NEA Webinar: Approaching Transition & Grief in Acquisitions Work by H Mumford

Anon

HarvardHistMed — 2019-04-09 20:26:14 UTC

Why is Joan so cool?

2019-04-09 20:26:27 UTC

From the Presenters!!

HarvardHistMed — 2019-04-12 18:56:09 UTC

Please use this space to add and vote on questions you would like us to answer. You can identify who you are or remain anonymous. Thanks! <3

2019-04-12 18:56:30 UTC

Chicken in a camo sweater

HarvardHistMed — 2019-04-29 18:32:22 UTC

I focus on manuscript collections

HarvardHistMed — 2019-04-29 18:47:10 UTC

I am a lone arranger

2019-04-29 18:47:29 UTC

I am an institutional archivist

HarvardHistMed — 2019-04-29 18:47:57 UTC

I conduct oral histories

2019-04-29 18:48:21 UTC

I don't work directly with donors (yet!)

HarvardHistMed — 2019-04-29 18:48:40 UTC

Student Struggles

2019-04-30 18:10:20 UTC

I am an archives student entering the field within the next year or so. What steps can I take to better prepare myself for dealing with grief and transitions when I may not be directly interacting with donors in a classroom setting? (and so far in my archives courses we have not discussed these topics at all!)

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2019-04-30 18:21:42 UTC

2019-04-30 18:28:47 UTC

How do you navigate donors who want collections to be processed/accessible quickly (within a certain timeframe) but don't want to fund processing?

2019-04-30 18:32:21 UTC

How do you handle it if a donor gets offended by something said/something they felt was implied and they become confrontational or upset?

2019-04-30 18:33:25 UTC

Similar to the question about how to handle donors who want something to be processed within a certain time frame, how do you handle donors who are very passionate about a collection but due to backlog it will not get processed immediately (and this delay upsets them)?

2019-04-30 18:36:37 UTC

How soon is too soon to contact potential donors after the change event about an acquisition? How do you make the initial contact if you don't already have a relationship in place?

2019-04-30 18:38:01 UTC

If you as an archivist knew the person whose materials are being donated, how do you navigate your own grief during the acquisitions process? Should you be involved in the acquisitions process?

While there may be merit to the impact of secondary trauma, it's also important not to co-opt the trauma and experience of others- particularly marginalized communities- for yourself

2019-04-30 18:45:34 UTC

2019-04-30 18:46:26 UTC

If a donor is venting/unloading their grief onto you to the point that it's crossing a boundary, how do you maintain distance while still getting the job done?

2019-04-30 18:47:55 UTC

How do you navigate the idea that acquisition work/donor relations is transactional?

level of processing

2019-04-30 18:48:03 UTC

I've experienced the situation where the donor (child, going through grief of loss) who believes that the collections should be described, arranged at a deeper level than we can promise. How to give them power while staying true to what we can do

2019-04-30 18:48:50 UTC

Any advice for what to do if the donor just stops communicating with you (after they've donated the materials)? Is there anything you can do or...just leave it? (In this particular case, we'd really like to get biographical information about the deceased family member from them.)

2019-04-30 18:49:09 UTC

Presenters spoke about how being emotional or feeling about this type of labor "doesn't make you a bad archivist" and that you don't need to take self care steps after each donor interaction, but can you share ways in which you might conceive of a system in which being emotional/feeling is not unprofessional and/or self care is professional care?

2019-04-30 18:54:24 UTC

Do you have any guidance on how to sensitively decline a collection that a family member wants to donate? (Ex: a widow wants to donate her late husband's work)

2019-04-30 18:55:08 UTC

It'd be *awesome* if you could/would answer questions in a Google doc. :)

2019-04-30 19:00:10 UTC

How do we help the field of archives recognize that our field can involve emotional labor and secondary trauma? What steps can be taken to have this be more recognized and integrated into curriculum/training for archivists?

THANK YOU!!! This was fabulous

2019-04-30 19:01:04 UTC