Thursday special: Pop culture, archives, libraries, genealogy, history, and everything nice!
In this week's newsletter, I'll be sharing some reviews of webcomics I wrote plus latest news about archives, libraries, genealogy, history, and more
Hello everyone! I hope you all had a good week! Last Tuesday, I published a post about recently added titles of animations with libraries in them to my blog reviewing libraries in pop culture, something which I plan to do next week as well. Last Wednesday I published a review of one of my favorite webcomics, Diamond Dive, on The Geekiary. Then, this Tuesday I published a post reviewing an episode from one of my favorite animated series, High Guardian Spice, and the reality of library destruction, and on Wednesday, a review of another webcomic, Ice Massacre, was published in The Geekiary. Apart from that, I loved seeing creators sharing my article in August about the indie animation boom (see here and here). I can say, as I did on Twitter in a post, I will probably do an update on it at some point in the future, especially after creators have thanked me for being included, saying it was cool to have them and their projects as part of the article, as it boosts them to bigger audiences. I love that one of the creators, Georden Whitman said that he wants to dig through the indie animations mentioned and recommended others “do the same to support these projects.” That made me smile, as did seeing indie creators sharing the article around. With that, let me get to the rest of my newsletter, which was considered again as “too long for email.” Since this newsletter is being published today, the next newsletter will probably come out on November 21, instead of November 14.
There was a lot of archives-related news this week, from Sam Cross talking about her process of adding new properties to the POP Archives master list, along with others noting the broken nature of FOIA itself, UNC Library cuts, reparative work, reparative description, urging people to stop posting, cataloging, and humidity. There was much more discussed outside of social media. Rebecca Kuske wrote in the American Archivist Reviews Portal about using university archives to teach the complexities of neutrality, while Archives Aware! interviewed the Director of Records Management for Houston Community College, Melissa Gonzales, and partner to the founding of the Accessibility & Disability Section of SAA and Regent for Member Services for the Academy of Certified Archivists, Michelle Ganz. David Ferriero, Archivist of the United States, wrote a series about 150 million digital copies in the NARA catalog, in posts on October 26, November 1, and November 3. I am also reminded of a post by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington in August 2020 where they noted how the EPA destroyed water quality records and deceived Ferriero, and the Kitchen Sisters having posts about archives.
Apart from this, there were many fascinating posts on the /r/Archivists subreddit, whether about dust jackets, preserving old photos and records, family records, vinegar syndrome and a film reel. This related to an AMA with the staff of the Indiana State Archives, part of the Indiana Archives and Records Administration back in April 2020. Of interest also is a video chat panel with the Walt Disney Archives archivists, for the 50th anniversary of the Walt Disney Archives in June 2020, with a video of this said panel available on YouTube.
That brings me to libraries. First and foremost, I am reminded of what April Hathcock, who is oft-cited in this newsletter, wrote in 2017, that those in the library and archives professions should be “more thoughtful, more critical about our work.” I will continue to do that, myself, as I continually question what I do, day in and day out, without stopping. Sure, there were tweets about a discord about “disability in its varied forms as library workers,” called the CripLib discord, a library first aid kit, subbing in public libraries, and saying people should wear a mask correctly inside libraries. At the same time, posts on /r/Libraries focused on using a freeze drying service, library’s best practices for LibGuides, whether libraries are transitioning back to being in-person or not, and book publication recommendations that talk about academic and public librarianship.
The Library of Congress (LOC) had a number of wonderful posts, whether about the police and the paranormal in England, new environmental law resources, new research guide for fine prints, and five questions for Amal Chara, a LOC intern. The same could be said for Hack Library School. There were posts about the benefit of unstructured time, finding success on the job hunt, the disorientation guide to librarianship, and many duties librarians have. There, were sadly, calls by those to cull so-called “harmful” or “obscene” books in libraries in Ontario, Canada and Texas, among many other places, like Washington County.
