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December 6, 2024 73 mins

This week we’re interviewing Brandon and Katherine on metadata related to indigenous issues, but we of course stray into many other topics. 

Katherine: https://linktr.ee/katwitzig 

Brandon: bcastle [at] umass [dot] edu

Media mentioned

https://open.spotify.com/show/0ZtaU2XZlPEhmIW1OV7k8O

PCC Task Group Charge: https://www.loc.gov/aba/pcc/taskgroup/Metadata-Related-to-Indigenous-Peoples-Americas-TG-charge.pdf 

Preliminary Report (PCC Task Group for Metadata Related to Indigenous Peoples of the Americas): https://www.loc.gov/aba/pcc/taskgroup/Metadata-Related-to-Indigenous-Peoples-Americas-TG-preliminary-report.pdf 

Short article on our work in Descriptive Notes (blog of Society of American Archivists): https://saadescription.wordpress.com/2024/05/20/taking-on-the-challenge-pccs-metadata-justice-work-for-indigenous-communities/ 

https://www.landgrabu.org/ 

https://localcontexts.org/ 

https://localcontexts.org/labels/traditional-knowledge-labels/ 

https://ailanet.org/ 

Transcripts:https://pastecode.io/s/ck3tz6ym

Join the Discord: https://discord.gg/zzEpV9QEAG 

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Transcript

Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Justin: I'm Justin. I'm Scala Communications Library. My pronouns are he and they. (00:27):
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Sadie: I'm Sadie. I work IT in a public library, and my pronouns are they, them. (00:31):
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Jay: I'm Jay. I'm a cataloging librarian, and my pronouns are he, him. (00:36):
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Justin: And we have guests. Would you like to introduce yourselves? (00:40):
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Katherine: I'm going to introduce myself in my language. Halito, Sahochifoyet, Catherine Witzig. (00:44):
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Katherine: Chetasea, Oklahoma, Atali. I just said, hello, my name is Catherine Witzig. (00:50):
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Katherine: I'm a citizen of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, and I am from Oklahoma. (00:55):
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Katherine: My pronouns are she and they. (00:59):
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Brandon: Hi, I'm also going to introduce myself in my language. I'm from the Simshian Nation, (01:02):
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Brandon: which is in the northwest coast of Alaska. (01:18):
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Brandon: I'm from Ketchikan, and I'm currently living in Amherst, Massachusetts, (01:21):
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Brandon: where I'm the Indigenous Studies librarian at UMass Amherst, (01:24):
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Brandon: and I use he, him pronouns. (01:28):
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Justin: Welcome. (01:33):
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Sadie: Welcome. (01:34):
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Justin: No, it's so great. I forgot to ask if you were going to do your introductions in your languages. (01:35):
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Justin: Actually, something I wanted to ask from listening to the podcast you already (01:42):
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Justin: did, when you're doing those sorts of introductions, is that something that, (01:47):
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Justin: I guess, what's sort of the etiquette when people are asking to do their introductions (01:54):
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Justin: that way in a group of a lot of Indigenous people? (01:59):
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Justin: How did that come about? Is there a reason people do the go-round in their Indigenous languages? (02:04):
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Justin: I don't know, I just feel like I'm missing some context. (02:12):
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Katherine: Yeah, so I think part of it is just an acknowledgement that Indigenous languages (02:14):
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Katherine: have historically been not allowed to be used in educational or public spaces. (02:20):
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Katherine: So it's definitely being used in a reclamative way. (02:27):
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Katherine: And also, I really enjoy that when people are introducing themselves in their (02:30):
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Katherine: language, obviously, there's some things that language brings to it, (02:35):
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Katherine: but you can tell a lot about a person by the things that they choose to include. (02:39):
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Katherine: In their introductions. So I think it's, it's a way to use the language in a (02:44):
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Katherine: reclamative way, but also really introduce who you really are. Yeah. (02:50):
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Brandon: And I think too, like, you know, there's, there's abridged versions, (02:55):
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Brandon: there's like your whole family line can be included. (03:00):
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Brandon: I mean, you're saying like in groups of indigenous people, yeah, (03:03):
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Brandon: people's introductions can go through their whole family line. (03:07):
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Brandon: So it's like, here's my grandma, here's my grandpa, my mom, and my dad, (03:10):
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Brandon: my cousins, and I think a lot of it is just to really allow different spaces, (03:14):
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Brandon: especially Indigenous spaces in the community, just to allow people to know (03:20):
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Brandon: where you're coming from, who your family is, so that it just brings that context (03:25):
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Brandon: to the relationships that you're in. (03:30):
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Jay: And I think that like sets us up nicely for what we're going to be like talking about today, (03:33):
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Jay: like your work with indigenous metadata, because like different ways and systems (03:38):
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Jay: of thinking about how do you describe something and for what, what purpose. (03:43):
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Jay: And not to get whatever the indigenous version of Orientalism is, (03:50):
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Jay: not to get Orientalist about it, but just what is it that different cultures, (03:55):
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Jay: no matter where they're from, what do they choose, (04:00):
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Jay: what do they value as important? (04:03):
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Jay: Sometimes when I'm doing cataloging, it's like, when someone's searching for (04:06):
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Jay: this, what would they use to search for it? (04:10):
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Jay: What's important to them about this that needs to be in this record? (04:13):
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Jay: And I think it's interesting how different that can be across cultures and stuff. (04:16):
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Jay: So yeah, tell us, what do you do? Why are you here? What's the very cool thing (04:22):
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Jay: that we're going to be talking about that you've been working on? (04:27):
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Katherine: So the very cool thing that we're going to talk about today is for the Program (04:29):
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Katherine: for Cooperative Cataloging, they have a task group for metadata related to Indigenous (04:34):
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Katherine: peoples of the Americas. Yes, it's a mouthful. (04:39):
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Jay: They always are. (04:43):
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Katherine: Always, always. But Brandon and I are co-chairing a group of 12, (04:45):
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Katherine: yeah, 12 individuals who are working in libraries with metadata in the US and Canada. (04:51):
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Katherine: And there's also a split between Indigenous folks and non-Indigenous folks, (04:59):
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Katherine: but just a lot of expertise in this group to kind of look at what has historically (05:03):
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Katherine: been done for metadata related to Indigenous peoples. (05:09):
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Katherine: And what can we do better? (05:14):
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Katherine: So we've got like a whole long list of things that we're responsible for, (05:16):
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Katherine: but we're just trying to look at (05:22):
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Katherine: Yeah, what we can do better and also take into account all these like local (05:25):
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Katherine: indigenous solutions that are happening because there are some incredible metadata (05:30):
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Katherine: solutions that are happening. (05:36):
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Katherine: And I don't think they get quite the spotlight that they should. (05:38):
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Katherine: So that's kind of what we're about. We're trying to like put a little light on these solutions. (05:42):
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Jay: Yeah, I'm always telling people when I was back when I was at UIUC, (05:48):
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Jay: Catherine, you were the one who graduated from UIUC? (05:52):
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Jay: Yeah, back when I was there and I did my thesis, all the research I was doing (05:54):
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Jay: on like, okay, what are people doing with a community driven metadata? (05:58):
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Jay: Because I was focused on like queer metadata. (06:02):
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Jay: And like, at the time, the only like, work that was being done that was even (06:04):
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Jay: close to what I was looking for was all indigenous projects, (06:09):
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Jay: like indigenous metadata projects like this, have been sort of the forefront (06:13):
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Jay: of this kind of project in a lot of like cataloging stuff for like a decade or more at this point. (06:17):
