- Archivists demand return of seized Iraqi documents The Society of American Archivists (SAA) and the Association of Canadian Archivists (ACA) have released a joint statement calling for the return of five sets of records seized from Iraq during both Gulf conflicts and now in various US locations. They are (from the statement): Records seized by the U.S. military and intelligence agencies during […]
- Event: Archive Fever at NYPL This coming Monday April 14 at the New York Public Library: “One of the most compelling issues explored by artists in recent years centers on the nature and meaning of the archive, that is, how we create, store, and circulate pictures and information. Against the standard view of the archive which evokes a dim, musty […]
- New Human Rights Archives newsletter from ICA The Archives and Human Rights Working Group of the International Council on Archives has published its first newsletter. According to the editorial, “The newsletter will appear on a monthly basis until the ICA Congress in July 2008. A possible outcome of the Congress could be the establishment of a formalized Network, possibly within the ICA, […]
- Orphan Film Symposium pt. II The Orphan Film Symposium made possible a fantastic convergence in NYC of archivists, filmmakers, scholars and students from around the globe this past week, with equal diversity represented in the film and video program. In addition to screenings of animated shorts, educational films, silents, newsreels and government sponsored films, we were pleased to see a […]
- Orphans Film Symposium WITNESS Media Archive staff will participate in the Orphans Film Symposium this week. What is an orphan film? From the Orphans website: Narrowly defined, it’s a motion picture abandoned by its owner or caretaker. More generally, the term refers to all manner of films outside of the commercial mainstream: public domain materials, home movies, outtakes, […]
- Behind the Abu Ghraib photographs: Gourevitch/Morris New Yorker article Thanks to everyone at Duke for a great visit. I had the opportunity to meet and speak with a great group of archivists there, as well as to screen Missing Lives: Disappearances and Impunity in the North Caucasus to a more general audience. Produced with partner Human Rights Center Memorial, the video documents the problem […]
- Event: visit to Archive for Human Rights at Duke Next week I’ll be visiting and speaking at the Archive for Human Rights at Duke University. I’ll be screening a recent Memorial/WITNESS video, Missing Lives: Disappearances and Impunity in the Northern Caucasus, and talk about some of the production and archiving processes and challenges; the announcement is here. I’m looking forward to seeing the Duke […]
- U Conn Symposium I returned last night from a brief but really productive symposium at the University of Connecticut, organized and hosted by the Dodd Center, home to the University’s human rights collections. The symposium was designed in part as a follow-up to last October’s conference at Columbia, and an effort to foster collaboration and resource-sharing among organizations […]
- Event: Human Rights Archives & Documentation at U Conn March 3 & 4, 2008: The Thomas J. Dodd Research Center and the Human Rights Institute at the University of Connecticut is hosting a one and a half day symposium, “Human Rights Archives and Documentation: Transforming Ideas into Practice.” Speakers include Patricia Wald of the ICTY and Trudy Huskamp Peterson, former Acting Archivist of the […]
- WITNESS launches the HUB WITNESS has launched the HUB. This is the first participatory site devoted to human rights media.
- Take 60 seconds to watch this – and then pass it on See video on the Hub here.
- Further thoughts on AMIA-Rochester A follow up to the Association of Moving Image Archivists conference two weeks ago: WITNESS Archive staff attended an thoughtful session entitled “Recording Retribution: Issues in the Curation of, and Access to, Actuality Footage of War and Atrocity.” Speakers included staff from the Imperial War Museum, the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, and Inkulla Media. Presentations […]
- Archives panel convenes for Rwanda, Yugoslavia tribunals Former ICTY and ICTR prosecutor Richard Goldstone is leading a panel tasked with determining how to ensure future preservation and access for the records of Rwanda and Yugoslavia war crimes tribunals. The archives of both courts comprise – so far – millions of documents and tens of thousands of audio and video recordings. More at: […]
- Archives & Documentation Conference: a few thoughts Human Rights Archives and Documentation: Meeting the Needs of Research, Teaching, Advocacy and Social Justice. Hosted by Columbia’s Center for Human Rights Documentation & Research, the conference was really an excellent first step in promoting collaboration and dialogue among different kinds of organizations dealing with human rights materials. Participants included archivists from academic institutions, and […]
- Event: Human Rights Archives & Documentation Columbia Center for Human Rights Documentation & Research event, October 4-6, 2007: Human Rights Archives and Documentation: Meeting the Needs of Research, Teaching, Advocacy and Social Justice. Keynote by Juan Mendez and David Marwell, with speakers from the National Security Archive, the Cambodian Genocide Documentation Project at Yale, the Shoah Visual History Foundation, Human Rights […]
Archiving Human Rights
Posts from the WITNESS Media Archive whose mission is to collect, document, preserve and provide access to audiovisual human rights media in the support of advocacy, prosecution of justice, truthtelling and the historical record.
These posts are devoted to news of our activities and work, and to discussion of topics relevant to it, including human rights archives and documentation, audiovisual archiving, social issue documentary, the social justice responsibilities of archives and archivists, etc.
Posts are written by Grace Lile, Director of Operations; Yvonne Ng, Archivist; and occasional other contributors.