This year's DHPSNY Antiracism Programming takes inspiration from two key resources: the AASLH Making History at 250 Field Guide and the New York State 250th Field Guide. Our guiding question: How do we make our collecting organizations interdisciplinary and representative of the realities of our many New York histories?
In our final Dialogue of the year, “Unfinished Revolutions: Telling Complete and Inclusive Stories,” we invited participants to explore revolutionary moments in our local histories that bridge the gap between our collective past and current experiences. This conversation was led by co-facilitator Gerry Szymanski, staff librarian at the University of Rochester's Eastman School of Music Sibley Music Library and volunteer librarian at the Lilac Library.
Gerry shared the background and history of both the Lilac Library and Sibley Music Library, as well as insights into his work at both organizations. The Sibley Music Library is the largest academic music library in North America and is continually collecting. The Lilac Library is a small Rochester, New York library that collects and circulates materials relevant to the local and national Queer community.
The Sibley and Lilac libraries differ in size, capacity, and policy, so Gerry provided our participants an overview of how each organization handles collections accessibility and management, deaccessioning policies, and balancing the disparate and similar needs of historians, researchers, and archival management.
Collections Accessibility and Management
Gerry shared that each institution uses creative and evolving “tags” to help researchers, students, and other library users find the materials they need. He highlighted the resource Homosaurus for inclusive queer vocabulary and described the intentional Lib Guides he created at Sibley to help students, academics, and researchers find composers and musicians of color within the collections. You can view the Lib Guide for Music by people of the African diaspora here. Additionally, Gerry discussed the Sibley Library’s statement on offensive materials, which provides important context for users from diverse backgrounds. He emphasized the importance of cross-training, institutional memory, and integrating new perspectives as organizations develop liberatory policies and practices. These strategies help staff and volunteers avoid “reinventing the wheel” and focus on advancing how collections are described and managed.
Deaccessioning Policies
Throughout the program, Gerry stressed the need for inclusive deaccessioning policies. Specifically, he cautioned against using circulation as a metric for deaccession eligibility and emphasized the importance of maintaining an institutional memory of the collection. For example, at the Lilac Library, they hold multiple copies of a book providing guidance on how to come out to your family—each copy is from a successive publication year, preserving the evolution and memory of how queer communities prepare to share their identities with loved ones. Gerry encouraged using multiple lenses and perspectives to understand collections, ensuring organizations don’t unintentionally exclude important materials that tell undertold stories.
Balancing Disparate and Similar Needs
Finally, Gerry shared his thoughts on the “dual” role of libraries and archives, museums, and history research. Specifically, he discussed the competing needs of different organizations— both what to collect, where to store it, how to make it accessible (and/or if to make it available for circulation), and also how to get students, academics, and researchers the materials they need to do their work. He suggested using a balanced approach that prioritizes collecting and providing access to materials from communities with untold and undertold stories while managing the resources (money and people!) that make the work possible.
What are some great examples of exploring unfinished revolutions that you’ve seen - at your organization or somewhere you’ve visited or studied? What are some possible barriers to success as your organization begins/continues this work? What are some things that work in favor of your organization doing this work? What are your and your organization’s next steps in this work? You can reach us by email at info@DHPSNY.org, or connect with us on the DHPSNY Facebook page or the DHPSNY Community Facebook Group.
Click here to access the recorded portion of the session.
Click here to download the slideshow.
Resources for Further Study:
AASLH LGBTQ Inclusive Interpretation Resource.
Embrace Race. (2023). Resources. Retrieved from embracerace.org.
Homosaurus: An International LGBTQ+ Linked Data Vocabulary.
National Coalition Building Institute - International.
New York State Office of Cultural Education. DEI Toolkit.
New York State Office of Cultural Education. DEI Toolkit (Relevant Publications).
New York State Office of Cultural Education. DEI Toolkit (Tools and Resources).
This post is part of a blog series on sharing information, promoting resources, encouraging discussion, and amplifying the voices of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) doing antiracism work in archives, museums, history sites, and library special collections. DHPSNY is committed to supporting the diverse network of collecting institutions that safeguard and ensure access to historical records and library research materials across New York State. To learn more, visit our first blog post in the series.