NAP

John Edward Bruce, photograph courtesy of Wikipedia John Edward Bruce (1856–1924), often remembered as a journalist and activist, was also one of the great bibliophiles and collectors of Black history in the early 20th century. Bruce relentlessly gathered books, pamphlets, manuscripts, and fragments of the Black past that others overlooked—or sought to erase. His collecting was not a hobby, nor an indulgence. It was a deliberate act of preservation, driven by the conviction t

Dorothy B. Porter photographed by Carl Van Vechten, 1951 Dorothy Louise Porter Wesley (May 25, 1905 – December 17, 1995) was the consummate librarian, bibliographer, and curator, who built the Moorland-Spingarn Research Center at Howard University. Porter was the first African American to receive a degree in library science from Columbia University. She published numerous bibliographies on African American history. Prior to her intervention, the Dewey Decimal System only had

By Steven G Fullwood Andre Elizee 1991 On Sunday February 28, 2010, the Schomburg Center memorialized Andre Elizee, archivist and intellectual in what was more than a simple acknowledgment of his extraordinary 26 years of service. It was a ceremony that featured testimonies from his coworkers, colleagues, scholars and researchers, and readings from his guides to the collections which illuminated for many the indelible footprint he left on the Center’s collections and the Cen

Cover Portrait and Design of Steven G Fullwood by Christopher Stahling Artwork by Keyon Monte. 25 years ago, the In the Life Archive (ITLA), originally known as the Black Gay and Lesbian Archive (BGLA), was created by archivist Steven G Fullwood to aid in the documentation and preservation of cultural materials produced by and about Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer people of African descent.  In 2004, the BGLA was donated to the Schomburg Center for Research in

"Information enhances my freedom." Marion Stokes, Recorder: The Marion Stokes Project Marion Marguerite Stokes was an American access television producer, businesswoman, investor, civil rights demonstrator, activist, librarian, and prolific archivist, especially known for her archiving of hundreds of thousands of hours of television news footage spanning 35 years, from 1977 until her death in 2012, at which time she operated nine properties and three storage units. According

2024 NAP SCHOLARSHIP AWARDEE: Dartricia Rollin s  Written by: Dartricia Rollins Edited by: NAP Staff As I enter the final semester of my MLIS program at the University of Alabama it was really important for me to attend the Society for American Archivists Annual Meeting (SAA) for the first time this year.   The archives world still feels very new for me and through my attendance, I was able to learn more about the field and make connections with  so many  Black archivists in

RAG co-founder Kamisha Thomas (standing) and artist Reagan Baruxes.  Credit: Mark D. Motz, Marketing Manager, Fitton Center for Creative Arts  On December 1, 2023, the Fitton Center for Creative Arts in Hamilton, Ohio, became the stage for "Preserving Our Creative Footprints: An Archive Workshop for System-Impacted Artists." Tailored specifically for members of the Returning Artists Guild (RAG), including co-founders Kamisha Thomas and Aimee Wissman, this workshop was a pivot

From the Career Documentation for the Visual Artist: A Legacy Planning Workbook & Resource Guide published by the Joan Mitchell Foundation By Steven G Fullwood For the past several years, I have had the pleasure of consulting with the Joan Mitchell Foundation to provide their artists with advice about preserving their archival collections. The Foundation recently published the Career Documentation for the Visual Artist: A Legacy Planning Workbook & Resource Guide . Developed

by Steven G Fullwood This past November, I went to Paris and London to meet with friends and collaborators, and to see a few sites. Generally, I like visiting libraries and archives when I travel domestically or internationally. I want to tell you about two archives that are worth experiencing in person, the Albert-Khan Musée and Le Catacombs De Paris. An Archive of the World: Albert-Khan Musée Bank and philanthropist Albert Kahn (March 3, 1860 – November 14, 1940) was a Fren

