Ara Wilson, Henry Banks Jr., Roy Banks and Fremont Nelson, cooks on a steamship
From the F 2076 Alvin D. McCurdy fonds as part of the Archives of Ontario’s GLAM Wiki project.

About the Project

This project asked three questions: How do new technologies, including advanced digital media, impact the preservation and (re)making of (re)emerging cultures and historical narratives, particularly among marginalized groups and communities? What opportunities and risks do these same technologies pose for communities? How can these communities engage with technologies on their own terms to define and derive benefits? 

This project analyzed the literature on archival digital assets that centralize storage, access, management, organization, and long-term preservation of artifacts and images; conducted a cross-disciplinary mapping of the current discussions about race in the fields of digital technology, graphic communications, library and archives, and Black studies; and identified the pragmatic components of developing a methodology for describing Black digital collections. This included articulating how, when physical materials are converted into digital assets, they can still be tagged in a way that preserves Black history, culture, and community narratives. 

At the core of this knowledge synthesis project was studying digital assets from a cross-disciplinary perspective to articulate a methodology that can be applied to the digital Black archival records.

Key findings

1. Overview of digital Black collections in Canada

Our study identified 34 digital collections in Canada that include and identify Black archival materials. In these collections, accessibility, nomenclature, content, categorization, and display include:

• Oral histories (e.g., Osgoode Society, TMU Libraries, Nova Scotia Archives)
• Exhibit catalogues (e.g., City Museum Edmonton, Archives of Manitoba)
• Virtual museums (e.g., Africville Virtual Museum, The BC Black History Awareness Society’s Digital Museum)

Collections ranged from:

• Federal (1)
• Provincial (11)
• Municipal (6)
• Postsecondary (10)
• Non-governmental/community-based (6)

There is no standardized system for the preservation, digitization, or presentation of Black collections in Canada. At the federal level, archival practices are governed by Library and Archives Canada’s Preservation Policy (2022), which identifies three guiding principles (trustworthiness, sustainability, and collaboration) for archives and libraries in Canada. Yet, it does not discuss race, equity or community. 

Similarly, the Canadian Council of Archives offers Guidelines for Archives (2001) and a Digitization and Archives (2002) resource. Still, neither document discusses historical inequity, cultural awareness, Black Canadian collections, racial justice, or community engagement. Neither resource has been updated in nearly 25 years.

2. Current literature on archives and problems of representation

• Our literature review included 27 journal articles and 17 books addressing archival studies, library and information sciences, digital humanities, race, and representation.
• Most of the texts were published in the 2010s or later (34/44 entries), highlighting a gap between current literature in archival studies and archival policy in Canada.
• Most of the library and information studies (LIS) has identified the problem of “White institutional presence” as ingrained in the acquisition, preservation, and organization of materials in academic libraries, calling for a reassessment of the institutional structures from hiring practices to service design (Brook et al., 2015). 
• The use of critical race theory (CRT) in assessing LIS as an epistemic field has revealed how the logic and structures of LIS perpetuate racial erasure and white supremacy and, therefore, require intervention in procedure and labour practices (Leung et al., 2021). 
• The creation of the African American Digital and Experimental Humanities initiative at the University of Maryland provides a significant practical framework for integrating Black studies (or CRT) with LIS and, by extension, the digitization of Black archival collections (Steele et al., 2023). Canadian archival collections, amidst demands for racial justice, must engage more directly with Black studies, CRT, LIS, and Black digital humanities. 

Portrait of two unidentified women, Ann Arbor, Michigan (left)
Portrait of unidentified couple, Windsor, Ontario (centre)
Portrait of unidentified couple, Mansfield, Ohio (right)
All images from the F 2076 Alvin D. McCurdy fonds  as part of the Archives of Ontario’s GLAM Wiki project.

Policy implications 

• We recommend integrating scholarship that critiques and reshapes LIS and archival studies into policies governing the development of archival and library sciences training procedures.
• Institutional policies governing archival and library sciences need review to better address the preservation and accessibility of historical and cultural narratives of Black Canadians.
• Institutional intervention is needed at the level of systems and training procedures to address epistemological racism. 
• By examining the literature on digital assets alongside literature on archival sciences, LIS, and Black Canadian history, we establish a foundation for a methodology that prioritizes greater equity in digital archival design. 
• This methodology includes developing descriptive language for Black histories and communities, creating an analytical framework rooted in our literature review findings, and identifying core themes for Black archival collections.