop a session idea for women’s collections of traditionally male fields. More business cards.

Friday night was the all-attendee reception at Boeing building at WWII museum.

 
The night (and conference) was capped off by experiencing Dr. "Gris Gris" John at Tipitinas!

Saturday August 17:
The last (EARLY morning) session before catching the plane home was Thinking Beyond the Box: How Military Archivists are Meeting 21st Century Challenges.
James Ginther of the Marine Corps University examines innovative approaches to documenting military operations when traditional records retirement methods fail. Anthony Crawford from Kansas State University focuses on the relevance of military archives addressing the multidisciplinary research value of military collections. Joel Westphal from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management addresses the issues of processing the massive amounts of digital records from the war in Iraq using innovative management and processing techniques on an archives of national importance.

My hope is to use my contacts, both new and old, to promote the WVHP within all of the various archival communities it represents.


 

My SAA Annual Meeting Recap

While it’s fresh on my mind, I wanted to share with you my recap of events and activities at the 2013 Society of American Archivists Annual Meeting, which took place August 11-17 in New Orleans. This was my 10th annual meeting (nine as a professional and one as a graduate student), and this one ranked as among the best. While I spent most of my time in meetings or presenting a paper or awards, I still felt that I came away with a greater sense of where the profession is going and innovative ways in which colleagues across the country are helping it get there

I flew out to New Orleans on Tuesday, and hit the ground running on Wednesday at 8am with a meeting of the Annual Meeting Task Force (AMTF). For the past two years, I’ve served on this appointed group that examined our current annual meeting structure and made recommendations for improvements and changes that might better meet member needs, address issues of social responsibility, and incorporate new technologies. In addition to our meeting on Wednesday, we hosted a “World Café” style brown bag forum on Thursday in which we solicited member feedback on our recommendations. Many of those recommendations have already been implemented, with the 2013 Program Committee actively soliciting sessions outside of the “three papers and a moderator” format, the introduction of an annual meeting mobile app that eliminates the need for an on-site paper program, and the SAA Council deciding to hold the 2015 annual meeting in a less expensive, “second tier” city (Cleveland).

River view from the Hilton Riverfront

In addition to AMTF, my appointment as the senior co-chair of the SAA Awards Committee kept me busy for a large portion of the annual meeting. We held a committee meeting on Wednesday afternoon to discuss logistics for the awards presentations as well as issues (such as vague language in the award description or questions of eligibility for certain awards) encountered during the 2013 awards season. With 70+ committee members and 20 awards (plus the selection of new SAA Fellows), we had a lot of awarding to do! Awards were presented at three different times during the annual meeting. At Plenary I on Thursday morning, four new SAA Fellows were introduced and the Council Exemplary Service Award and the Jameson Archival Advocacy Award were presented. On Friday morning, I opened the 8am Plenary II with the presentation of scholarships, travel awards, and writing awards to nine MLIS students from around the U.S. and Canada. And finally, at the Friday afternoon Awards Ceremony, we presented the remaining awards that honored excellence in publications, description, outreach, etc.

I was also elected to a second term on the steering committee of the Issues and Advocacy Roundtable. SAA doesn’t have the government affairs and advocacy framework that other groups like ALA has, so the I&A Roundtable serves as a site to discuss those issues and create opportunities for learning ways to reach out to funders, administrators, and politicians in order to advocate for certain issues, for individual archival repositories, or for the profession at large. At our meeting on Wednesday afternoon, we talked about the ways in which the Roundtable can collaborate with SAA’s Government Affairs Working Group on developing a set of issue briefs that can serve as official SAA position pieces and talking points on key issues.

Late Friday morning, I presented a paper as part of a session titled “Shout it from the Mountaintop: Changing Perceptions about Archival Advocacy.” My paper entitled “Get Your House in Order: Advocating for the Profession by Advocating for Your Archives” focused on the need for archivists to align their conversations with their institution’s mission. I discussed the need for archivists to go beyond a focus on their “specialness,” and instead focus on clearly articulating, assessing, and demonstrating how the work of the archives fits in with the larger whole of their parent organization (a library, corporation, government department, etc.). In doing so, they can build an army of advocates – non-archivist colleagues who can speak to how the archives impacts their work (and how it can potentially impact the work of others in the institution).

Two other meetings – both broken into really well run small group discussions – proved particularly fruitful in helping me think through my work here. One was at the Reference and Outreach Section’s meeting, where I took part in conversations on assessment of instruction in special collections and on engaging undergraduates through archival instruction. The other was at the College and University Archives Section meeting, where we had great talks about collaborating with IT staff and building a network for tenure support and professional mentoring.