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Jay: So you mentioned the program for cooperative cataloging and the catalogers in (06:23):
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Jay: the room know what that is. (06:27):
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Jay: But we do have a lot of non-library worker listeners as well as people who are (06:29):
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Jay: in library school or who are thinking about being librarians and also just like (06:34):
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Jay: all of our weird podcast friends that we make listen to this. (06:38):
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Jay: So could you clarify what is (06:41):
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Jay: the PCC? What is the program for cooperative cataloging? What do they do? (06:44):
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Katherine: So let's see. So I know Program for Cooperative Cataloging is an extension of (06:48):
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Katherine: the Library of Congress. (06:55):
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Katherine: And so they do a lot of the programmatic work of looking at standards. (06:56):
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Katherine: And so that's kind of the position that we were coming from. (07:03):
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Katherine: What kind of standards does Library of Congress have as far as like for their (07:06):
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Katherine: subject headings and for their classification schemas? (07:11):
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Katherine: I know if you work with Library of Congress, you know that Native American topics (07:15):
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Katherine: are all in E under American history. (07:21):
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Jay: The Indians of North America. (07:24):
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Katherine: Indians of North America are in E under American history. (07:25):
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Katherine: So there's kind of looking at that, how it's been relegated to the past, (07:31):
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Katherine: and ways that Library of Congress, as an institution that sets these standards (07:37):
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Katherine: for other institutions, ways that they can do better. (07:42):
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Jay: And how did y'all get involved with this project, with the PCC? (07:46):
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Katherine: I was actually on the American Indian Library Association listserv. (07:52):
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Jay: Yeah, I love them. (07:58):
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Katherine: Oh, they're fantastic. I'll be the treasurer next year. (08:00):
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Katherine: Yeah, I'm really excited. But they put out a call. (08:05):
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Katherine: They wanted people to apply for it. (08:09):
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Katherine: So I know I had to create kind of a statement, a little bit about my background, (08:13):
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Katherine: kind of like what I would be bringing to the project. (08:18):
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Katherine: And then from there, they kind of narrowed it down to the professionals that (08:21):
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Katherine: would be working on the project. (08:25):
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Jay: Very cool. And how about you, Brandon? (08:27):
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Brandon: Yeah, it was a similar, you know, similar experience. I hadn't really heard (08:29):
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Brandon: of PCC because I was still, you know, in library school when the call came out. (08:33):
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Brandon: But I think what really spoke to me was just that, you know, (08:39):
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Brandon: an organization with such close proximity to Library of Congress was even like, (08:42):
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Brandon: proposing that, you know, this work is like of vital importance. (08:46):
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Brandon: And we, you know, this is a call to, you know, make a contribution. (08:50):
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Brandon: And you know i personally do not really come from you know a metadata cataloging (08:54):
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Brandon: background but what i think is a really important part of this work and i think (09:00):
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Brandon: pcc in general is that pcc is is also about like a lot of collaboration across (09:05):
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Brandon: libraries worldwide to you know provide like (09:11):
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Brandon: affordable, but also inclusive cataloging for libraries all over the place. They do a lot of work. (09:14):
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Brandon: And for me, I think it's really about that collaborative piece. (09:21):
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Brandon: And that's what I have brought from my previous experience was how do you navigate (09:24):
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Brandon: these different institutions. (09:30):
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Brandon: These different entities as Indigenous peoples, as communities that have kind (09:32):
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Brandon: of a, I would say, an interest and a need to connect with these different types of collections. (09:37):
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Brandon: So it's like, how do you bring that like community oriented (09:42):
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Brandon: mindset to this type of work so for me i was like okay i this is a really great (09:46):
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Brandon: opportunity and i really want to collaborate with people from many different (09:52):
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Brandon: backgrounds to to focus on indigenous metadata so i was like sign me up let's do it so. (09:56):
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Jay: This kind of relates to a question i'll ask probably later into our recording (10:03):
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Jay: but But something that I personally struggle with politically is why work with the PCC on this? (10:08):
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Jay: Why the Library of Congress? Why do this through such an institution as opposed (10:19):
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Jay: to – not to say that it's bad, (10:26):
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Jay: but thinking about politically, why choose to do it through an institution as (10:29):
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Jay: opposed to do it independently with another group, I suppose? (10:33):
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Jay: Was that like a decision you had to think through in your head? (10:36):
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Katherine: For me, I thought about the way that it would be a kind of systemic change. (10:40):
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Katherine: And then also acknowledging that there are local solutions. My perspective is why not both? (10:49):
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Katherine: I think if we are going to have standards, which we are going to have standards, (10:55):
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Katherine: let's try to make them as inclusive as possible, but then also leave space. (11:01):
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Katherine: For having individual organizations and institutions to have solutions that do work for them. (11:06):
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Katherine: So it is something that I thought about because, you know, everything takes a long, long time. (11:12):
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Katherine: So that was something to think about as well. Like, even though we've been putting (11:20):
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Katherine: in a lot of this work, it's going to be a while before we can see the actual (11:25):
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Katherine: like fruits of our labor. (11:29):
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Katherine: So that was something that I considered as well, but I was really interested in having, (11:30):
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Katherine: Library of Congress be more inclusive in a way that's not like, (11:37):
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Katherine: you know, everybody's like Indians of North America and just like rubbing their temples. (11:42):
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Katherine: And it's like, you know, that's kind of like, that's not a great reflection (11:48):
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Katherine: of like who I want libraries to be. (11:53):
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Katherine: So that's where I was coming from when I was thinking about like, should I do this? (11:57):
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Brandon: Yeah i i think similar to to (12:02):
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Brandon: catherine especially you know regarding like the systemic (12:06):
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Brandon: potential for systemic change you know i know (12:09):
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Brandon: that i've seen advocacy like even before (12:12):
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Brandon: you know going into library school to to (12:15):
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Brandon: change subject headings to like make this change (12:18):
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Brandon: and how people are described at like you know what is seemingly (12:21):
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Brandon: like such a top level way and another (12:24):
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Brandon: part of like the collaborative work of this is like just seeing (12:28):
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Brandon: like how many people and like different libraries (12:31):
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Brandon: have already implemented so much change and (12:34):
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Brandon: being able to advocate for that and you (12:37):
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Brandon: know point to that this is a need because i mean like in some of the previous (12:40):
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Brandon: work i've done you know that's that's definitely a barrier for so many different (12:44):
