Though commonly imagined to be dusty spaces containing rare objects from the distant past, archives are deeply tied to the present and to questions of knowledge, power, and authority. They preserve some cultural histories, practices, and artifacts while excluding others.
Archivists decide which histories are told and which are not, as well as who has access to these resources. The books on this list address problematic archival histories, practices, and structures, while also reimagining the archive as a potential site for community-building.
Disputed Archival Heritage
Edited by James Lowry
Building on his 2017 edited volume Displaced Archives, Lowry continues to explore archival collections that are removed from the places and peoples from which they come and the relationships between displacement and power for communities. Contributors examine the contexts for not only displaced archives but also diasporic archives and community archives. This title offers salient and interesting overviews of laws and guidelines related to archival claims and the transfer and even repatriation of records. This is an important read for anyone interested in archives, the history of provenance, and the deep connections between archives and communities.
Routledge, 2022. 356 p. $54.99. PBK. 978-0-3675-2403-6
Urgent Archives: Enacting Liberatory Memory Work
By Michelle Caswell
Drawing on a decade of work in ethnography archives like the South Asian American Digital Archive, Caswell puts feminist, postcolonial, and critical race theory in conversation with qualitative research data. This allows her to theorize the role that justice can and should play in archival practice. Touching on digital humanities, critical library studies, and ethnographic anthropology, Urgent Archives examines the liberatory potential of community archives. It also interrogates traditional archival strategies and theories while proposing new practices and approaches. It would be a welcome read for library and information science students, seasoned archivists, and other practitioners alike.
Routledge, 2021. 142 p. $51.99. PBK. 978-1-0320-0027-5.
Import of the Archive: US Colonial Rule of the Philippines and the Making of American Archival History
By Cheryl Beredo
Despite being published over a decade ago, this book is still relevant and recommended to not only readers interested in history but also those interested in archival ethics and questions of neutrality, authority, and the ownership of history. It analyzes how archives have historically been used as a tool for colonialism and imperialism rather than community-building. While the focus of Beredo’s study is the Philippines from 1898 to 1916, the short monograph reveals how record management can legitimize and strengthen political or bureaucratic power, tracing how archives were used by colonial powers in military conflicts, against revolutionaries and dissidents, and in land disputes.
Litwin Books, 2013. 168 p. $40. PBK. 978-1-9361-1772-7.
The Social Movement Archive
By Jen Hoyer and Nora Almeida
Understanding the role archives play in communities requires reconsidering assumptions about what an archive is and reimagining what an archive can be. The Social Movement Archive considers these questions through interviews with librarians, activists, and community organizers. While framed as an archive of social movements, Hoyer and Almeida’s work illustrates how archival practices are shaped by their social and political contexts, connecting archival theory to media studies, philosophy, political science, and environmental humanities. It would be a useful read for anyone working in archives or libraries or anyone interested in community activism, social movements, and their ephemera.
Litwin Books, 2021. 244 p. $75. PBK. 978-1-6340-0089-5.
Becoming Palestine: Toward an Archival Imagination of the Future
By Gil Z. Hochberg
The archive is not only a matter of the past but also the future. Published in 2021, this contribution to visual studies presents close readings of potential archival materials to engage in current discussions in archive studies about archival materials and their relationships to cultural memory. With the historical loss of more than 30,000 manuscripts, documents, and other material during the 1948 Nakba, along with the recent destruction of schools, libraries, archives, and universities in Gaza, Hochberg’s imagined archive is an incredibly timely and important read for understanding both Palestinian culture and the archive’s role in shaping the future.
Duke University Press, 2021. 208 p. $25.95. PBK. 978-1-4780-1482-9. (Also available as an ebook.)
Information Activism: A Queer History of Lesbian Media Technologies
By Cait McKinney
Groups that are marginalized have the most to tell us about information, argues Cait McKinney in this deep dive of lesbian media history in the US and Canada from the 1970s to 2010s. McKinney’s research involves an array of archival resources, including newsletters, indices, and community ephemera, while also contemplating archival best practices. Chapter 3, on descriptive practices, and chapter 4, on the Brooklyn, New York–based Lesbian Herstory Archives, are especially useful for readers interested in archival practices. Because of how it shows the roles that information plays in activism and, in turn, that activism plays in information, this work stands the test of time.
Duke University Press, 2020. 304 p., $28.95, PBK. 978-1-4780-0828-6. (Also available as an ebook.)
