Sharing Knowledge through Community-Assisted Cataloging and Generous Distribution of Media Assets / Al Bersch, Oakland Museum of California
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Libraries, archives and museums generally share a commitment to provide access to collections information, yet we often struggle for time and resources to fully catalog, digitize, and publish our data. By working in partnership with community experts and other institutions, we have a better shot at reaching a broader public and improving the metadata and digital assets associated with our collections. Collaborative approaches to collections care and access—such as crowdsourcing metadata, volunteer-led digitization, and participation in aggregated sites like the Digital Public Library of America—can open up opportunities, but may require us to rethink our standard modes of operation and to shift perspective—from that of an isolated and distinct facility to one experiencing membership in a global community of institutions, community experts, and end users. This talk will consider various strategies for “opening” collections processing, as well as access, using case examples from the Harold O’Neal film collection at the GLBT Historical Society, and Andrew J. Russell’s glass plate negatives documenting the construction of the transcontinental railroad, at the Oakland Museum of California.
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Sharing Knowledge through Community-Assisted Cataloging and Generous Distribution of Media Assets / Al Bersch, Oakland Museum of California
- 1. Collections and Public Access process > access > critique > change
- 4. Lesbian house party, circa 1968, with Thelma Davis
- 5. From the Enrique Hermosillo papers, 1998-10 (1970)
- 7. The Retro-8 in John’s studio
- 8. Empress IV Reba of San Francisco Imperial Court, 8mm silent film. Anonymous Collection, 2000-67
- 11. Political posters online at collections.museumca.org
- 12. Political posters online at collections.museumca.org
- 13. Brooklyn Museum Online Collections
- 14. East and West Shaking Hands at Laying of Last Rail
- 15. Total 645 Glass plate negatives 447 Stereograph (4”x8” and 5”x8”) and 198 Imperial Plates (10”x13”)
- 16. Locations for Russell photographs
- 19. Andrew Russell photograph online at collections.museumca.org
- 20. OMCA and GLBTHS collections are available on DPLA
- 21. Resources ● Mellon Foundation findings on open access of collection images, published by CLIR ● Studies/commentaries on legal/fiscal/democracy- building motivations for open access (see Michael Peter Edson’s handy list) ● DPLA’s many projects and how to contribute ● Rights Statements project of the DPLA
- 23. How did we get here? Where is this going? Beyond the life of an individual project: reflecting on the past, and looking forward to the future. ● What motivates us towards public engagement? ● Who holds the power? ● Whose interests are being served by this project, in the long run? ● What happens when this project ends? ● What role does my organization play in gentrification? ● Is my organization’s staffing structure stratified in terms of race, gender, class, and disability? ● Do the cultural identities of the staff reflect our local community?
- 25. Community Advisory board to Pacific World exhibition, in collections storage.
Editor's Notes
- I want to describe some ongoing, in-process frameworks for community-assisted collections work that could be adapted and applied to any project, focusing on areas for improvement.
- The GLBTHS is a community-based public history institution housing one of the largest collections of LGBT materials in the world, and documenting nearly 100 years of queer life.
- The Wide Open Town History collection (2003-05) contains the photos gathered for Historian Nan Alamilla Boyd’s history of queer San Francisco to 1965, Wide Open Town. The GLBTHS funds its digitization and cataloging work primarily through grants. Two recent grants from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission (NHPRC) allowed us to complete an electronic survey of all the Historical Society’s manuscript collections, as well as survey, process, and create prioritized lists of audiovisual materials for future digitization.
- This collection contains materials relating to the professional and personal life of nurse and cosmetologist, Enrique Hermosillo (1952-1997), who lived in San Francisco off and on from the mid-1970s until his death from HIV. The collection includes correspondence; journals; materials related to his two careers; drawings; personalia; and photographs.
- O'Neal started filming in Southern California in 1939 and continued through the 1980s. The collection includes footage of the relocation of Japanese Americans to concentration camps in World War II, female impersonators performing at the Beige Room in San Francisco, gay men socializing in the 1940s including drag and other camp images and gay freedom day parades from 1978-1980. There are also numerous reels documenting his travels abroad with his partner of over 50 years. Crawford Barton was primarily a still photographer and artist who left us two boxes of films depicting his life and loves in San Francisco and his native Georgia.