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Brandon: librarians catalogers where it's like yeah like we would love to do this but (12:48):
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Brandon: like you know we got to address the harm of what's already there and then And also, (12:54):
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Brandon: you know, we're still kind of bound to LCSH and, you know, we can't, (12:59):
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Brandon: you know, there's not a whole lot of, you know, support. (13:05):
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Brandon: Staffing and just the ability to go and make all those changes. (13:08):
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Brandon: So it's like, how can we gather as many voices as possible? (13:12):
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Brandon: And people who are doing that work already locally on the ground, (13:15):
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Brandon: like, how can we bring that more to light? (13:20):
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Brandon: And so that's definitely what I was thinking about was like, (13:22):
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Brandon: how can we like, you know, Go up to the Library of Congress and be like, (13:25):
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Brandon: hey, all of this is happening and there should definitely be support and change. (13:28):
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Jay: Now yeah like i so i was on was it the pcc i don't even remember which fucking (13:35):
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Jay: like ad hoc group it was on but i was on it with billy who i saw was part of (13:43):
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Jay: this as well for like the the gender and the name authority records where we said don't do it. (13:47):
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Jay: And i remember one of the things that that was in response to was the first (13:52):
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Jay: go around of putting gender in name authority records. (13:57):
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Jay: There was a lot of good scholarship put out about that, including the Ethics in Name Authority book. (14:01):
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Jay: And one of my homosaurus colleagues wrote a really great chapter criticizing (14:09):
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Jay: the way that Library of Congress Name Authority views names and gender and relationships (14:14):
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Jay: and how Western reflects a very specific worldview. (14:22):
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Jay: And one thing I'm always curious about because (14:27):
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Jay: i love this shit um is like because (14:30):
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Jay: library of congress like is structured a certain way (14:33):
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Jay: and reflects a certain worldview as you (14:36):
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Jay: are adding and changing the (14:40):
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Jay: terms to include and reflect better like indigenous topics like where that knowledge (14:43):
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Jay: organization and ways of describing doesn't overlap well like what's that been (14:50):
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Jay: like like How do you decide when you do endonyms versus exonyms or what language is used? (14:57):
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Jay: Or how do you make it fit together? (15:02):
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Katherine: For me, I think about it a lot like weaving. (15:05):
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Katherine: So you've got the piece already there. You've got the warp and the weft and everything. (15:11):
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Katherine: You just kind of have to start wiggling things apart to make space. (15:17):
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Katherine: And that's the work of like we are prying it apart. so we can make the space (15:23):
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Katherine: to add those additional knowledges and those additional terms and those different ways of naming. (15:28):
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Katherine: And while it's somewhat unfortunate that we can't automatically put all these (15:34):
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Katherine: Indigenous languages in the authority files, I don't think that will happen. (15:40):
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Katherine: I think that the fact that we are getting the potential to include them or to (15:45):
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Katherine: just change these larger things, (15:52):
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Katherine: I think that we're kind of like tearing, we're tearing at it a little bit and (15:55):
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Katherine: making space for those indigenous threads. (16:00):
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Katherine: So that's kind of the way I think about it in pictures. So. (16:03):
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Brandon: Yeah, I love thinking about basket. (16:08):
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Katherine: Just like in general. (16:11):
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Brandon: But then also for this, because it's such a good metaphor, especially like for (16:12):
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Brandon: other ways of knowing it's like how to like things like, especially like for indigenous knowledge, (16:18):
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Brandon: you know, you have knowledge that has been developed for like, (16:25):
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Brandon: millennia, and then, you know, communities who have like disseminated that knowledge (16:30):
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Brandon: and like so many different ways. (16:35):
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Brandon: So yeah it's like how do you take something that (16:37):
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Brandon: you know is is seemingly like (16:40):
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Brandon: it seems like there could be (16:43):
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Brandon: you know an easy way to just oh well that's how this (16:46):
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Brandon: group describes them let someone just write it down like whatever is (16:49):
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Brandon: the easiest way to spell it but i think it misses so much (16:52):
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Brandon: especially you know for how certain communities (16:56):
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Brandon: view the world how indigenous peoples all over the world have come (16:59):
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Brandon: to build these knowledge systems and i (17:03):
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Brandon: think yeah it's just about like how do we do that justice in (17:07):
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Brandon: in libraries and there's not always an easy (17:10):
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Brandon: answer i mean especially you know (17:13):
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Brandon: for different groups i mean i can't speak for any particular group but if you (17:16):
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Brandon: know you know like tribal politics can get really tricky and then it's like (17:20):
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Brandon: how do you one person doesn't want it spelled that way but another person you (17:24):
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Brandon: know so i think i would say just to answer your question about how do these (17:27):
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Brandon: two things overlap or how do you integrate them? (17:33):
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Brandon: I think a lot of it, to me, what I've seen is absolutely that, (17:35):
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Brandon: being able to build relationships over a sustained period of time with Indigenous peoples. (17:40):
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Brandon: Whether that's through certain collections that are in an institution or a library. (17:47):
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Brandon: Yeah, it's like just bringing people in. (17:52):
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Brandon: It's maybe easier said than done, but I think that relationships being built, (17:55):
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Brandon: really important part of it. (18:00):
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Katherine: I think we also, sorry. (18:02):
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Jay: I'm sorry. Go ahead, Catherine. (18:04):
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Katherine: I think we also need to consider a policy of documentation and kind of the way that, you know, (18:05):
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Katherine: we give priority to literary warrant and kind of the idea that there is an origin (18:13):
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Katherine: point or person or publication. (18:20):
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Katherine: I think if we did a little more thinking about that and the ways that we can (18:25):
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Katherine: incorporate knowledge that, yes, has been developed over thousands of years. (18:30):
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Katherine: It's not going to have a single, like, let me cite this source. (18:35):
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Katherine: It's generations upon generations of knowledge. (18:39):
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Katherine: So, I mean, I think the policy of documentation is a great place to start. (18:42):
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Jay: Yeah, in the homosaurus, that's actually something we think about a lot as well (18:48):
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Jay: as literary warrant versus this thing could exist, so what if we made a term for it, right? (18:52):
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Jay: Like this sort of almost like a making space for (18:58):
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Jay: something for when it shows up instead of instead of (19:01):
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Jay: waiting and therefore like kind of creating the the (19:04):
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Jay: world ontologically as it would (19:08):
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Jay: be cool to be i also really love that weaving metaphor that you use because (19:11):
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Jay: i feel like people view controlled vocabularies as this rigid set in stone thing (19:16):
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Jay: and in certain ways i think they are If we get all critical theory about this, (19:22):