By Steven G Fullwood, exhibitions coordinator, Marking Time Photo credit: John Thomas Fields. This past summer, I was hired by Dr. Nicole Fleetwood, author of the award-winning Marking Time : Art in the Age of Mass Incarceration, to be the exhibitions coordinator. Currently, we are finishing up a successful run at the Abrams Ingles Institute of Visual Arts (AEIVA) in Birmingham, Alabama (September 17 – December 11, 2021, which also includes programming focusing on the carcera

by Steven G. Fullwood “Making Queer History Public” is a new podcast series by the American Social History Project/Center for Media and Learning that explores LGBTQ+ public history. The podcast will focus on archives, museums, public art, and education initiatives to investigate how queer and trans histories are being told, how LGBTQ+ people are pushing public history narratives forward, and where you can go to learn more about queer and trans-led projects and experiences. Tw

by Steven G. Fullwood “I use images of my family because they affect me so strongly. And it's just something I knew extremely well, very deeply, and that's why I used them, the images of my family….I don't know any life from the forties and fifties with their picnics and their beautiful clothes and everything is so nice and perfect and wholesome. I don't know that little world, you know.” --Darrel Ellis, Interview with David Hirsch, 1991 Last year I was asked to contribute a

by Miranda Mims The Nomadic Archivist Project is producing an anthology called The Evidence: Black Archivists Holding Memory . The global Black archival experience is complex and converges over time, space, and memory. NAP acknowledges and affirms archiving our stories as a cultural and political act. Archivists rarely share their experiences as archivists. The Evidence is a platform to tell these unique and powerful stories within the context of the Black archival tradition

On April 29, 2021, I was invited to speak with BLACKOUT, a group of Black LGBTQ students at Yale University, for their program series on Grief and Joy. My presentation, “Archiving Joy and Grief with Steven G Fullwood,” was an interactive workshop that focused on the necessity of building and sustaining Black queer archives and why our stories matter. We discussed different ways in which Black queer joy is archived (for ex., diaries and journals, analog and digital photographs

"Archival-Futurism," an essay by Miranda Mims, appears in a special edition of InVisibile Culture: An Electronic Journal for Visual Culture in Issue 31: Black Studies Now and the Countercurrents of Hazel Carby . Read the full essay here: https://ivc.lib.rochester.edu/archival-futurism/ Featured image: Inscriptions at MLK Park community installation “The Empire Strikes Black,” created by public artist Shawn Dunwoody. Photo by Quajay Donnell.

“Processing a collection is a form of storytelling in and of itself, providing access for researchers and simultaneously planting seeds for stories wanting to be born. It’s a generative practice, very fluid and inspiring and inherently political. Whose stories, and where are they archived? What’s crucial to doing archival work is knowing that you’re assisting in not just putting down the history, but you are a conduit for a certain kind of energy transfer. Archivists can be g

By Steven G. Fullwood Born in 1952, Bradley Johnson, a 6’2” African American gay male poet whose work appeared in several groundbreaking volumes of work. In March 2011, I went to meet Brad in his Philadelphia home to pack his archive (along with publisher and archivist Lisa C. Moore) to be shipped to the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, New York Public Library. Brad couldn’t breathe on his own and was on a ventilator. I often found myself staring at the plastic

NAP just wrapped up a year long project to collect and preserve podcasts that speak to politics, history, human rights, and equality as it relates to the black experience. We recently published a piece about the experience in the Society of American Archivists journal: Archival Outlook. Check it out !

Welcome to Uncovered, a column dedicated to telling the stories of unique and interesting discoveries found in the archives! The Nomadic Archivists Project (NAP) is excited to share the experiences of scholars, researchers, artists, archivists, and memory workers who, unintentionally uncovered something marvelous while conducting research in a physical or virtual archive. These rare experiences can be life changing in profound ways. And we want to tell you about them! In this

Welcome to Uncovered, a column dedicated to telling the stories of unique and interesting discoveries found in the archives! The Nomadic Archivists Project (NAP) is excited to learn about and share the experiences of scholars, researchers, artists, archivists, and memory workers who, unintentionally uncovered something marvelous while conducting research in a physical or virtual archive. These rare experiences can be life changing in profound ways. And we want to tell you ab