Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture
Digital Archivist & Project Curator – #SchomburgSyllabus

Project Overview: Launched in September 2021, the syllabus marked the 95th anniversary of NYPL’s acquisition of Afro-Puerto Rican scholar, historian, writer, activist collector, and curator Arturo Schomburg’s collection in 1926. The collaborative efforts that enabled Schomburg to amass his collection mirror those driving hashtag syllabi and the #SchomburgSyllabus today. This project is a celebration of the legacy of Black self-education and Black librarianship, and the resources are drawn from the Schomburg Center’s five divisions: Jean Blackwell Hutson Research and Reference; Manuscripts, Archives, and Rare Books; Photographs and Prints; Art and Artifacts; and Moving Image and Recorded Sound; and staff blog posts, LibGuides, exhibitions, public programs, and the Black Liberation Reading List.

Scope of Work: Aug 2019-Sept 2021: As the digital archivist at the Schomburg Center, I collected and archived online materials for the #SchomburgSyllabus that can be used for classroom curriculum, collective study, self-directed education, and social media and internet research. The syllabus includes Schomburg Center primary sources in its 27 themes, which serve as guides to topics in Black diasporic history and an introduction to the Schomburg Center’s collections. In honor of the 135th Street Library Branch, where the Schomburg Center began, the 135 items represent just a slice of the resources available on the 27 topics. 

Awards: Educational Use of Archives Award presented by The Archivists Round Table of Metropolitan New York, October 2022

Features:
Interview with Zakiya Collier, Schomburg’s Digital Archivist

Black Liberation at the Schomburg Center (AD, CC)

A Black History Trove: Teaching with the #SchomburgSyllabus and Its Primary Sources

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