February 2014

Maher Judah (left) and Tiera Shana Harris (right) organize archival documents at the Center.

This semester, the Amistad Research Center is taking advantage of some extra helping hands, while providing experience and service opportunities to a number of local college students. Student interns from three area universities, as well as a class undertaking a service-learning component to a Yoruba language class, are greatly assisting the Center while gaining exposure to unique primary source collections.

Two interns are assisting the processing department as part of Amistad's Young Archivists Mentoring Program, which gives our archivists an opportunity to train undergraduate and graduate students in the fields of library and archival work and help Amistad to complete the archival arrangement of priority collections. In addition, two students are completing service-learning internships as part of their graduation requirements at Tulane University.

Tiera Shana Harris, a senior at Xavier University with dual majors in biology and history, is assisting the processing team on the archival arrangement, description, and preservation of the Most Worshipful Prince Hall Grand Lodge, Free and Accepted Masons of Louisiana records. Work on the Louisiana Masons records was started in the fall of 2012 with the assistance of two Xavier interns, so it is fitting that the final stage and completion of this project will end with the assistance of another Xavier intern.

Maher Judeh is a graduate candidate in the International and Global Studies Masters program at the University of New Orleans (UNO). Maher's research focus is on the relationship between the United States and Algeria during the 1960s. He is assisting Amistad with the archival processing of the papers of international labor activist Maida Springer Kemp. In addition to the arrangement and preservation of the Kemp papers, Maher will be selecting items for digitization from the collection for Amistad's new thematic collections digital initiative.

Morgan Wolfe, a senior political science major with an interest in slavery and race relations, is currently digitizing correspondence, pamphlets, and other documents related to the Supreme Court case United States v. Libellants and Claimants of the Schooner Amistad, commonly known as the Amistad Case. The result of this digitization initiative will be a new thematic digital collection available through the Louisiana Digital Library and Tulane University Digital Library.

Tulane junior Jake Patterson is undertaking an inventory of approximately 85 boxes of ephemera long held at the Center but inaccessible by researchers. This collection contains all manner of materials related to civil rights, race relations, housing discrimination, school integration, and an assortment of topics. Jake and Amistad's staff have already uncovered a trove of little known documents that will soon be added to the Center's online finding aid database.

Students from Dr. Olanike-Ola Orie's Diaspora Yoruba class work to translate Yoruba texts collected by linguist Lorenzo Dow Turner.

A Yoruba language class taught by Dr. Olanike-Ola Orie of Tulane's Anthropology Department is putting their language skills to the test by assisting the Center with texts and recordings of Yoruba, a West African language. These materials are housed in the papers of linguist Lorenzo Dow Turner. Students are analyzing Yoruba texts collected by Turner to aid in the description of these texts, as well as inventorying and rehousing recordings made by Turner on wire reels and metal phonograph discs during the 1930s to the 1950s.  

Each year the Center attracts an increasing number of applicants for a very limited number of intern experiences. Increasing also is the number of applicants who come from outside of the local area. Amistad was a recent grant recipient of support from the Institute of Museum and Library Services that was designed to encourage mentoring and partnering with persons interested in archives and archival projects. One of the goals of the program is to increase the number of individuals from underrepresented populations gaining experience in such settings in order to encourage professional interest.