2020 was a year like no other. It started normally enough, but on March 16, 2020, Columbia University closed its physical facilities as part of the New York State-mandated PAUSE that sought to control the spread of COVID. For months, staff were permitted onsite only for essential security and maintenance checks. As restrictions loosened over […]
Tag: Archives
Eleanor Roosevelt Speaks for Herself: Identifying 1,257 Married Women by their Full Names
It sounds like the setup for a magic trick: how can an archivist and a public services assistant, both working from home without access to the Rare Book and Manuscript Library, identify 1,257 (!) women previously referred to in our finding aids by their husbands’ names? Yet it involved no sleight of hand. We used […]
10/1 @ 6PM: Doing Recent History: History that Talks (and Tweets!) Back
Thursday, October 1, 2015 at 6:00 PM Columbia University’s Butler Library, Room 523 535 West 114th Street, NYC (Directions) Why is writing living history challenging? What are the ethics of doing research on social media? How can archivists balance the ethics of open access and ethics of privacy? Do historians watch enough TV?! Join Tenured […]
A Narrative in the Documents: The Gibbs Affair
Interesting narratives that are interwoven into Columbia University’s history can unravel simply by creating an online inventory for a collection. Recently, a series of letters was discovered within the Columbia College Papers that elucidate past events involving administrative prejudice, academic politics, and the Civil War. After James Renwick, Professor of Natural and Experimental Philosophy and […]
Sept. 8th, 6pm — A Panel Discussion with Former Gov. David Paterson and Leading Scholars and Community Organizers
A conversation on libraries, government, and activism, with: Former-Governor David Paterson. Jim Neal, Columbia University Librarian. Dr. Khalil Muhammad, Director, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. Ester Fuchs, Professor of International and Public Affairs and Political Science, SIPA. Peggy Shepard, founder director of West Harlem Environmental Action. Monday, Sept. 8, 2014, 6pm. The Kellogg Center 1501 […]