- Stu Maddux purchased a small gauge film scanner and made it available to GLBTHS in exchange for use of the digital copies in his film Reel in the Closet. Here is the Retro-8 set up in John’s studio. Inside, a camera sees sprocket holes go by and takes a snapshot of each and every frame. They’re sent in HD resolution to a computer, where they get assembled into a QuickTime movie at the appropriate frame rate — sixteen frames per second (fps) for Regular 8 mm or 18 fps for Super 8.
- Regular 8mm film from the Harold T. O’Neal Collection
- OMCA, as the multidisciplinary art/history/science museum we know today, was formed out of the joining of the Oakland Public Museum, the Snow Museum of Natural History, and the Oakland Art Gallery, in 1969.
- AOUON - The “All Of Us Or None” (AOUON) archive project was started by Free Speech Movement activist Michael Rossman in 1977 to gather and document posters of modern progressive movements in the United States. Though some early works are included, its focus is on the domestic political poster renaissance that began in 1965 and continues to this day. When Rossman died May 12, 2008 his family donated the collection to the Oakland Museum of California.
- Specialist curator Lincoln Cushing was hired to assist with cataloging, because of the breadth of his knowledge about the movements and people who created these posters. Public input was gathered online, and added to collections information. Registrars spent 5 years cataloging 22,000 posters.
- Elegant crowdsourcing, adaptable for a collection like All Of Us Or None.
- Andrew Russell Andrew Joseph Russell (1830 – 1902) One of a handful of landscape photographers who shaped our perception of the American West in the 19th century, Russell worked for Matthew Brady before documenting the U.S. Military Railroad as a captain during the Civil War. After the war, he secured a position as official photographer for the Union Pacific Railroad in its massive endeavor to construct a transcontinental railroad. His photographs, culminating in the iconic “Joining of the Rails” at Promontory, Utah, were hugely instrumental in shaping the image of the American West. In 1969 the Oakland Museum acquired nearly 650 collodion “wet plate” negatives in both stereo and “imperial” (10 X 13 inch) formats.
- This important collection was long under-accessed and poorly stored. The NEA funded a digitizing and rehousing project, involving conservators, curators, collections staff and educators. Train enthusiasts and photography historians got involved.
- Independent historians have gathered extensive information about the locations along the Union Pacific railroad. We have a real opportunity to incorporate this knowledge back into the collections metadata.
- More than anything else from the AOUON collection, people are asking for access to large, printable reproductions.
- The Andrew Russell collection is fully digitized, and in the public domain, so in that sense it provided a good test case for providing large images free of charge. In order to come to this decision, we needed agreement from the development department, rights and reproductions staff, and IT. We had to plan for more storage space, since the image files are larger that we’d been using.
- By linking up collections data in aggregated sites like the DPLA, we broaden access to our collections information. The DPLA is sharable, user friendly, and freely available to libraries, archives and museums throughout the US and the world. Yet, lack of knowledge about the benefits of participation, compounded with concerns about loss of control, can be barriers to sharing. Fortunately, there are resources to help build an argument for further involvement. (next page)
- Kristin Kelly’s 2013 Study for the Andrew Mellon Foundation on the experience of open access to images of works of art at 11 Museums highlights the importance of clear processes, access to the right technologies/tools, and assuages fears about loss of control and loss of revenue from opening up. The DPLA: Ideas and Projects - you don’t need to be a programmer to contribute a great idea for an app or tool. Here you’ll also find digitization resources for libraries, sample rights statements, and more. We do not need to start from scratch.
- Access for Whom?
- Privatization and restrictions of public spaces, both physical and virtual, often masquerade as opportunities for increased access and community engagement. In an age when intellectual freedoms are threatened more than ever before, we need to pay attention, and to speak up at our institutions.
- New York Times, 1969 Understanding our institutional history is the first step towards accountability and action.
- OMCA uses a community advisory board, or task force structure to bring in the voices and areas of input from community members who are also stakeholders in specific exhibitions. Could there be benefits of replicating something like this for collections care and access? What are the pitfalls or sticking points with using a community advisory model? How could museums, archives, and libraries ensure that programming reflects the desires, needs, and interests of diverse audiences? What needs to change, structurally (disruption of racial stratification in staffing structures, cost of admission, communication materials)?
- Being intentional rather than opportunistic: Investing in education around power and privilege. Permanent community outreach work that is integrated with entire institution, rather than grant-funded. Seeking out community expertise rather than waiting for people to self-nominate. Being generous with access.
- Thank you!