Three books have been published in recent months which address themes of fundamental importance to the Nelson Mandela Foundation. Each of them, in very different ways, explores the nexuses of archive-discourse, public-private and violence-peacemaking. All three of the books have benefitted from engagement with the Foundation and its archival resources.
Jacob Dlamini’s The Terrorist Album uses a particular apartheid-era security police record as a prism for reading apartheid security archives...
For most of his life, all the information Igor Kulakov had about his paternal great-grandparents was their picture, their names and the fact that they had been murdered during the Holocaust.
The assumption in his family had always been that Sheindle and Mordechai Sova were shot at Babyn Yar (often spelled “Babi Yar”), a ravine on Kyiv’s outskirts where German troops massacred at least 33,000 Jews in September 1941, in one of the largest massacres of the Holocaust.
But in recent months, Kulakov...
Since the Vatican opened its post-1939 closed archives earlier this year, historians are gaining new insight into how one of the world’s most influential institutions, the Catholic Church, confronted—or failed to confront—the Nazi regime, particularly its persecution of Jews.
Holy Silence, a thought-provoking and timely new documentary, examines the role of Vatican and US leaders in shaping the Church's response to the rising Nazi threat and antisemitism spreading across Europe.
Join us for a...
Join us to celebrate the launch of Out North: An Archive of Queer Activism and Kinship in Canada. Recently published by Figure 1 Publishing in Vancouver, BC, this book tells a story of LGBTQ2+ collective life and action in Canada since the mid-twentieth century and emphasizes political and cultural movements across regional lines. Out North features artwork, photographs, journals, publications, and ephemera held at The ArQuives: Canada’s LGBTQ2+ Archives (the largest independent LGBTQ2+ archive...
Algoma University’s Shingwauk Residential Schools Centre (SRSC) has been awarded the National Trust of Canada Ecclesiastical Insurance Cornerstone Resilient Places Award for their impressive work on the Shingwauk site.
The Ecclesiastical Insurance Cornerstone Awards bring national attention to exemplary projects and places that contribute to quality of life and sense of place, and illustrate the viability of heritage buildings and sites for traditional or new uses. The awards are presented in...
The Convention relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War was adopted in Geneva on July 27th 1929. It was later revised alongside the pre-dating Convention protecting the war wounded and remains in force today as the third of the four 1949 Geneva Conventions. In 1929, the adoption of this first multilateral treaty entirely dedicated to the protection of prisoners of war (POW) filled an important gap in the international legal framework and crystallized a major shift in the way prisoners of...
This report examines algorithmic technologies that are designed for use in criminal law enforcement systems. Algorithmic policing is an area of technological development that, in theory, is designed to enable law enforcement agencies to either automate surveillance or to draw inferences through the use of mass data processing in the hopes of predicting potential criminal activity. The latter type of technology and the policing methods built upon it are often referred to as predictive policing....
Now that the Republican and Democratic parties have officially confirmed President Donald J. Trump and former Vice President Joseph R. Biden, Jr as their respective presidential nominees, the Cyber Vault will take a closer look at what cybersecurity and digital policy might look like under either a Trump or Biden administration. Over the coming weeks, future postings will review documents that provide insights into how key areas of cybersecurity policy, such as critical infrastructure...
In August 1862, Minnesota erupted in unprecedented violence. The Dakota, a people that had been confined to two strips of land along the Minnesota River Valley through a series of treaties, began attacking white settlements in the region. Within days, New Ulm had been almost completely burned down and an American Army outpost had been besieged. Just as quickly as the fighting began, it was over; Lincoln, in the midst of leading the Union through the American Civil War, sent Federal troops into...
The Nelson Mandela Foundation’s Centre of Memory houses Nelson Mandela Archive that includes Madiba’s private papers, office papers and associated papers. The digitisation project aims at creating a virtual archive by documenting, enabling access and preservation, and promoting the utilisation of the writings and life and times of Nelson Mandela. Although analogue materials can survive for centuries if they are kept under proper conditions, it is important for them to be digitised so that they...
The Douglas County Library Board of Trustees voted 3-2 Tuesday to approve an investigation into the library’s director Amy Dodson and the staff of the library regarding their proposed support for the Black Lives Matter movement.
On July 22, the Douglas County Public Library Board of Trustees issued an agenda for their July 28th meeting which included a discussion item on a proposed addition to their Diversity Statement.
However, that meeting was cancelled after the library, the Douglas County...
The Canadian Museum for Human Rights (CMHR) welcomes today’s announcement of Manitoba human rights lawyer and advocate Isha Khan as its new president and chief executive officer.
CMHR Board Chair Pauline Rafferty said the appointment is a crucial and positive step towards rebuilding trust in the Museum’s commitment to human rights. The five‐year appointment, which commences on August 17, was announced today by the Honourable Steven Guilbeault, Minister of Canadian Heritage.
Read more here....
