Librarians are working to counterbalance collections decisions and priorities that have historically marginalized the histories and experiences of people of color. Critical digital scholars have also highlighted the need to disrupt the replication of this marginalization in the digital sphere. Meanwhile concerns about diversity, cultural competence, and the marginalization of students of color in STEM and librarianship continue. Libraries can use critical digital collections in response. This presentation will focus on an open access digital resource built at Indiana University Bloomington Libraries - Land, Wealth, Liberation: The Making & Unmaking of Black Wealth in the United States - which has seen significant uptake from the campus and community and attracted diverse student workers.

1. LAND ACKNOWLEDGMENT
Welive and work,
without permission,
on the lands of
indigenous peoples.
We wish to acknowledge and honor the Indigenous communities native to this region, and recognize that Indiana
University Bloomington is built without permission on Indigenous homelands and resources. We recognize
the myaamiaki (Miami), Lënape (Delaware), Bodwéwadmik (Potawatomi), and saawanwa (Shawnee) people as
past, present, and future caretakers of this land.
We encourage all to look beyond the gesture of acknowledgment and to engage with local Indigenous
communities. For all who are committed to justice for Indigenous peoples, it is important to not merely read,
learn, and reflect, which are meaningful, but to support Indigenous communities as well. To learn more,
please visit IU Libraries’ resource guide and IU’s First Nations Educational & Cultural Center webpage.

2. LAND
WEALTH
LIBERATION
Critical Digital Collections and Student
Employee Engagement in Libraries

3. Introduction
01.
06.
Student Focus
02.
Lessons Learned
04.
WHAT WE
WILL COVER
Critical Digital
Collections
05.
Digital Exhibitions at
Indiana University
03.
Interactive Activity

4. INTRODUCTION
01.Land, Wealth, Liberation: The
Making & Unmaking of Black
Wealth in the United States

5. https://bit.ly/LWLproject

6. OUR TEAM
MARQUIS BULLOCK
Master’s student Library
& Information Science
RIHONA BING
-ENGLIS
Master’s student
School of Social Work
SAVANNAH PRICE
APOORVA CHIKARA
Master’s student
O’Neill School – Public Policy
Undergraduate student
History & Gender Studies

7. Critical
Digital
Collections
02.

8. Intercultural understanding requires
understanding:
● Marginalized in academic study
● Marginalized in K-12 curriculum
● Marginalized in the built environment
● Marginalized in library collections
Libraries can engage in technologies of
recovery and technologies of reconciliation.
Digital place-making or place-keeping can
foster engagement with students from a
wider range of cultures.
WHAT DO YOU KNOW
ABOUT THE HISTORY OF BLACK COMMUNITIES?

9. RE
-PRESENTINGHISTO
RY
Reconstruction to Tulsa
1865-1921
The Missouri Compromise
to the Civil War
1820-1864
Urban Renewal
1949-1979
After Tulsa, the Great
Depression & the New Deal
1922-1949
The Neo-Liberal Economic
Era
1980-2020
Representation of Library of Congress US History Primary SourceTimeline
OurTimeline

10. ● Need for these kinds of
projects
● Process
● The importance of open
scholarship & open
access publishing
Critical Digital Collections

11. 03.
Digital Exhibitions at
Indiana University

12. ● Often accompany physical exhibitions
● 15 Omeka Classic sites, since 2012
● Growing interest
● Growing technical burden
Digital Exhibitions at
Indiana University

13. ● Omeka S
● Multiple sites on one instance
● Custom themes for IU Libraries
Pilot Project

14. ● TimelineJS
● SoundCloud
● IU digital repository services
Embedding

15. ● Continued use of Omeka S
● Spotlight
Next Steps

16. Questions?

17. Student Focus
04.

18. STUDENT FOCUS
• Training Focus
• Minimal Computing
• Agency
• Meaningful learning experiences

19. MARQUIS BULLOCK
“You think about what the past could have produced,
and what futures could have been created had Black
Americans been given full autonomy over the direction
of their lives after enduring one of the most fraught
experiences—enslavement—in American history.”
Left: MarQuis Bullock
introduces feature speaker
Dr. Valerie Grim at the
LWL launch.
RIHONA BING-ENGLISH
“I had zero information on these policies and history”
Right: Rihona at the LWL launch event.

20. APRIL URBAN
"History is not the past. It is the present." - James Baldwin
Making history publicly accessible is crucial to engaging
communities, increasing understanding, and starting
conversations.”
At left, photo of April.
APOORVA CHIKARA
“Humans are mortal. So are ideas. An idea
needs propagation as much as a plant needs
watering. Otherwise, both will wither and die.”
At right, Apoorva engages with featured
speaker Dr. Valerie Grim at the LWL launch
event.

21. Savannah Price
"History isn't made of irrelevant events; it was made and
shaped by those in power, which we often forget. As
someone from Kentucky, you hear a lot about how we're
majority white, but it wasn't always that way.
Investigating and sharing our own history, where
Kentucky folks intentionally made it that way centuries
ago, is more important now than ever."
Above: Price speaks at the Land, Wealth, Liberation
launch event in March 2022.
Right: A photo of Elleanor Eldridge's memoir, currently
housed in the Indiana University Lilly Library.

22. Lessons
Learned
05.

23. LESSONS LEARNED
Trauma, care and compassion Storytelling Collaboration

24. Interactive Activity
06.
https://bit.ly/LWL-skills

25. Q&A

26. CREDITS: This presentation template was created by Slidesgo, including
icons by Flaticon and infographics & images by Freepik
THANKS!
Do you have any questions?
wtavern@iu.edu
https://libraries.indiana.edu