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Jay: things are defined by what they're not, (19:28):
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Jay: all boundaries necessitate policing, (19:30):
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Jay: all the things that we say on here every other episode, right? (19:33):
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Jay: But control vocabularies change all the time. (19:36):
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Jay: Terms get added, terms get changed, terms get updated, new relationships are formed between terms. (19:40):
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Jay: Like all of the time, there's a reason why libraries pay third parties to do (19:45):
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Jay: all of their authority control in their ILSs for them because it changes so (19:51):
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Jay: often and it's a huge pain in the ass. (19:56):
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Jay: Right. So like these things are living documents, you know, they're living things (19:59):
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Jay: and sort of showing how like these things can change. They do all the time already. (20:04):
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Jay: Like we're not, y'all aren't doing anything necessarily novel or unique by adding (20:12):
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Jay: stuff to a vocabulary that gets stuff added to it. (20:17):
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Jay: But I, I feel like people have this idea about LC in particular. (20:19):
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Jay: So I really like that weaving, like pulling stuff apart metaphor. (20:25):
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Katherine: Well, and I think it's really helpful to you, (20:28):
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Katherine: to what you were saying about they have this idea of what Library of Congress (20:31):
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Katherine: is like or kind of the attitudes that they portray. (20:35):
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Katherine: I think this work with PCC is an excellent opportunity to potentially change (20:38):
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Katherine: some of those perceptions and kind of move in a way that is being more responsive. (20:44):
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Katherine: I think in many ways, it's still reactive. (20:51):
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Jay: Because we've. (20:54):
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Katherine: Had Indians of North america for a very long. (20:56):
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Jay: Time um but um i. (20:58):
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Katherine: Think i think there's there's motion and movement and i'm feeling that and so (21:02):
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Katherine: i'm excited to like help change this kind of stagnation that they that they've (21:08):
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Katherine: had regarding indigenous topics. (21:13):
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Jay: I tend to jump on the mic very quickly so i'm just pausing see if anybody else (21:16):
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Jay: wants to yap so i'm not yapping um brandon you mentioned, (21:20):
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Jay: justice right and i was wondering if y'all would talk about like the concept (21:27):
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Jay: of justice within metadata like does this is this work that you're doing a type (21:32):
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Jay: of metadata justice or if not (21:37):
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Jay: like what does metadata justice like actually look like to you two yeah. (21:40):
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Brandon: I think that's um you know the question of all of this is you know like how (21:44):
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Brandon: can we you know bring to light these other ways of knowing in a respectful way (21:51):
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Brandon: and in a reciprocal way too? (21:57):
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Brandon: How can we, as information professionals, be able to share accurate, trusted information. (22:00):
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Brandon: But then also, you know, allow indigenous communities, people to have, (22:09):
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Brandon: you know, more of like more of a control over how and, you know, (22:13):
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Brandon: where their cultural expressions, intellectual property, how that is stewarded. (22:17):
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Brandon: So, yeah, I think this group is definitely touching on, you know, (22:23):
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Brandon: these goals, I think, as Catherine was mentioning, like, you know, (22:28):
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Brandon: creating that space for this layer of justice. (22:31):
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Brandon: But, you know, I think, yeah, there's a whole lot of terms, you know, (22:34):
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Brandon: for example, in a lot of Indigenous communities, there are terms in Library (22:38):
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Brandon: of Congress, the broader terms are often misspelled, (22:42):
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Brandon: they're often inaccurate, or not even from the actual community, (22:46):
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Brandon: it's usually more of a colonial perspective and description. (22:52):
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Brandon: Description so it's like how you know (22:55):
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Brandon: where where can where does the justice start you know (22:58):
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Brandon: is i think it's all encompassing but you know it's addressing that harm and (23:01):
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Brandon: that's part of what our the pcc group that we're in is also working on is is (23:06):
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Brandon: drafting a couple statements to include in what we present who the pcc and eventually (23:11):
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Brandon: library of congress is you know the harm that some of these. (23:16):
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Brandon: Classification ranges have caused, especially, what is it, like E75 through (23:22):
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Brandon: E99, basically anything under the you know the term. (23:27):
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Brandon: Anything in that, I think there's a lot of, there's, (23:32):
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Brandon: a lot of need to correct those terms. (23:36):
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Brandon: And I think that's definitely part of doing communities justice for sure. (23:40):
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Katherine: Yes, it is absolutely metadata justice. I think, (23:45):
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Katherine: especially leaning on the idea of reciprocity, if the general populace as primarily (23:50):
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Katherine: English speakers would want information presented in a way that made sense to (23:59):
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Katherine: them, that they could read, that they could understand. (24:04):
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Katherine: Same way Indigenous communities want to see their information represented in (24:06):
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Katherine: a way that they understand that makes sense to them. (24:11):
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Katherine: So I think it's just, it's really trying to keep in mind that these are different (24:15):
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Katherine: communities, but they deserve the same respect as these larger communities. (24:22):
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Katherine: So I think it's really about doing what is right. (24:28):
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Katherine: And I think what's right is to let these communities define themselves and to (24:33):
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Katherine: use their own languages to describe themselves. (24:38):
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Katherine: And we should just respect that and use those terms. (24:41):
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Katherine: So absolutely metadata justice. (24:45):
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Jay: Hell yeah. (24:47):
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Jay: And that, so one thing (24:50):
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Jay: that I feel like sometimes people are surprised that I'm (24:53):
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Jay: very critical about this is like this (24:56):
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Jay: gets me thinking about like all the like sort of reparative cataloging projects (24:59):
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Jay: that have been going on for like a couple years and you see them a lot with (25:03):
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Jay: like people adding homosaurus terms but then there was also the the illegal (25:07):
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Jay: aliens uh thing and then people changing that there's a lot of work where people (25:11):
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Jay: will locally do stuff and i'm often kind of, (25:16):
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Jay: critical of these projects not because i (25:21):
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Jay: don't believe in what they're doing but because librarianship (25:24):
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Jay: is still predominantly a white profession a (25:28):
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Jay: lot of these are very white projects right and i'm always like well did you (25:32):
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Jay: talk to the people in your community where you're deciding what the right word (25:38):
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Jay: is like this was the whole reason behind my fucking master's thesis right I was like, (25:45):
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Jay: have people talked to gay people at all when they decided that this word wasn't (25:48):
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Jay: good for gay people, but this one is? (25:53):
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Jay: Did they talk to a gay person? I don't know. (25:55):
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Jay: And so I'm always like, what are they actually in contact with these communities (25:57):