A4BLiP stands in solidarity with Don’t Shoot and its disassociation from and opposition to Portland Wall of Moms (WOM). Don’t Shoot Portland has called out WOM, and specifically WOM leader Bev Barnum, for failing to protect vulnerable Black women protestors after marching, filing for 501c3 status without consulting newly installed Black leaders, and using the cover of Black leadership to further an agenda unrelated to Black Lives Matter.
As a primarily white group, A4BLiP largely seeks to...
We all would like to believe that we are aware of Cultural Diversity Competency (CDC), but what exactly does it stand for? Helen Wong Smith says it’s the ability to function with awareness, knowledge, and interpersonal skill when engaging people of different backgrounds, assumptions, beliefs, values, and behaviors. In this workshop you’ll be challenged to examine personal perceptions that might surprise you and, you’ll be introduced to strategies that will increase your ability to practice...
Are you a New York State museum, historical society or heritage organization that wishes to engage more deeply in work related to Indigenous peoples?
To assist you, the International Coalition of Sites of Conscience – with generous support from the New York Council on the Arts – is offering free one-hour virtual consultations with four experts in awide range of Native American issues, including history, arts, women, and memorialization.
Read more here.
Bridges of Memory: Connecting Communities & Classrooms was a series of community dialogues and virtual educator workshops with the aim to learn about genocides from the experiences and perspectives of local survivors and survivor communities. Topics included the Armenian Genocide, Holodomor, Holocaust, and Cambodian Genocide, as well as a focus on how individuals and communities share stories of loss and survival, navigate trauma, memorialize victims, preserve and celebrate culture, and...
Bearing Witness is an effort to document and interpret the events associated with the novel coronavirus epidemic in the United States as it pertains to racialized minorities.
Our methodology is fairly simple. Our research team has established a series of Google alerts on specific topics related to mass incarceration, social determinants of health. We have drawn from these to create the Timeline below. The Timeline represents principally four types of events: data events, political events,...
Fifteen years old this week, Guatemala’s National Police archive has helped prosecute numerous officials for their roles in the country’s civil war. Now shuttered by a Trump-backed government, its dramatic history illustrates the crucial role of state archives in protecting democracy.
“Even ten years ago,” the activist told me, “they would have killed all the people working on a project like that.” It was 2008, he was referring to the unlikely discovery and rescue of the archives of Guatemala’...
In October, the Center for Holocaust & Genocide Studies welcomed Hasan Hasanovic to campus to discuss his experience as a survivor of the Srebrenica genocide. Mr. Hasanovic was 18 when Bosnian Serbs systematically murdered more than 8,000 Bosniak men and boys in July 1995. Since then, Mr. Hasanovic has written an account of his story, Surviving Srebrenica (The Lumphanen Press, 2016), and spoken around the world on the topic of Srebrenica and genocide more broadly. For the last decade, he...
There is perhaps no single figure whose own life and career embodies the promise, success, and continued challenges of civil rights for Black Americans than John Lewis. We mourn this tremendous loss and look back on his incredible history through our holdings dating back to the early 1960s, including the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom and “Bloody Sunday,” the first March from Selma to Montgomery.
Representative Lewis spent his life fighting for human rights and civil liberties and...
Archives for Black Lives in Philadelphia (A4BLiP), formed in 2016, is a loose association that now includes 80+ archivists, librarians, and information professionals in the Delaware Valley concerned about the issues raised by the Black Lives Matter movement and interested in finding ways to react and engage as community members and as archival professionals.
A4BLiP has watched with alarm as Black library workers at the Free Library of Philadelphia (FLP) have surfaced significant complaints,...
The RBML’s archival, manuscript, oral history and University Archives are full of materials from people who were out and proud, recently revealed queer collections and likely materials and people still somewhat closeted by historical forces and past archival practices rooted in homophobia.
You’re invited during PRIDE month, and every other month, to explore the collections we have on offer that begin to demonstrate the range of LGBTQIA people, voices and experiences.
Read more here.
The LGBTQ Oral History Digital Collaboratory is excited to announce the completion of the Trans Collections Guide for The ArQuives: Canada’s LGBTQ2+ Archives! Drawing on research supported by the Canadian Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, a rotating team of Collaboratory and members of The ArQuives have been hard at work for the past six years to create The ArQuives’ first-ever Trans Collections Guide, offering researchers much-needed insight into The ArQuives’ extensive trans-...
The Board of Trustees of the Canadian Museum for Human Rights (CMHR) has announced immediate action to address recent allegations of systemic racism, discrimination and claims of sexual harassment at the Museum.
“These allegations were not properly escalated to the Board of Trustees,” said Board Chair Pauline Rafferty. “Now that we have a more complete understanding of these events, we are taking immediate action and will undertake long‐term steps to address these issues.”
The Board and CMHR...
In recent years, I’ve spoken (or tweeted) in passing about some of the ways I’ve been disabled by traditional academic conference models. I am intentionally using the verb tense “disabled.” Where the medical model of disability argues that I am rendered incapable by my own broken and deficient body, the social model of disability emphasizes that we are disabled by the hostility and inflexibility of our environment. The social model reminds me that pain and discomfort is not the inevitable price...
