Safe Spaces for BIPOC Archival Workers

The AAO’s Professional Development Committee presents

Safe Spaces for BIPOC Archival Workers

The safe space virtual sessions are safe spaces set aside and reserved for archives workers and records managers from historically excluded groups in our profession to connect with one another in an informal, participant-driven environment.

These sessions are open to students, emerging, and established professionals, as well as those working in volunteer and activist roles. Note that this space is only open to Black, Indigenous, and people of colour (BIPOC) identifying archives workers and records managers.

Date: Friday, May 27, 12:00 pm-1:00 pm EDT

Location: Zoom (Link will be sent when registered)

Recording: This session will not be recorded.

Registration: FREE (AAO members, student members, and non-members)

This meeting is governed by the AAO’s Code of Conduct as well as a guideline of confidentiality. It is essential that all participants agree to keep confidential the identities of individual participants and any names that may be mentioned during their time together, as well as any attributed specific comments. Agreement about this point is required.

About the moderator:

Tamara Rayan (they/them) is a Palestinian settler and archivist. They are currently an Archives Assistant at the Art Gallery of Ontario's E.P. Taylor Library and Archives and for a number of years they have been involved with Alternative Toronto, a participatory digital archive, where they guide members of Toronto’s resistance cultures to describe and contextualize their own records. Anti-racist action and BIPOC representation within the archive has always been at the forefront of their archival work. They have been a moderator and organizer of the ACA BIPOC Forum for the past two years and they are a current Steering Committee Member of the Society of American Archivists - Archivists and Archives of Color Section. Their research interests are focused on the ways in which minority and marginalized groups document and preserve their cultural heritage in the face of social pressure, colonialism, assimilation, and political oppression.

Please contact professionaldevelopment@aao-archivists.ca with your questions and any requests for accommodation.