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Jay: when they're doing reparative projects? (26:02):
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Jay: Arthur, please don't get on my desk. There's a bunch of stuff on it, (26:04):
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Jay: buddy. My cat's breathe. (26:06):
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Jay: I want to crawl all over your laptop now. It's okay, buddy. Come on. Here we go. (26:08):
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Jay: This is Arthur. He's very sweet. (26:14):
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Katherine: Hi, Arthur. (26:16):
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Jay: Please don't show your butt there we go, (26:18):
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Jay: and so yeah i'm always just like like you (26:23):
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Jay: know obviously a white librarian's doing (26:27):
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Jay: reparative projects isn't in and of itself inherently bad right (26:30):
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Jay: but i'm always like what's the sustainability is this a one-time project (26:33):
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Jay: you got a grant for but that's gonna end as soon as the (26:36):
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Jay: cataloger who's doing it goes to another job or (26:39):
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Jay: the money runs out or you hit a snag (26:43):
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Jay: or something or did you talk to people like at all (26:46):
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Jay: ever so like how can like (26:48):
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Jay: especially like people who are not indigenous like how (26:53):
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Jay: can we when we're maybe identifying these problems in our own library catalogs (26:57):
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Jay: in our communities like how do we like work with like the communities in question (27:02):
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Jay: like how do we empower those communities who are not dominant and librarianship. (27:08):
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Jay: Like, how do we actually repair this relationship to make these reparative projects better? (27:13):
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Katherine: I will say something that I have run into as an indigenous information professional (27:18):
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Katherine: is sometimes you are the only indigenous person in the room. (27:25):
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Katherine: And sometimes it's that's enough for some people. They've asked me and that done. (27:29):
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Katherine: But I mean, there are over 500 distinct tribal nations in the United States alone. (27:36):
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Katherine: And so I can't be a representative of my own tribal nation, much less over 500 (27:45):
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Katherine: others. So I think it needs to be a constant conversation. (27:53):
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Katherine: And that also lends itself to the sustainability of the project. (27:57):
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Katherine: Because like you said, if you're repairing those relationships, (28:02):
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Katherine: it's a relationship that should be reciprocal and fulfilling. (28:07):
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Katherine: So I think to start with, kind of think about things that your institution can (28:11):
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Katherine: offer to these communities. (28:19):
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Katherine: Instead of thinking about what knowledge can these communities give to me to (28:21):
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Katherine: make my metadata better, think (28:26):
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Katherine: about like, oh, this is knowledge for which they should be compensated. (28:28):
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Katherine: They should be compensated for their time and for their wisdom. (28:33):
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Katherine: And I think there are a lot of people that forget about that, (28:36):
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Katherine: that this is still knowledge and expertise. (28:41):
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Katherine: So I think that definitely needs to be acknowledged. And that will help kind (28:45):
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Katherine: of treat it as like professional relationship. (28:50):
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Katherine: But then it can be like more than that. it can be a truly fulfilling bond if (28:54):
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Katherine: like you're able to consider these communities as communities of people so i (29:00):
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Katherine: think that's probably like the first place to start. (29:07):
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Brandon: Yeah yeah i really love what you (29:13):
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Brandon: said catherine because i think yeah i think there's like (29:16):
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Brandon: there's lot you know it's every (29:19):
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Brandon: every community that you're you (29:22):
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Brandon: know that that are that you're ever going to work with communicate with (29:25):
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Brandon: it's it's always going to be different there's going to be different needs there's (29:28):
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Brandon: going to be a whole different set of stages of where you know work is out especially (29:33):
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Brandon: regarding like cultural heritage things i mean you know a lot of tribes nations (29:37):
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Brandon: and at least in what is the u.s there's so much Shit. (29:43):
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Brandon: Like inundation of just requests from (29:48):
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Brandon: all sorts of different things so i think (29:51):
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Brandon: another component just to to add to what you're saying (29:54):
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Brandon: catherine too is like kind of that prep work if you want to call it that or (29:57):
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Brandon: kind of pre-relationship building so that when communities do you know come (30:02):
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Brandon: to a particular library or or you individually that there's at least some foundations. (30:07):
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Brandon: Some scaffolding in the library that addresses some of these concerns. (30:15):
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Brandon: Because I want to put a plug in for things like the protocols for Native American (30:20):
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Brandon: archival materials, which has fabulous outline for how to approach this work. (30:24):
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Brandon: Things from building relationships with community, like how to make sure your (30:31):
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Brandon: collections are accessible and to communities, (30:35):
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Brandon: providing context for where your collections came from you (30:38):
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Brandon: know just just aware general awareness of like indigenous uh (30:42):
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Brandon: related issues you know so that there that there's already (30:46):
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Brandon: this this general awareness of that these types (30:49):
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Brandon: of resources exist that institutions can implement and (30:52):
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Brandon: now that's definitely not always easy because i think going (30:55):
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Brandon: back to what we were saying about being like a sole indigenous (30:58):
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Brandon: librarian it can be (31:01):
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Brandon: really really challenging uh to (31:04):
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Brandon: have to continuously advocate for something that (31:07):
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Brandon: not everyone either a understands or (31:10):
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Brandon: b cares about because you know (31:14):
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Brandon: there's a whole you know depending on the size of the library there's (31:17):
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Brandon: so many different things going on and it can be a lot but (31:20):
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Brandon: you know like for me i would say that like tapping into (31:23):
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Brandon: the resources that exist and framing them as a necessary component to do this (31:26):
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Brandon: work because I think a lot of libraries and things are really interested in (31:32):
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Brandon: DEI I mean we'll see what happens in the next year with all that but it's like (31:35):
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Brandon: there's so much interest and or I think there's this like. (31:41):
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Brandon: Desire to have like a really shiny like you know (31:44):
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Brandon: initiative we're doing the good thing yeah we're (31:47):
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Brandon: doing it yay um oh november's (31:51):
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Brandon: over okay no more native americans like you know (31:54):
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Brandon: it's like that that's just one month and i (31:56):
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Brandon: think like you know for indigenous people it's (31:59):
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Brandon: like we're indigenous all the time like it's it's happening (32:02):
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Brandon: all the time so i would (32:05):
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Brandon: say that like you know things like implementing protocols and (32:08):
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Brandon: framing those in a way that it's like we got to (32:11):
