- Kate Doyle: “Archivists Can Be At the Heart of Accountability and Justice” On October 27, the UNESCO World Day for Audiovisual Heritage, I spoke with Kate Doyle, Senior Analyst of U.S. policy in Latin America at the National Security Archive (NSA), about the Guatemala Project, the notion of the activist archivist and how archives can advocate for open societies.
- WITNESS’ Grace Lile wins 2010 Archival Achievement Award Today is UNESCO World Day for Audiovisual Heritage and so, particularly relevant to share the following great news: our Director of Operations, Grace Lile, has been awarded the 2010 Archival Achievement Award by the Archivists Round Table of Metropolitan New York.
- Nelson Mandela, Archivist Activist You may have seen a recent 60 Minutes segment on the newest published memoir of Nelson Mandela, perhaps “the most admired man alive” in the words of correspondent Bob Simon. And if you are an archivist, chances are you are familiar with Verne Harris, of the Nelson Mandela Foundation, renowned in his own right, activist archivist sine qua non.
- Using Archival Description to Foster Accountability I first became interested in records documenting the Khmer Rouge period in Cambodia a decade ago, when I was working as the arts and culture web producer for the Asia Society Museum in New York. For the museum’s website, I interviewed the director of a troupe of classical Cambodians dancers who were touring the U.S.
- Archiving Practices Strengthen Human Rights Video Online My name is Taz Morgan. I’m a new intern at the WITNESS Media Archive and was able to attend the two-day Open Video Conference last weekend. There were a few panels dedicated to the discussion of open video specifically in relation to archives, such as the session Yvonne wrote about a few days ago.
- What Does the Open Video Movement Mean For Archives? At the WITNESS Media Archive, we collect, document, preserve, and provide access to human rights videos. Each component in this archiving endeavor contributes to the creation of reliable and authentic records in support of advocacy, prosecution of justice, truthtelling, and historical understanding.
- Archives for Change: Activist Archives, Archival Activism In recognition of Archives Month (October) and UNESCO World Day for Audiovisual Heritage (October 27), Archiving Human Rights will explore the theme of activism, in its myriad word forms and meanings, as it relates to archives and archivists.
- Human Rights Archives: Report from SAA, Part 1 Last week, I attended the annual conference of the Society of American Archivists (SAA) in Washington, DC. There were a number of sessions relevant to human rights archives and archivists this year, most notably the inaugural meeting of the new Human Rights Archives Roundtable, and the panel it organized with the Latin American and Caribbean Cultural Heritage Archives Roundtable, entitled "Silence No More! Archives Threatened by Political Instability."
- Inside the Media Archive: Metadata In the WITNESS Media Archive, we rely on a lot of open-source and openly documented (i.e. with published specs) resources to manage our collection of human rights videos created by our partners all over the world.
- Srebrenica: A Forensic Reconstruction Now on Exhibit at Open Society Archive In July 1995, over 8,000 Muslim men and boys were systematically slaughtered on grounds of ethnicity in and around Srebrenica in roughly 72 hours by units of the Bosnian Serb Army.
- Forensic Anthropology, Video, and Archives In mid-April, an episode of NPR program "Speaking of Faith," featuring a representative of the Argentine forensic anthropology team (EAAF) aired. The guest spoke about how recovering the remains of victims of repressive regimes leads to healing, the re-writing of history, and the prosecution of justice.
- Thoughts on archives “fitting in”, and processing the Rainlake donation. I have had the pleasure of interning in the WITNESS Media Archive for the past semester. I chose this internship because I hoped to put my Masters in Human Rights Studies and my Masters in Library Science to work in the video archive.
- An Archivist’s Perspective on Access and Privacy The New York Times reports that earlier this month, a US District Court granted a petition by Chevron to subpoena 600 hours of footage from Crude: The Real Price of Oil. The film, by director Joe Berlinger, documents a landmark lawsuit filed by 30,000 Ecuadorean Amazon residents against the oil company for allegedly contaminating the jungle and creating a “death zone” the size of Rhode Island.
- Archiving Human Rights Last year, 2009, WITNESS devoted a considerable amount of time to strategic planning from which emerged a new and re-conceived way of approaching what we do, which is, simply put, video advocacy.
- Highlights from the Orphan Film Symposium: Part 2 Following on my post Tuesday, here are more highlights from the Orphan Film Symposium I attended last week:
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.