blog post by Jessica Tai, Archival Processing Scholar, CFPRT

The Center for Primary Research and Training, part of UCLA Library Special Collections, recently hosted an archival outreach event in which participants created buttons, zines, and other crafts using materials reproduced from UCLA Library’s archival collections. Materials focusing on social justice initiatives, activist groups, and human rights were highlighted. Activating the Archive aimed to create a space for creative engagement with the collections, which included material from activist groups including the Black Panther Party, the United Farmworkers Union, ACT UP Los Angeles and documented events such as desegregation, the Vietnam War, and the Asian American Movement of the 60s and 70s.

Students and staff from a multitude of departments came out, excited to create buttons with slogans such as “A Day without Human Rights is Like a Day Without Sunshine,” “We Shall Overcome,” and “A Woman’s Place is in the House and the Senate.” Participants collaged reproductions of materials from collections including the UCLA Student Activism Materials (1927-2014), the TreePeople Records (1970s-2010), and the Underground, Alternative and Extremist Literature Collection (1900-1990). Activating the Archive was part of a series of events that UCLA Library Special Collections began to host in response to the 2016 U.S. Election. With the vast number of groups on campus being directly targeted by the new administration, we hoped our event would provide students with a creative outlet to make their voices heard.

Activating the Archive sought to highlight the ways in which archives can become sites of active social engagement, as well as display the relevancy of historical records in our contemporary lives. Through hands on interaction, remaking, and reinterpreting the ways these records are portrayed, participants were invited to discover the ways in which archives can supply source materials for creative resistance. We also compiled and made available an “Activist Resource List” that highlighted collections that focus on activist initiatives and activities from UCLA Library Special Collections, the Chicano Studies Research Center, and the Center for Oral History Research Collections. Also featured was an exhibit case including materials such as a Black Panther party publication, an image from a Gay Liberation Front protest, and a t-shirt for International Worker’s Day.

Through the invitation for participants to creatively engage with the archives, and by encouraging the reuse, remaking, and recontextualizing of our collections, we sought to open up our archive to our campus community in an innovative and socially relevant way.

Activating the Archive poster featuring buttons from our collection that were recreated during the event.

CFPRT student employees Tori Maches and Joyce Wang make buttons for participants.

Exhibit case featuring material from the Steve Louie Asian American Movement Collection, the Cheryl Nassar Papers, the Underground, Alternative and Extremist Literature Collection, the Carol Waymire Collection of Periodicals and Ephemera, and the LA Times Photographic Archive.

Protest march against the Signal Hill police over the death of Ron Settles, who died while in jail in Signal Hill Long Beach, California, 1981. Photograph by Rick Meyer. (Los Angeles Times Photographic Archive.)

Two members of the Gay Liberation Front protest in front of the Hollywood division police station with signs reading "Stop Police Brutality and Entrapment of Homosexuals," Los Angeles, 1972. (Los Angeles Times Photographic Archive.)