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Brandon: like implement this because otherwise those relationships (32:14):
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Brandon: those things that you that the library like wants (32:18):
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Brandon: to to show are are not actually going to happen in any meaningful way so i think (32:21):
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Brandon: like seeing what's already out there in in our field because there is there (32:26):
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Brandon: is a lot of stuff out there but it's about you know just seeing like kind of (32:31):
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Brandon: what how how to implement and just raise i think general awareness is a component which. (32:34):
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Jay: I think is terrifying for a lot of catalogers since the stereotype of catalogers (32:41):
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Jay: is that they're just shut-ins who forget that. (32:45):
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Brandon: Patrons exist. (32:47):
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Jay: Right? I feel like this is so important to remember that we're cataloging for people, right? (32:49):
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Jay: And that like we are like where I work cataloging as part of public services, right? (32:55):
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Jay: Like it's like it's its own department, but it's under public services, right? (33:01):
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Jay: So it's like I am a public services librarian, even though I do cataloging. (33:06):
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Jay: It's like the whole like there is no such thing as like we're all front facing (33:10):
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Jay: kind of work, right? And to also forge relationships with people who aren't (33:13):
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Jay: in cataloging and metadata. (33:19):
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Jay: That's how you even start doing community building. Sadie does IT stuff. (33:22):
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Jay: What are some IT considerations for the various systems that might need to change? (33:26):
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Jay: Or maybe you look for a new system to accommodate whatever, right? (33:33):
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Jay: But like you wouldn't know that if you didn't like talk to the other people (33:38):
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Jay: who worked in your library like it's like step one know who else works in your (33:42):
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Jay: library and what they do and how their work intersects with yours like maybe (33:46):
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Jay: you should do that first absolutely because that's that's. (33:49):
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Katherine: Knowing that's knowing the assets that you have. (33:55):
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Jay: Um these. (33:59):
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Katherine: Are efforts that we can all do together. You just got to know what you have (34:00):
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Katherine: already, what you need to go forward. (34:05):
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Katherine: And I think that's just, I think sometimes people forget, at least for me, (34:08):
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Katherine: I do work with the Oklahoma Library Association, and I do Tribal Libraries Committee. (34:14):
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Katherine: So I think sometimes people forget that Tribal Libraries Committee is not just (34:21):
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Katherine: about tribal libraries. It's not just an over there problem. (34:26):
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Katherine: I think the spiel that I try to give whenever I talk about it is like, (34:30):
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Katherine: we support Indigenous communities and librarians supporting Indigenous communities, (34:36):
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Katherine: which is everyone in the state of Oklahoma. (34:41):
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Katherine: Every librarian who works in Oklahoma is serving Indigenous communities. (34:43):
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Katherine: So I think it's not, even if you're not Indigenous, there are things that you (34:48):
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Katherine: can do to advocate for Indigenous issues and Indigenous knowledges. because, (34:54):
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Katherine: Indigenous people have a lot to bring to the table. We just don't always get (35:00):
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Katherine: equal opportunities to do so. (35:05):
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Jay: Yeah, like I am. So when I was, I did a project with the American Indian Library (35:07):
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Jay: Association back in 2018. (35:11):
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Jay: And we talked about the, we did a poster about it at the Tribal College Librarians (35:13):
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Jay: Institute. I don't know if you've ever been to that, Catherine. (35:18):
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Katherine: We haven't, but I've heard about it. Yeah. (35:20):
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Jay: It's cool, but there were things where you wouldn't think, that's not a tribal (35:23):
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Jay: college, like Montana State University, which is where it was held. (35:28):
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Jay: It's like, no, because something doesn't have to be on a tribal land or anything (35:32):
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Jay: to be a tribal college or to serve indigenous communities. (35:39):
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Jay: Right. Like a state university of Montana was included in that institute. (35:43):
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Jay: Right. So I think that's a good way of reframing it, that every library is serving (35:49):
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Jay: Indigenous communities, not just tribal libraries. (35:55):
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Justin: Yeah, and just to bring in my bummer drummer segment, if you go to a land-grant (35:59):
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Justin: university, you go to a university that is funded on the theft directly of Indigenous people's lands. (36:05):
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Justin: So go to, what is it, Land Grab? (36:12):
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Jay: Yeah, I think it's Land Grab. I can find it real quick. (36:16):
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Justin: Yeah just just so you know if you do go to a land grant university no matter (36:18):
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Justin: where in the country that is based on the expropriation of land and sale of (36:23):
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Justin: that land and that's where your your library your university's funding comes (36:28):
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Justin: from is the sale of land thousands of miles away sometimes. (36:32):
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Jay: Let's put the link in the chat. (36:37):
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Justin: Sorry i just haven't been talking enough and i'm like oh oh i think i know i (36:39):
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Justin: think i know okay because jay does all the metadata nerd stuff and i um i just (36:42):
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Justin: jump in with the bummer stuff well. (36:48):
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Jay: I'm wondering like for our non-exclusively metadata people and i guess brandon (36:51):
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Jay: that includes you like how does this affect your daily work as a librarian who (36:55):
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Jay: doesn't do cataloging and metadata primarily like sadie justin like all y'all i. (37:00):
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Brandon: Mean you know like i so i did a project before the job i'm in now that focused (37:06):
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Brandon: solely on making a collection about Indigenous literature more accessible to (37:11):
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Brandon: communities, Indigenous communities more specifically, (37:17):
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Brandon: but also, you know, the general public and researchers. (37:19):
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Brandon: And part of that was being able to include the nation that a particular author (37:23):
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Brandon: was from, because that's not something that you can just, you know, (37:29):
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Brandon: take from, you know, LC, that that was definitely a local intervention. (37:32):
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Brandon: And I think that, you know, for me, especially, you know, wanting to build these (37:36):
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Brandon: relationships of communities, it's like part of that is being able to tell communities, (37:41):
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Brandon: okay, this is what is from your community. This is like what we have. Here it is. (37:45):
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Brandon: And it can be challenging to locate resources, especially if they are not written in the right way. (37:51):
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Brandon: But it can also be harder to find like more like resources written by Native people. (38:01):
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Brandon: So I think that was something that I ran into a lot was, you know, (38:06):
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Brandon: people would, you know, students would ask, where can I find like books on, (38:10):
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Brandon: you know, the Navajo Nation or the Native people? (38:15):
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Brandon: And, you know, sometimes it could be hard to locate that type of information. (38:17):
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Brandon: But I think being able to include that these like local author notes, (38:23):
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Brandon: I think really helped consolidate that in the catalog. And it made it just that much easier. (38:29):
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Brandon: So I'm like, you know, if we can just keep this going, like add more accurate (38:34):
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Brandon: terms, like this would be better. Because people will ask me frequently for (38:38):
