The site where hundreds of men and women trained as volunteers to register African-Americans to vote in the 1960s has been designated a Freedom Station by the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center.In 1964, hundreds of volunteers, many of whom were white college students, trained in Oxford on the former Western College for Women campus before they traveled south to register black voters and set up freedom schools.Read more here. In related news, there is a new president at the Underground...
This report describes our investigation into the global proliferation of Internet filtering systems manufactured by the Canadian company, Netsweeper, Inc. After undertaking a mapping of worldwide country installations, we focus in on ten country cases in which we verify that Netsweeper systems are being used to censor the Internet for subscribers of consumer Internet Service Providers, and where human rights and corporate social responsibility questions are acute.
Read more here.
This conference brings together scholars to address the role of the police in the Holocaust, particularly in the organized murder of Jews and Roma. The Nazi state and their allies involved police at every stage of the genocidal process, from the arrest and looting of the victims to their deportation and killing. During Nazi occupation, non-German police units—some already in existence, some newly created—performed a range of key functions in pursuit of German goals, but also based on their own...
Bishop Malusi Mpumlwana said at the event held in front of the Constitutional Court in Johannesburg that with Madikizela-Mandela’s passing “we have gained an ancestor of active citizenship”. He said this after leading the gathering in observing a moment of silence for her.
Monday 9 April marks exactly 100 days to what would have been Mandela’s 100th birthday; and a week since Madikizela-Mandela passed away on 2 April after an illness.
The public event honoured and celebrated the life of...
The National Security Archive filed suit under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) against the CIA today in federal district court in Washington. The case seeks 12 specific cables from November and December 2002 that were authored or authorized by Gina Haspel, the acting director of the CIA as of this morning. The cables describe the torture of a CIA detainee under her supervision.The Archive filed a FOIA request with the CIA for the 12 cables on April 16, 2018. The Archive FOIA sought...
The Home Office destroyed thousands of landing card slips recording Windrush immigrants’ arrival dates in the UK, despite staff warnings that the move would make it harder to check the records of older Caribbean-born residents experiencing residency difficulties.
A former Home Office employee said the records, stored in the basement of a government tower block, were a vital resource for case workers when they were asked to find information about someone’s arrival date in the UK from the West...
In the latest on our blog, Meg Hixon covers the panel on de-centering whiteness in archives at the Midwest Archives Conference in Chicago, IL. Read the post here.
There's more conference coverage coming very, very soon! If you're interested in covering a conference session, or writing about something else related to archives and human rights email hilary.h.barlow@gmail.com
Come join in the Twitter preservation conversation on Thursday, April 26, 2018. #PresTC will have 25 presentations on a range of topics, from the general public to preservation specialists. See below for the full schedule. Follow The Preservation Section's account at https://twitter.com/SAApreservation for more.
Time (All times EDT)
Session
9:00-9:15 AM
Emergency Preparedness: More than a Binder
Andrew Robb
Abstract: Collection Emergency Preparedness involves five steps...
Apologies for the delay this month, but I had a busier than expected Easter/beginning of Passover. Hope you had a blessed Easter and a hearty chag sameach!
Something important to you missing from this newsletter? Send a submission my way and let me know what you would like to see.
Please submit newsletter items about archives and human rights (writ broadly) to hilary.h.barlow@gmail.com. These can be recent publications, upcoming events or exhibitions, opportunities and scholarships, or...
Critical approaches to librarianship help us think about the ways that our work is fundamentally political and theoretical. These approaches firmly assert that social justice should be central goal and professional responsibility of librarianship and are used, therefore, to inform more inclusive policy, curriculum, and communication. As critical librarianship gains in popularity and visibility there is a growing demand for spaces where beginners can explore and unpack what it means to be ‘...
A prominent image of the Canadian Museum for Human Rights (CMHR) will be featured on the new $10 bank note as a symbol of Canada's ongoing pursuit of rights and freedoms, the Bank of Canada revealed March 8.The front of the note displays a portrait of Viola Desmond, whose defiant stand against racial segregation is featured in an exhibit housed in the CMHR's Canadian Journeys gallery. An external façade of the CMHR, overlaid on an image of its glowing alabaster rampways, will be portrayed on...
On Tuesday, the Nelson Mandela Foundation, Media Monitoring Africa and the Oslo Freedom Forum hosted a panel discussion and dialogue named “Media Under Fire”. The dialogue was part of ongoing work to engage with the media in South Africa. The event sought to explore new threats posed to the media, as well how journalists begin to self-censor when they find themselves under threat.
The panel included award-winning Angolan investigative journalist Rafael Marques de Morais, Palestinian blogger...
All these conferences have sessions related to human rights and archives, and the HRA Blog needs YOU to write posts summarizing them. It's not as hard as it sounds, and it's a great way to ad a publication to your resume. Here are two examples of sessions covered at SAA 2017.
If you're interested in covering a session at these or other conferences, or if you have any questions, email hilary.h.barlow@gmail.com
The National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis, TN and the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center in Cincinnati, OH will be hosting events to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination.
Events at the National Civil Rights Museum include two symposiums on April 2 and 3, followed by am all-day remembrance on April 4, and a Evening of Storytelling featuring civil rights icons and new movement makers also on April 4.
The MLK50 event at the National...
Archival History News Call for Editor(s)
The Archival History Section seeks an editor(s) to assist in the production of Archival History News (https://archivalhistorynews.wordpress.com/).
Founded in 1986 as the Archival History Roundtable, the AHS advocates for and promotes an understanding of the history of the American archival profession. Archival History News has cultivated an international online readership interested in the people, events, and literature central to the history of...
As of March 2018, MDOS has updated its committee roster, and includes the following members:
Co-Chair: Martha Parker, University of Arkansas Libraries
Co-Chair: Blake Graham, University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries
Social Media Coordinator: Rebecca Pattillo, University of Louisville
Steering Committee Member: Courtney Butler, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City
Steering Committee Member: Laurel Mcphee, University of California, San Diego
Steering Committee Member: Elisa Landaverde, Michigan...
The Students and New Archives Professionals (SNAP) Roundtable is seeking nominations for the appointed ex-officio position of Blog Coordinator (see description below). Ex-officio positions are open to all SNAP members.
The term for the office is for the 2018 calendar year, beginning immediately upon appointment and ending on December 31, 2018. A second year may optionally be considered after the end of the first year. If you wish to nominate yourself or someone else, please complete the...
The SNAP Steering Committee has reviewed its standing rules and is putting forward the following revisions (as detailed in the attached PDF). The proposed revisions bring the standing rules up-to-date with the section’s current communications methods, and include the removal of references to the defunct SNAP newsletter, which has been replaced by the SNAP blog.
Per Section VI Amendments of the standing rules, the proposed changes will be submitted to an electronic vote on the section’s annual...
