Save As: The past, present and future of post-custodial approaches to community generated, community owned digital content
John Sheridan Karyn Williamson Lorna Hughes Valerie Love William Kilbride
In a dramatic intervention in 2022, [Tamar Evangelista Dougherty challenged iPres to recognize community leaders][1] as legitimate and necessary collaborators in digital preservation. That call was given fresh impetus in 2023 by Sherry Williams and Ricky Punzalan who further articulated the barriers and benefits of community-engaged preservation. This panel progresses that discussion through the lens of ‘post-custodial’ approaches to digital preservation for ‘community-generated digital content’. ‘[Post-custodial][2]’ in this context refers to efforts that empower community centered data creators to preserve their own content when traditional memory institutions are not available or appropriate.  

The panel emerges from the ‘Our Heritage Our Stories’ project which has explored the challenges of sustaining a large number of small-scale, community-based digitization initiatives in the UK.  It draws on research, current practice, and case studies to propose a post-custodial toolkit for community generated digital content.  The toolkit is designed to improve the preservation outcomes of data classed as ‘[critically endangered][3]’ in the 2023 Global List of Endangered Digital Species. 

Post-custodial approaches are not devoid of problems.  For example, what is the appropriate relationship between community-driven approaches and existing memory institutions?  Do they undermine well established workflows; and how much is gained in return? How do we enable participatory metadata creation and management?  What technical steps are needed? How to resolve disputed meanings and contested access within preservation practice? How do post-custodial approaches relate to decolonization? Is there alignment with emerging expectations of indigenous data sovereignty in countries colonized by the West? What can be learned from the indigenous data sovereignty movement to enable community ownership of digital materials by marginalized or precarious groups in colonizing nations?

This lively panel will introduce and review post-custodial models of digital preservation and set them in a global perspective.  It will provoke comment from practitioners from different contexts, including from Aotearoa / New Zealand where data sovereignty principles have been impactful in the protection of land, culture and knowledge. Thus, the panel will maintain momentum through two previous iPres conferences while anticipating themes which are certain to arise in the next. 


  [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDEWqey559M
  [2]: https://dictionary.archivists.org/entry/postcustodial.html
  [3]: https://www.dpconline.org/digipres/champion-digital-preservation/bit-list/critically-endangered/bitlist-community-generated-content
legal and social responsibilities for dp start 2 preserve