Reception at the National WWII Museum

The other big events that I took part in were related to my participation in the 2013 cohort of the Archives Leadership Institute. While ALI isn’t operated by or associated with SAA, they used the annual meeting as an opportunity to bring us all together to discuss our practicum projects, review some key take-awards from our time in Iowa, and allow us to talk about potential collaborative projects that might bridge institutional lines. We had a dinner for all of the ALI alumni (we’re the sixth cohort) on Saturday night, and a Practices Workshop at Tulane University on Sunday morning. Lots of great ideas were discussed, and I’ve already got plans for an SAA 2014 annual meeting session proposal, a possible collaborative grant focused on professional issues, and a number of possibilities for research collaboration.

Audubon Aquarium fish

Both at the SAA and ALI events, we also talked up Archival Practice, our new open-access, peer reviewed journal that is being hosted by UNCG using OJS. I held an informal meeting with many of the members of our wonderful Editorial Board. We handed out 500 postcards to promote the journal, and talked about in all of the roundtable meetings we attended. Folks are really excited about this new publishing opportunity, and we’re looking forward to going live with our first issue – hopefully in January 2014!

So, it was a busy week. I even had to talk a friend from Emory into bringing me beignets, since I didn’t have time to go out to Café du Monde. But there was still time for a little bit of fun – including touring around the National World War II Museum at the All Attendee Reception on Friday night and a trip to see the otters, penguins, and other critters at the Audubon Aquarium of the Americas on Saturday afternoon. All in all, a great trip where I met loads of wonderful new people and learned lots of awesome new things.

Archives Leadership Institute Intensive

I have the privilege of being one of 25 members of the 2013 cohort of the Archives Leadership Institute (ALI), a training opportunity for emerging and innovative leaders in the archival profession. ALI (which is sponsored by the NPHRC -- the National Historical Publications and Records Commission) features a group of archivists from around the country, working in a wide variety of archives. A little over half of the group work in academic institutions, from smaller institutions with only a single archivist to huge institutions like Yale. The other half of the cohort are from government, private/foundation, or corporate archives (including the Target corporate archivist, who talked with us about everything from her collection of little Target dogs to the records she has related to opening new stores in Hawaii and Alaska).

From June 16-22, I traveled to beautiful (and isolated!!) Luther College in Decorah, Iowa, to participate in the week-long Leadership Intensive, the kick-off to our year of ALI. There, we discussed a number of key trends affecting the archival profession, received mentorship from the ALI steering committee, and collaborated on a number of projects and activities aimed at enhancing our abilities to effect change in the archival profession.

Our facilitator for the week was Luther Snow (no relation to the Luther who the Lutheran college is named for), who introduced ways in which leaders can make a positive impact and affect change, even when they are not in a position of authority or control. We focused on issues of leadership (leading when you’re not in charge or even the manager), not management (supervising). Throughout the week, he closed each day’s discussion by steering us away from need-based thinking (which we all know is pretty common in archives and libraries), and focusing on our assets, partnerships, and contributions to a greater whole. I can be a bit of a pessimist, and I’m not a big fan of most “motivational” talk using words like “generativity” or “synergy.” But it was really useful at the end of the days to think in terms of what we do have and what we can do, as opposed to simply thinking about what we need to do or what we need to have.

He's supposed to be falling. Not a failure
on the part of his awesome belayers.

We spent Monday afternoon at Luther College’s ropes course, essentially giant logs hoisted in the air that people climbed up, walked across, jumped off, etc. Folks like me -- those who weren’t about to do something like that! -- served as the “belayers,” essentially the weight at the other end of the ropes that kept the more adventurous people from falling. This was a great ice-breaking activity that really helped our cohort get to know each other.

Tuesday was focused on preservation of born-digital and other technology-dependent records. This session was led by Dan Noonan, Digital Resources Archivist at The Ohio State University. Dan focused on leadership thinking and skills needed to approach digital preservation, not the technical skills or competencies. He emphasized, however, that every archivist should be a digital archivist. Modern records creation demands that every archivist at every institution know something about born-digital records. He also used one my favorite quotes: Voltaire’s “Le mieux est l'ennemi du bien” (Perfect is the enemy of the good). Too many archivists are awaiting a “solution” to the born-digital records challenge. I was proud to be able to talk about my work with ERIT on our BDRM system, and our attempt to do something to ensure that today’s born-digital records are not lost, even if it’s not a “perfect” solution (although I think it’s becoming a pretty great one!).

Seed Savers Exchange

During lunch on Tuesday, we traveled to Seed Savers Exchange, a non-profit farm dedicated to saving and sharing heirloom seeds. Not only was the farm a beautiful spot for a picnic (with awesome cows, chickens, ducks, and geese in addition to the plants), but we learned a lot from their seed curator about ways in which their work is similar to ours in the archives (selection, description, distribution, preservation).

