Dissertation
Unexamined Standards and Complex Histories: Case Studies on Rhetoricity, Transgression, and Decolonial Praxis in Archives
Washington State University
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Washington State University
2023
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.7273/000005388
Abstract
Bringing library and information science (LIS), rhetoric and composition, and decoloniality scholarship into close conversation, this project analyzes the many commitments, biases, and unexamined standards that affect how primary source materials are preserved, accessed, and understood. From variable researcher training, to outdated cataloging and descriptive practices, to institutional paradigms for research and collaboration, archives are endlessly impacted by the ideals and practices of the stakeholders who interact with them. Far from neutral repositories of mere-information awaiting discovery, archives – and, by extension, the historiographical work derived from them – persuade us to adopt a particular orientation to both the stories and voices held within the historical record and those not-so-conspicuously left out of it. Via two emblematic case studies, and with particular guidance from Qwo-Li Driskill (Cherokee) and bell hooks, I endeavor to answer: why do we need to decolonize archives and what would a decolonial archival praxis really look like?
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Details
- Title
- Unexamined Standards and Complex Histories
- Creators
- Kathryn Manis
- Contributors
- Jon Hegglund (Advisor)Patricia Wilde (Advisor)Julie Staggers (Committee Member)
- Awarding Institution
- Washington State University
- Academic Unit
- English, Department of
- Theses and Dissertations
- Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Washington State University
- Publisher
- Washington State University
- Number of pages
- 234
- Identifiers
- 99901031037701842
- Language
- English
- Resource Type
- Dissertation