An abstract illustration shows gridded lines overlaying lanscape contours.
Transformation in the Archives

Paper archives have long been foundational sources of data for humanities scholars–be these materials organized as logs and records or correspondences and various other writings, institutionally produced and preserved or recovered by other means. What are the risks and rewards of digital archives? What are our corresponding responsibilities–as archivists and scholars of archives in the digital era? What makes a digital data archive? What are their ethics in the new digital formats of accessibility and of preservation? Can we revolutionize the burdens that accompany past archives? This seminar addresses these pressing questions of archives in the digital era.

A triptych: the left photo is of two mangoes hanging from a tree. The middle is of two brown men. One is wearing an African mask, and the other kisses his throat. The image on the right is of three men, overlaid with a photo of grass.
Queering the Archive: Brown Bodies in Ecstasy: Visual Assemblages, and the Pleasures of Transgressive Erotics

Jordache A. Ellapen reflects on his photographic project, Queering the Archive: Brown Bodies in Ecstasy, which blends photographs from his family archive with contemporary portraits shot in a studio. The work examines the intersections of race, sexuality, and eroticism as they relate to the in/visibility of black and brown queer bodies and subjectivities in South Africa.