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Brandon: specific books by Indigenous groups. (38:42):
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Brandon: And sometimes, yeah, I really have to dig hard because there's not all this (38:45):
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Brandon: different cross-referencing and these different types of notes that actually (38:50):
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Brandon: help tell who this community is. (38:55):
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Sadie: Yeah. And I'm in public libraries. I've never worked in an academic library, (38:58):
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Sadie: so I'm not very familiar with Library of Congress at all and how it works. (39:02):
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Sadie: I'm just not an academic. (39:07):
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Sadie: But one of the libraries I worked at when I was in public service had a Native American collection, (39:08):
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Sadie: specifically because we had a library (39:14):
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Sadie: that was on and the property and the building and stuff was Native, (39:17):
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Sadie: the local tribe owned. (39:24):
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Sadie: So it was part of their studies program (39:25):
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Sadie: too because it was also a college it was a whole it was (39:29):
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Sadie: a whole campus but some of i just (39:32):
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Sadie: remember shelving and some of those dewey decimal numbers got so long because (39:34):
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Sadie: they had to get so specific across like different nations and whether or not (39:40):
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Sadie: it was addressing like the language or addressing the history or you know whether (39:44):
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Sadie: or not it was an oral history versus like a written. (39:50):
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Sadie: So like there was just these like two shelves that were just like the first (39:52):
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Sadie: five or six numbers were all the same and then it just got tinier and tinier (39:57):
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Sadie: like on the spine as it went. (40:01):
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Sadie: And I just think about that and like how very little room that is in this giant (40:03):
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Sadie: wide system. And you know, this, (40:11):
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Sadie: And these two shelves were probably the only places that some of these books were. (40:15):
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Sadie: So they're like skinny little things that are bound with the plastic ring binding kind of thing. (40:22):
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Jay: Oh, not the ring binding. (40:30):
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Sadie: Yeah, no, that was really hard to shelf. (40:32):
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Sadie: But I can imagine the ILL for some of these materials is probably nuts because (40:35):
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Sadie: some of them probably are very, very unique. Some of them are probably really rare. (40:43):
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Sadie: Yeah, I don't know. It's just the breadth of the materials is – I lost my train of thought, sorry. (40:50):
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Sadie: But yeah, so I see what you mean, Brandon, is it's like there's just very, (40:57):
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Sadie: very few sources of certain things. (41:04):
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Sadie: And it can be when you're trying to acknowledge a very specific local tribe, (41:07):
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Sadie: it probably gets even harder. (41:13):
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Sadie: And I was curious, because you guys are going to be working with metadata, (41:16):
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Sadie: and maybe this isn't a problem in Library of Congress. Like you said, (41:22):
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Sadie: Catherine, there are over 500 nations. (41:28):
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Sadie: I was curious, is that just federally recognized nations? (41:31):
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Sadie: Because I live in Washington state and there are several non-federally recognized nations as well. (41:35):
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Sadie: How do you reach out to those people to build relationships when they maybe (41:41):
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Sadie: don't have a recognized government or don't have that sort of thing? (41:46):
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Sadie: What ways can we support those sorts of communities? (41:55):
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Katherine: That is a really good question. I think something that can be really beneficial (42:00):
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Katherine: is enhancing your presence in the communities. (42:08):
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Katherine: I think that's always really helpful for starting partnerships and then building (42:13):
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Katherine: partnerships, because I think it's really easy to just, (42:19):
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Katherine: especially the role that public education and libraries have played in the assimilationist (42:23):
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Katherine: practices of the federal government, (42:30):
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Katherine: like it's easy for there to be a mistrust of these institutions. (42:33):
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Katherine: But if these institutions are making a concerted effort to be a part of their (42:37):
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Katherine: communities, to build in their communities, then I think that's an excellent (42:43):
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Katherine: first step for like building that trust. (42:49):
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Katherine: And I think it's just a part of like knowing these Indigenous communities and (42:52):
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Katherine: just kind of getting the pulse of the local Indigenous community, (42:58):
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Katherine: I think will be really beneficial because I know that I am in a rather urban area, (43:03):
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Katherine: but we flock together because (43:09):
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Katherine: we're creating that community and (43:13):
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Katherine: especially when we are not on the (43:16):
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Katherine: land of our people it's really important (43:19):
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Katherine: to find that community wherever you can so if if there are staff members who (43:22):
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Katherine: are indigenous that's expertise you can absolutely lean on and then just kind (43:29):
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Katherine: of getting a sense of like community events that are indigenous centered and (43:34):
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Katherine: then just kind of like being in that space, (43:38):
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Katherine: I think is probably a big first step. (43:40):
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Brandon: Yeah, I think the Library of Congress, they hired somebody to kind of oversee, (43:43):
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Brandon: well, yeah, there's a lot that they're potentially overseeing, (43:50):
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Brandon: but I'm like, we're rooting for you girls. (43:54):
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Brandon: But I think part of what I've kind of been hearing and gotten the impression (43:57):
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Brandon: is that, yeah, there's definitely a lot of different communities to talk to. (44:03):
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Brandon: 576 right now federally recognized and then (44:11):
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Brandon: i think there's probably 400 plus you know (44:14):
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Brandon: non-federally recognized or state recognized those numbers (44:17):
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Brandon: you know up or down but i think that yeah (44:20):
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Brandon: i think what katherine is saying is this yeah (44:24):
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Brandon: i agree like i think being able to just get a (44:27):
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Brandon: sense of what's going on in a local setting (44:29):
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Brandon: and being able to understand you know (44:32):
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Brandon: who's like what's going on what are the needs (44:36):
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Brandon: what are the different groups that are around i think (44:39):
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Brandon: can be a really important starting point (44:42):
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Brandon: but you know yeah i think there's there's a huge (44:45):
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Brandon: i think for that the project that i (44:48):
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Brandon: mentioned earlier was that you know in this (44:51):
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Brandon: particular collection it was like there's all all over (44:54):
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Brandon: like yeah i mean there's so many different groups (44:57):
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Brandon: represented in this particular collection there's not one particular (45:00):
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Brandon: focus so i mean we could spend like (45:03):
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Brandon: the rest of our lives trying to map out all the (45:06):
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Brandon: different communities and languages and things (45:09):
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Brandon: that are here but what we decided to do is. (45:12):
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Brandon: Like let's actually focus on like where we (45:15):
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Brandon: are right now first like that's that's (45:18):