There were articles, like one in School Library Journal on eight yuri manga which will sweep you off your feet, a scholar arguing that the library technology market has failed to support controlled digital lending, and April Hathcock’s reflection on the racism and misogyny toward her at ALA’s Midwinter conference in January 2019, whether she was publicly berated by a White man, and the ALA did little to help her, only wanting to protect themselves, and a later panel with “gaslighting and victim-blaming” toward people such as herself. She noted that the ALA did issue a statement later about the verbal attack but described it in milquetoast language. On June 29, 2021, she decided to leave the ALA for good, penning a post on why she was leaving and wanted nothing to do with the organization going forward.
Then, there is genealogy. Some wrote about researching Irish passenger lists while others focused on World War II’s rumor control project and the class action lawsuit filed against Ancestry. I liked reading the Genealogy journal articles on the return of Mesoamerica’s Quetzalcoatl and the Venus Star, tracing genealogies of mixedness, and generational and ancestral healing in community. Dividing Ridge Genealogy had a number of interesting posts, whether about differentiating between fact and fiction, and using DrabbleWriter as genealogists. The Hidden Branch interviewed Olivia Peacock, a digital historian and creator of DigitalBlackHistory.com. The blog of the SAA’s SNAP section had a post by Marilyn Creswell about the secret marriage law in Michigan and overcoming genealogical hurdles. Of note, in terms of genealogy are posts about making sense of census records (from Lisa Lisson), online newspapers summary for Alberta, Canada.
There’s also history. The Journal of American Revolution had articles about surveying in Early America, the misadventures of Captain John Linzee, John Marshall and Mercy Otis Warren’s treatments of Benedict Arnold, and how America declared its rights. Southern Spaces, on the other hand, had some worthwhile articles from some years ago about crowdsourcing and Appalachia. The same publication had articles about gospel music, New Orleans and the so-called “marijuana menace” from 1920 to 1930, social justice environmentalism, the narrative form of Southern queerness, queer square spaces and the revolution in digital intimacy, the queer literary canon, and how in the 1980s Athens, Georgia youth built “the first important small-town American music scene and the key early site of what would become alternative or indie culture.”
There were other scattered posts. LOC noted about the Salem Witch Trials, the importance of Indigenous maps, and a civil and voting rights activist named Elizabeth Peratrovich. Smithsonian magazine had posts on medieval gold coins found in England, an ancient actors latrine found in Turkey, and archaeologists able to map the capital of the Mongolian empire for the first time.
There are several topics which don’t fit easily into the other parts of this newsletter but should still be included. This includes reviews of Inside Job by Hello Magazine, Monsters and Critics and BrinkWire. On the other hand, Smithsonian magazine had articles about the disappearance of a massive Antarctic lake vanishing in three days, seven inventions for a safer Fourth of July, how in 19th-century Gibraltar, survivors of a deadly virus used ‘fever passes’ to prove their immunity, an incredibly dense white dwarf star packs the mass of the Sun into the size of the moon, and trailblazing pilot Wally Funk will go to space 60 years after passing her astronaut tests. Articles beyond this included a new law library report which lists countries with legislation establishing a net zero emissions target, love triangles which end in polyamory, a book on the secret history of home economics, an interview with Molly Ostertag on Darkest Night and carving a more intimate space for queer stories, the 11 types of nonfiction, defining pansexuality, and the U.S. Copyright office ok’s the right to repair the optical drive of video game consoles. It was very said that to read that bird populations are continuing to decline.
There was some positive news, however. CBR praised the anime Aquatope on the White Sand as being a good “office anime” which has a positive message. Anime News Network reported that Crunchyroll has added Revolutionary Girl Utena, the classic 1997 anime, to its catalog, and listed the most watched and best rated anime from this summer. The only ones on the story’s two lists, which I’ve watched, are as follows: Miss Kobayashi's Dragon Maid, Kageki Shoujo!!, and The Aquatope on White Sand. I’d recommend all these anime shows, each for distinct reasons.
Finally, there are illustrations from The Nib, as always. Some focused on “unhindered oil extraction,” still life, economic shortages, White male privilege, cognitive dissonance on government mandates, and the invention of monogamy. Other illustrations were about Facebook crisis, using MDMA, simple math, the growth industry, and FBI failing to act on tips for likely violence on January 6.
That’s all for this week. I hope you all have a good week ahead.
- Burkely