On Wednesday, we learned about Project Management from Sharon Leon, Director of Public Projects at the Center for History and New Media at George Mason University (home of wonderful projects like Omeka and Zotero). She emphasized the importance of communicating a clear vision for a project as well as a willingness to jump in and clearly model the work that needs to be done for your staff. She demonstrated a number of project management tools (like Basecamp), but stressed that you should focus on using the tools, not years of set up. My favorite thing she discussed, however, was her hiring practice for new team members. At the CHNM, they focus primarily on hiring based on curiosity and capacity to learn, not on a strict list of skills or knowledge. As she noted, this allows her to have a flexible team that is willing and able to adapt and respond quickly to change.

Field trip to the Laura Ingalls Wilder Park

During the short free time that we had in the late afternoon, some of us made a quick field trip to the Laura Ingalls Wilder Park and Museum in nearby Burr Oak, Iowa. For those who are Little House fans, this was the place where Grace was born, but not a place featured in any of the books. Unfortunately the museum was closed by the time we got there, although we did spend time exploring the park. Luckily, Decorah sports a large and surprisingly beautiful trout hatchery that was built in the 1930s by the Civilian Conservation Corps, so we traveled there instead.

Thursday’s session featured Chris Barth, Associate Dean at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. Chris talked about strategic planning -- particularly about the importance of having a clear vision of where you want to go and a common understanding of how to get there. The vision remains a constant, but libraries and archives must be able to adapt their “how to get there” plan in order to be responsive. He also discussed the importance of assessment, focusing on the fact that we must target our data collection on things we can change in our move towards our vision. His Tumblr focused on major topics in the information profession (http://pulse.infoneer.net/) is one that I’ll be adding to my feed.

Baker Commons at Luther College, site of our Leadership Intensive

On Friday, we looked at issues of advocacy and awareness with Kathleen Roe, the newly-elected Vice President/President-Elect of the Society of American Archivists and the Director of Archives and Records Management Operations at the New York State Archives. Much of what Kathleen focused on echoed my years of working in athletic media relations. Know your audience, be proactive in your outreach, tailor your messages, understand context, and don’t pander. She had us work on our “elevator speech” about archives (prompting one attendee to ask “Why are we always stuck in an elevator?”), and led us through the steps in developing a formal advocacy plan.

Saturday morning, we wrapped up with week with our facilitator Luther Snow tying all of the topics together. We also had time to talk with our Steering Committee mentor about our practicum projects, a year-long project where we will take what we learned at ALI and apply it to our home institutions. Here at UNCG, I will be focusing on building and promoting a records management training program for faculty and staff -- something that ensures that records (digital or analog) that have enduring historical value make it to the archives. Stay tuned for a brown bag session on this at some point in the upcoming year.

2013 ALI Cohort

Overall, ALI was an outstanding experience. Even though I am exhausted and my back hurts from a week spent sleeping on a dorm mattress, I feel like I learned a lot and met a number of wonderful new colleagues from across the country to whom I can turn with questions, ideas, etc. In fact, it was the informal discussions with passionate people during meals or activities or breaks that proved the most interesting and, in many ways, reinvigorated my love of the archival profession. 

We will be continuing our practicums and our conversations throughout the year, including a second formal discussion during SAA’s annual meeting in New Orleans in August. I really look forward to continuing work with this awesome group of archivists (already have a session proposal for the 2014 SAA annual meeting sketched out!) and applying the management skills and techniques learned to my work here.

Outreach at the University Archives

As part of our outreach at The University of North Carolina at Greensboro’s University Archives, Hermann Trojanowski offers two programs for the University Studies (UNS) students. UNS is a one-semester course designed to help students make a successful transition to the University and covers topics such as adjustment and expectations, time management, learning styles, personal responsibility, goal setting, choosing a major/registering for classes, wellness, leadership and citizenship; and skills such as writing, note-taking, studying, test-taking, and learning about the history of the University.

The first program is a presentation titled “The History of UNCG and Campus Ghosts” and is taught in the Hodges Reading Room located on the second floor of Jackson Library, Main Building. During the presentation, the UNS students learn about the history of UNCG as well as the three ghosts that allegedly haunt Aycock Auditorium, Mary Foust Residence Hall, and Spencer Residence Hall.

Charles Duncan McIver Death Mask

In addition to the presentation, Trojanowski sets up a small display for the students consisting of the 1906 Death Mask of founding president Charles D. McIver and several items from the University Archives Textile Collection such as a 1906 Marshal Dress, 1913 Gym Suit made of black wool, and a 1917 World War I military uniform worn by Dr. Anna Gove and made by Abercrombie & Fitch.

