Many institutions hold collections related to incarcerated people, but stewardship of these materials remains an underexamined part of our responsibilities. Sometimes created by prisoners themselves and sometimes created by government agencies or advocacy groups, materials documenting incarcerated people encompass everything from zines and correspondence to oral histories and government records. In this session, academic archivists consider how access policies for these materials change when incarcerated people are placed at the center of stewardship functions.
Derek Potts will discuss how he helps incarcerated individuals access the Anthony Rayson zine collection, which was created by and for people detained in prisons and jails. Jenny Mitchell and Anu Kasarabada will discuss correspondence with prisoners located in the papers of federal judges, with a particular focus on the tensions between protecting the privacy of incarcerated individuals and enabling access to voices that are often invisible in the public sphere. Gideon Goodrich and Alexis Miettinen will discuss processing and determining access to materials documenting both targeted arrests and the general incarceration of queer folks, particularly gay men, in the Equality Michigan records and James W. Toy papers. Finally, Katie Nash will discuss donor relations and access issues related to the LGBT Books to Prisoners collection, an unprocessed collection that contains extensive correspondence with incarcerated people. Drawing on their experiences with acquiring, processing, and providing access to the materials, the presenters will discuss the challenges and opportunities involved in managing collections that document incarcerated people, with a particular focus on issues related to access, privacy concerns, and donor relations.
Speakers Anu Kasarabada, University of Kentucky (Session Chair) Gideon Goodrich, University of Michigan Alexis Miettinen, University of Michigan Jenny Mitchell, Washington and Lee University Katie Nash, University of Wisconsin-Madison Derek Potts, DePaul University
