The work of archival and rare book processors is truly fascinating and never-ending. At RBML, we take great pleasure in exploring beyond the obvious and discovering curious and surprising artifacts left behind between pages and amidst letters for years, decades, and even centuries. These treasures come in varying formats, subjects, and meanings, some of them […]
Tag: Archives
Dan Talbot, a New Yorker and His Love for Independent Films and World Cinema
The Daniel Talbot papers are processed and the finding aid is now available. “I distribute and show films for a living–sometimes precariously. But when I ‘discover’ a new director, I want to sing out to everyone that something new has come along–a work of art that is fresh, different, exciting. The really good stuff makes […]
Event | Intoxicating the Archive – Preserving Narcotic Heritage and including Marginalized Voices in Collections and Libraries
“Intoxicating the Archive” critically explores how the memories and struggles of people who use drugs and those of other marginalized and/or activist groups in history are represented in archives, museums, and collective memory at large. While often being invisible at first, drug cultures have left traces in many archives and collections. However, finding and […]
On Outdated and Harmful Language in Library of Congress Subject Headings
Note: We always welcome corrections and other feedback on our finding aids. Please contact us at rbml@library.columbia.edu if you notice anything in a finding aid, including a subject heading, that needs attention. A colleague recently asked an excellent question: why do the subject headings in our finding aids frequently use outdated terminology? It seems […]
Linking Names in Our Archival Collections: Shared Authority Review (Interim update)
One of our collaborative work-from-home projects since the COVID pandemic started in March 2020 is our ongoing review of linked authority records in our archival collections. The shared authorities in our archival collections are managed in ArchivesSpace and are utilized across four of our distinctive collections including the Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library, the […]