Community Driven Archive Initiative (CDA) and Labriola just wrapped up their first year of in-person mentoring for the Memory Keeper Fellowship funded by the Institute of Museum and Library Sciences (IMLS). It is bittersweet to see the first year of the fellowship come to an end however we would like to share the experiences of fellows and their mentors.
Last semester, the first cohort of the IMLS grant-funded Memory Keeper fellowship began. This first cohort of students came from different cultures and walks of life. All were exposed to the Library Information Science (LIS) field. There is a strong focus on archives, memory keeper fellows were introduced to archives through the Community-Driven archival theory. The mission of the fellowship project is to empower local communities to archive their history. However, fellows will learn to archive in a way that fits the cultural customs and protocols of the communities they come from; Black, Latino, Asian Pacific Islander, and Indigenous.
CDA and Labriola developed a solution to protect and preserve the history of local BIPOC communities. To have historical documents accurately documented with the cultural context and narrative of BIPOC (Black Indigenous, People of Color) communities, archivists and librarians are needed from those communities. CDA and Labriola have teamed up to expose students as early as possible to community archiving. Thus a fellowship was created to expose community college students to the fundamentals of LIS.
Shelly Talas (Shelly’s bio can be read here, along with her fellow cohort members) who is a recruit of the 2023-24 cohort chose to work in Black Collections. An archive dedicated to the archival memory of Black and African American people in Arizona at Arizona State University Library. This is where Shelly will be assisting with the processing of a recent archival donation to the collection. With no prior experience and with the knowledge she received during her fellowship here at ASU, Shelly has shown that she is more than capable of archiving materials and has helped the archivist of Black Collections Jessica Salow with the processing of the Ragsdale Family Papers at ASU Library. Shelly shares her experience:
“Getting to work with Jessica Salow on the Lincoln Ragsdale collection has been nothing short of amazing. I am very grateful to have been given the opportunity to see how history is being processed firsthand. The Lincoln Ragsdale collection (and his-self) is the very thread of Black excellence. It’s disheartening to learn that his legacy in the state of Arizona is newly, becoming uncovered and that the pivotal role that he and his family played in shaping the vibrant and diverse inclusivity of our state, has been swept under the rug of Arizona's history. It certainly opened my eyes to the often-overlooked narratives that contributed to the richness of this state. Dr. Lincoln Ragsdale’s impactful contributions to our community, business landscape, and civil rights surely make him an inspiring figure worth highlighting and I can’t wait to see this collection through to the end”
The Ragsdale Family Papers collection is one of the donations Black Collections received since 2021. In the summer of 2023, Lincoln Ragsdale Jr. donated his father’s collection of work as a civil rights leader, businessman, community organizer, and more to ASU Library. The donation consisted of oral history recordings, pictures ( including when Martin Luther King, Jr., visited Arizona), letters between Mr. Ragsdale Sr. and Jessie Jackson, and some of the now historic documents of the fight the Black community of Phoenix took for integration here in Arizona. After her fellowship, Shelly plans to present her fellowship experience at the Juneteenth event on June 16, 2024, at the Arizona Heritage Center in Tempe. Additionally, after Shelly has completed her fellowship, she plans to continue to volunteer and process the collection with her mentors Jessica Salow and Elizabeth Dunham.
Archivist Jessica Salow shares her experience as a mentor during the IMLS Memory Keeper fellowship:
My time as a mentor with this fellowship program and specifically with Shelly Talas during her time as a fellow has been nothing short of amazing. Shelly has provided so much assistance with processing the Ragsdale Family Papers collection at ASU Library during her time with Black Collections. I am so appreciative of this opportunity to share with others the importance of BIPOC representation in the LIS field and the understanding of the need to be a part of the archival memory here in Arizona. This opportunity to mentor someone who could one day be a colleague within this field is an honor and I look forward to being able to mentor future fellows of this program as we continue into this second year of the program.
