African American Archival Resources: Representation in North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia Tekla Ali Johnson
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SLIS Connecting Volume 6 | Issue 1 Article 7 2017 African American Archival Resources: Representation in North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia Tekla Ali Johnson Follow this and additional works at: http://aquila.usm.edu/slisconnecting Part of the Archival Science Commons, Collection Development and Management Commons, Information Literacy Commons, Scholarly Communication Commons, and the Scholarly Publishing Commons Recommended Citation Tekla Ali Johnson (2017) "African American Archival Resources: Representation in North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia," SLIS Connecting: Vol. 6 : Iss. 1 , Article 7. DOI: 10.18785/slis.0601.07 Available at: http://aquila.usm.edu/slisconnecting/vol6/iss1/7 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by The Aquila Digital Community. It has been accepted for inclusion in SLIS Connecting by an authorized editor of The Aquila Digital Community. For more information, please contact [email protected]. African American Archival Resources: Representation in North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia By Tekla Ali Johnson Master’s Research Project, August 2015 adopted the ideal of determining one’s own identity Readers: Dr. Elizabeth Haynes since the international anti‐colonial and domestic Dr. Teresa Welsh Civil Rights Movement. This practice is carried out with respect to several of areas of life, including the Introduction right to record, protect, design, and preserve their The breadth, scope, security, evaluation, and own history. preservation of African American archival resources in the United States are all understudied. Moreover, Historically, African Americans were colonized for the the scope and contents of the majority of African purpose of usurpation of their labor. African American resources are likely unknown. Some American archivists and historians have insisted on proportion of existing materials Africana are interpreting African history from that vein. Namely, presumed held in private homes and private reinforcing the reality that African American’s collections with no lending practices or duplicates to experiences in the Americas and Western share, they are therefore inaccessible. On the other Hemisphere, generally, revolved around an economic hand, Africana collections in formal archival system and economic incentives. These factors were repositories such as in university library collections, alive in the minds of Africana lay curators in the historical societies, and in state, city, or county run 1960s and 1970s during the boom of independently‐ archives and museums are typically not fully formed Black museums. It is perhaps not too digitized; and marketing information about their surprising that private Black‐run archives and African existence may be too slim to alert researchers to American museums emerged in droves after the Civil their existence. In addition to these issues is the Rights Movement. The goals of these curators and historic issue of slavery and its aftermath, including managers were first and foremost to preserve the segregation and accompanying social and political history of African people, and the right of African repression of African Americans. The outcomes of people to tell their own narratives. However, many of these realities include the restriction, physically and these curators also knew that historical archival in terms of representation, of African Americans from resources and historical narratives bear potential mainstream libraries and state historical societies latent economic value, and they reasoned that care until the mid‐1960s, and omission of documentation should be taken to ensure that colonization of the of their story from the archives, libraries, and African American story did not occur. Lay Africana historical societies. These misrepresentations have curators at times insulated their collections away led to the current problem of fair and accurate from the reach of state and county archives and at representation. times they may have lost opportunities for city and state support. Their efforts to resist the possibility Yet, there is more to consider. Another aspect of the that their collections would fall into the hands of historical backdrop for the current research is that those who would exploit the African image and use African Americans have experienced complications Africana documents for their own gain, effectively with traditional identity reinforcement structures due prohibited collaborations with institutions who would to their constructed non‐appearance in the historical acquire African American holdings. In some cases, record. For years, public school textbooks and the financial distress resulted, and some African national narrative omitted the African American American museums and archives, funded by the story, at least from an African American perspective. curator’s personal income or memberships fell into Like many other subject peoples around the world disrepair within a few decades. Meanwhile, a who, in the aftermath of the world‐wide fight against growing class of professional African American colonialism, did internalize the concept of self‐ historians and archivists emerged, and these determination, many African Americans have individuals continue to seek the best ways in which to maintain their people’s national and local history, Carolina is expanding outward. Historically and and African Americans’ right to tell their story culturally, Georgia and South Carolina are considered themselves. part of the Deep South, as well as part of the Southeastern United States, a region that is Problem Statement and Purpose understudied with respect to Africana resources. The preservation, processing, and accessibility of Moreover, they are part of an area with no regional African American archival materials has been collection that is equivalent to the Schomburg Center neglected, historically, and despite some for research in Black Culture, situated in New York advancements, has still not reached the standard or City, in terms of scope and size of the collection, acceptable level of archival resources in the United funding support, national recognition, or Black States. The initial purpose of this study was to leadership. That these regions are centers of African compile a record of collections holding primary American experience in the U. S., from which African resources on African Americans in the United States. Americans migrated west and north make the When the scope of necessary research was hypothesis that there is a depth of history and considered, it was clear that a comprehensive study historical holdings there which has not be tapped, would exceed the scope of a master’s project. and archival and material resource holdings which Similarly, the goal of researching archival holdings in are still dissembled and protected, likely. It should be the Southeast United States, would require said that such historical documentation of the significant funding and other resources, setting this Africana experience is inaccessible to researchers, subject outside of the scope of a master’s thesis. but that is not the most important point. More While both of those projects should and must be importantly, such resources may be partially hidden done in the future, the current project is much from successive generations of African people, who smaller and encompasses a smaller geographical need to experience their entire story as part of the area. The present research is therefore dedicated to daily narrative of life. conducting research on African American Archival Resources in three states, North Carolina, South Research Questions Carolina, and Georgia. This research builds on earlier R1. What Africana resources exist in North Carolina work by Linda Simmons‐Henry and Lisa Parker, who (outside of formal repositories)? wrote the 1995 Guide to African American R2. What Africana resources exist in Georgia (in Documentary Resources in North Carolina after being formal repositories and within communities)? commissioned to do so by an organization that R3. What Africana resources exist in South Carolina formed in the North Carolina research triangle and (in formal repositories and within communities)? which went by the title the African American Archives Group. The NC Guide provides a model for how Operational Definitions individual studies of Africana collections may be Large collection: defined by this study as over conducted in each of the fifty states. Lehman (2007) 200 cubic feet virtually updated the NC Guide (Simmons‐Henry & Medium collection: 50‐200 cubic feet Parker, 1995) more recently by assessing the Small collection: 1‐49 cubic feet digitalization of the collections described in the Africana: Pertaining to African American or Guide. Diasporic Africans Black Museums and Archives: African Thus, the best model to date of a listing of African American repositories in the United States. Resources by state is the Guide to African American Documentary Resources in North Carolina (aka the Limitations and Assumptions North Carolina Guide or NC Guide) (Simmons‐Henry & Research was limited to the English language. It was Parker, 1995). South Carolina and Georgia were assumed that historical documents existing in private selected to expand on the North Carolina report in and formal repositories are authentic representations part because they each border on North Carolina and because symbolically, the work started in North or original materials and that materials in the The first formal archives dedicated