PLO: 4 Evaluate systems and technologies relevant to a particular information context.
SAA Core Value(s):
- Cultivate collaborative opportunities not only with creators, users, and colleagues, but with any interested parties who wish to engage with archival records.
- Respect the diversity found in humanity and advocate for archival collections to reflect that rich complexity.
This was a project designed for in the field work connecting to someone who’s oral history was profound. I chose to speak with Dr. Ayisha Morgan-Lee, founder and director of the Hill Dance Academy Theatre (HDAT) in Pittsburgh, PA. HDAT is a predominantly black dance conservatory located in the heart of Pittsburgh’s historic Hill district, which is home to a host of black artists including the famous playwright August Wilson. Dr. Morgan-Lee, a graduate of Howard University, Carnegie Mellon University, and the University of Pittsburgh, has been establishing a legacy of black dance over the past twenty years in the very same neighborhood she grew up in. She is committed to further developing the artistic history of the historic Hill district and does so with compassion, discipline, vitality, and stellar whit. The system I used was the Oral History Association’s 2018 guidelines. Guided by the core principals, statement of ethics, and best practices, I set out to create a set of goals. I wanted to be sure that Ayisha was well informed that the interview would be an informal conversation in which she could choose to answer as many of the questions I asked, she had the right to not answer, and that nothing she said would be used to harm or incriminate her in any way. I let her know that this interview was being conducted as a part of class requirements in the pursuit of a MLIS degree and that the digital recording would live on StoryCorps, which is an ethical, widely used, digital oral history repository well documented by Jolly (2024). I also gathered some easily digestible wording about informed consent to provide to her. This was a practical application of my research into the needs of users of dance/arts related archives.
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MLIS E-Portfolio 