Community Driven Archive Initiative (CDA) and Labriola just wrapped up their first year of in-person mentoring for the Memory Keeper Fellowship funded by the Institute of Museum and Library Sciences (IMLS). It is bittersweet to see the first year of the fellowship come to an end however we would like to share the experiences of fellows and their mentors.
Last semester, the first cohort of the IMLS grant-funded Memory Keeper fellowship began. This first cohort of students came from different cultures and walks of life. All were exposed to the Library Information Science (LIS) field. There is a strong focus on archives, memory keeper fellows were introduced to archives through the Community-Driven archival theory. The mission of the fellowship project is to empower local communities to archive their history. However, fellows will learn to archive in a way that fits the cultural customs and protocols of the communities they come from; Black, Latino, Asian Pacific Islander, and Indigenous.
CDA and Labriola developed a solution to protect and preserve the history of local BIPOC communities. To have historical documents accurately documented with the cultural context and narrative of BIPOC (Black Indigenous, People of Color) communities, archivists and librarians are needed from those communities. CDA and Labriola have teamed up to expose students as early as possible to community archiving. Thus a fellowship was created to expose community college students to the fundamentals of LIS.
Shelly Talas (Shelly’s bio can be read here, along with her fellow cohort members) who is a recruit of the 2023-24 cohort chose to work in Black Collections. An archive dedicated to the archival memory of Black and African American people in Arizona at Arizona State University Library. This is where Shelly will be assisting with the processing of a recent archival donation to the collection. With no prior experience and with the knowledge she received during her fellowship here at ASU, Shelly has shown that she is more than capable of archiving materials and has helped the archivist of Black Collections Jessica Salow with the processing of the Ragsdale Family Papers at ASU Library.
Shelly shares her experience:
“Getting to work with Jessica Salow on the Lincoln Ragsdale collection has been nothing short of amazing. I am very grateful to have been given the opportunity to see how history is being processed firsthand. The Lincoln Ragsdale collection (and his-self) is the very thread of Black excellence. It’s disheartening to learn that his legacy in the state of Arizona is newly, becoming uncovered and that the pivotal role that he and his family played in shaping the vibrant and diverse inclusivity of our state, has been swept under the rug of Arizona's history. It certainly opened my eyes to the often-overlooked narratives that contributed to the richness of this state. Dr. Lincoln Ragsdale’s impactful contributions to our community, business landscape, and civil rights surely make him an inspiring figure worth highlighting and I can’t wait to see this collection through to the end”
The Ragsdale Family Papers collection is one of the donations Black Collections received since 2021. In the summer of 2023, Lincoln Ragsdale Jr. donated his father’s collection of work as a civil rights leader, businessman, community organizer, and more to ASU Library. The donation consisted of oral history recordings, pictures ( including when Martin Luther King, Jr., visited Arizona), letters between Mr. Ragsdale Sr. and Jessie Jackson, and some of the now historic documents of the fight the Black community of Phoenix took for integration here in Arizona. After her fellowship, Shelly plans to present her fellowship experience at the Juneteenth event on June 16, 2024, at the Arizona Heritage Center in Tempe. Additionally, after Shelly has completed her fellowship, she plans to continue to volunteer and process the collection with her mentors Jessica Salow and Elizabeth Dunham.
Archivist Jessica Salow shares her experience as a mentor during the IMLS Memory Keeper fellowship:
My time as a mentor with this fellowship program and specifically with Shelly Talas during her time as a fellow has been nothing short of amazing. Shelly has provided so much assistance with processing the Ragsdale Family Papers collection at ASU Library during her time with Black Collections. I am so appreciative of this opportunity to share with others the importance of BIPOC representation in the LIS field and the understanding of the need to be a part of the archival memory here in Arizona. This opportunity to mentor someone who could one day be a colleague within this field is an honor and I look forward to being able to mentor future fellows of this program as we continue into this second year of the program.