UNS Summer Launch Class in front of the Charles Duncan McIver Statue

The second program is a 50-minute historic walking tour of the campus. During the tour, students learn about the founding of the school in 1891, the typhoid epidemic of 1899 during which thirteen students and one staff member died, the burning of Brick Dormitory in 1904, and brief historical facts about the buildings on the tour as well as the three campus ghosts that allegedly haunt Aycock Auditorium, Mary Foust Residence Hall, and Spencer Residence Hall.

Trojanowski also offers historic campus walking tours to faculty, staff, and visitors as well as parents during the annual Parents Weekend each September.

Society of American Archivists Annual Meeting

By Michelle Belden, Technical Services Archivist

From August 23 to 31 I was in San Francisco for the annual conference of the Society of American Archivists, entitled "Archives 2008: Archival R/Evolution & Identities." The conference was hosted at the Hilton in downtown San Francisco, but I stayed with friends in the Noe Valley/Mission area -- next time, I'm staying at the hotel and forgoing reliance on public transportation to get me to the best sessions in time to grab a seat. Several sessions were SRO, with crowds bubbling out of smaller conference rooms five archivists deep.

I landed at SFO Saturday night and was up bright and early Sunday for a one-day workshop entitled "Applying DACS to Single Item Manuscript Cataloging," taught by two experienced archivists from Yale. DACS - Describing Archives, a Content Standard -- is the current bible of archival cataloging, and this workshop was very useful in its methodical examination of applicable rules and the regular use of in-class exercises to drive home important points. I will definitely use the knowledge gained (and the handy booklet handout) when cataloging our single item collections here in SCUA.

Monday and Tuesday brought a two-day workshop, "Copyright: The Archivist and the Law," taught by William Maher (not the politically incorrect one, the one who is University Archivist at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, former president of SAA and author of several articles I was required to read for graduate school.) Maher furthered the flashback to grad school by requiring a pile of pre-workshop reading as well as periodic quizzes during the days and a group project over Monday night; however, I learned an incredible amount, and the reference materials he distributed should prove invaluable in the future.

The third workshop I attended, "Preserving your Audio and Video Assets," lasted only a half-day, and was taught by the CEO of a professional preservation company rather than a practicing archivist. Though it did not provide the emotional satisfaction of spending time with accomplished role models in the archival field , the presentation did include a detailed checklist for A/V triage accompanied by helpful photographs for identifying different A/V formats and the common problems associated with each.

The latter part of the week was spent in sessions, the best of which was Jill Katte's presentation of her paper "Why Can’t I Click on This? Levels of Description, Variable Access, and User Experience" as part of the session entitled Finding Aids 2.0: Meeting Users Where They Are by Rethinking Finding Aid Presentation. Jill is the Digital Collections Program Coordinator at Duke, and I knew her slightly from my time interning there -- she fixed the file folder structure for an extensive EAD conversion process that had been torturing me for weeks, so I already knew she was awesome, and her paper confirmed this. I covet Duke's new XSLT stylesheet, which allows for a Windows Explorer-type drop-down menu for navigating finding aids (this would be especially appropriate for the new Hansen Performing Arts Collection finding aid, with its 19000 individually-coded lines.)

Another highlight of the week was John Dean's opening plenary, a celebration of the work archivists do to keep government honest and accountable, and an indictment of the current administration's devotion to governmental opacity.

The closing address, given by outgoing SAA president Mark Greene (of More Product, Less Process fame to those of us in the archival groove of things), was nearly overshadowed by the hilariously roast-like introduction by his amigo Dennis Meissner. Greene's delivery was not nearly as entertaining, but the meat of his talk, The Power of Archives: Archivists’ Values and Value in the Post-Modern Age was as significant and inspiring as one would expect from one of the biggest names in archives today. An excerpt from his introduction:

...Of course we must do good work, but we have to actively seek resources and recognition, and that is done by exercising the tools of professional power—at whatever hierarchical level one happens to reside... This is, of course, part of an overall goal of replacing the image of the lab-coated, dust-coated, withdrawn and quiet archivist preciousizing over “old stuff” in dead storage with an image (and self-image) of a confident, articulate, savvy professional.

According to Greene, archival power must stem from archival values, and we as a profession should codify those values much as our colleagues in ALA have done. He proposed 10 core values for for discussion amongst us all: Professionalism; Collectivity; Activism; Selection; Preservation; Democracy; Service; Diversity; Use and Access; and History. I encourage any archivists who missed the speech to read the full text online (link above).

Of course, an important benefit of attending professional conferences is the opportunity to network. I was able to catch up with former classmates from library school -- including one who has been working on implementing the Archivists Toolkit for the past year and will be serving as a resource for me as I begin implementation this semester; and a former mentor from my grad school days who always provides valuable perspective on career development within the archival profession.