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Brandon: going to be the first like three years is just (45:21):
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Brandon: trying to understand like the scene in our (45:24):
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Brandon: area uh you know what's going on like who can we (45:27):
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Brandon: talk to who can we meet with like who can we just invite (45:30):
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Brandon: at the library who can we you know go out (45:33):
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Brandon: and visit and and see their communities if you know (45:36):
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Brandon: nothing to do with the library nothing to do with their (45:39):
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Brandon: work but who can we just like go and like see and (45:42):
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Brandon: what's going on like what are what are you up to like you (45:45):
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Brandon: know yeah like i think just just treating it like that is really important just (45:48):
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Brandon: like people you know because i think that that's definitely a big part of it (45:53):
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Brandon: too is just like yeah really understanding like what communities or living on (45:58):
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Brandon: a day-to-day basis, I think it's important too. (46:04):
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Jay: And that's something librarians or library workers, no matter what their function (46:06):
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Jay: is, can do every day, even outside of official grant-funded projects or whatever. (46:10):
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Jay: This is something we all can and should be doing all the time, (46:19):
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Jay: whatever that looks like for our specific job. (46:25):
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Jay: Let's see, let me look through the notes here. Thank you. (46:28):
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Jay: Sort of related to something we talked about earlier, but I think comes into play here a little bit, (46:33):
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Jay: is sort of like when you are doing this kind of work, especially like the kind (46:41):
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Jay: of reparative LC work, Like, (46:46):
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Jay: when do you decide it is worth it to correct or repair this LC classification (46:49):
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Jay: or subject heading versus this is better suited by another vocabulary? (46:58):
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Jay: Because obviously, this is something in the homosaurus, for example, (47:04):
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Jay: homosaurus is not meant to exist on its own. (47:08):
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Jay: It is meant to exist alongside other vocabularies like ELSI. (47:11):
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Jay: And sometimes terms overlap directly. Sometimes they're slightly different. (47:15):
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Jay: Sometimes they're reparative, sometimes not. Sometimes there's just a different angle to it. (47:19):
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Jay: So how do you view when do you correct versus when you think it's better suited to another vocabulary? (47:24):
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Brandon: Yeah, I think just to just go back to the program specialist for indigenous (47:32):
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Brandon: peoples that I mentioned that Library of Congress recently onboarded. (47:39):
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Brandon: I know that that was like a really big part when they were advertising the job. (47:43):
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Brandon: And now that person is there, that that's a huge part of it. (47:47):
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Brandon: They're like, we also need, you know, want to know, like, at the end of this, (47:53):
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Brandon: like, should we just pivot? (47:57):
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Brandon: Like, is, you know, LCSH the place for this? Or should we, you know, (47:59):
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Brandon: transition to demographic terms? (48:04):
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Brandon: Like, is there a different place for this that's going to be more impactful? (48:06):
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Brandon: Or, yeah, that was one of the pertinent questions that I kept hearing. (48:11):
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Brandon: And I'm really curious to see, like, what's going to happen with that. (48:15):
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Katherine: I think what's interesting, too, is that there is the question of potentially demographic terms. (48:19):
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Katherine: But these are independent sovereign nations, so they're also political entities. (48:27):
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Katherine: So that's another element that kind of complicates that a little bit. (48:34):
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Katherine: But I think there is benefit in repairing Elsie. (48:40):
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Katherine: But I am so strongly for local solutions to be representing these communities. (48:47):
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Katherine: And I would love to see some larger, just indigenous vocabulary emerge that (48:57):
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Katherine: maybe Elsie can take some cues from or something. (49:05):
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Katherine: Because i think there's there's a (49:09):
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Katherine: lot there's a lot to do so i (49:11):
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Katherine: i can see how that could be overwhelming and especially with the kind of time (49:15):
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Katherine: that it takes to develop things at this larger institutional level i i think (49:19):
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Katherine: they they have to work together um i don't think there's there's a way that, (49:27):
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Katherine: I had a question when I was at the National Information Standards Organization (49:33):
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Katherine: conference that was related to globalization. (49:38):
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Katherine: And I think it's a similar question of do we aim for complete standardization (49:43):
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Katherine: or do we simply rely on local solutions? (49:51):
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Katherine: I think there needs to be global solution that is kind of a little bit more (49:54):
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Katherine: bare bones. And then the local solutions can fill in the gaps and be the meat on the bones. (50:01):
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Katherine: That's kind of how I see it, especially because we have so many different communities (50:08):
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Katherine: and so many different knowledges. (50:12):
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Katherine: I'd love to see them emerge in interesting ways. (50:14):
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Justin: Yeah, this is what I think about. This is a long-standing problem in archival (50:18):
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Justin: metadata where there's a lot of local solutions, but then people don't share their local solutions. (50:23):
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Justin: And everyone's like, how can we get EADs to be linked? (50:30):
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Justin: How can we do all this stuff? And I feel like I'm kind of out of the special (50:35):
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Justin: collections archives game, so I don't know what the state of the discussion is. (50:39):
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Justin: But I think with these extremely local things, there still hasn't been an entire solution to it. (50:43):
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Justin: Although in the scholarly communications field, there's just what I call like (50:50):
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Justin: think locally, fuck globally, which is you get all of your local stuff and you (50:54):
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Justin: push it as far as possible. (51:01):
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Justin: You don't hoard this stuff to yourself. Everything you make is, (51:03):
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Justin: it reflects your institution, but you want everyone in the world to know what you're doing. (51:08):
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Justin: Yeah. So that's always in the back of my mind. (51:15):
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Justin: I never get to use that in like professional conference presentations, (51:19):
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Justin: but that literally is how I think about it is just like think locally, fuck globally. (51:27):
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Justin: Like you just, you get it out there. And so, yeah, I think if there, (51:32):
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Justin: you know, I think this is a dual problem of very local solutions. (51:36):
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Justin: And again, because like, you know, all the different nations, (51:42):
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Justin: you know, the politics, you know, I think one thing people need to realize is (51:46):
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Justin: indigenous people are people. And therefore. (51:52):
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Justin: I know, right. And therefore, just as unfortunately stupid as all of their Anglo (51:57):
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Justin: counterparts sometimes and kick off, like, you know, make things as annoying as possible. (52:03):
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Justin: So there's there's not always going to be consensus on (52:10):
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Justin: these things and so there there needs to (52:13):
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Justin: be a way where cultural institutions can push out their (52:15):
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Justin: data and it's it's not just tooling always it's sort of i think a lot of it (52:19):
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Justin: is attitude i think a lot of it is we're going to fix this locally but who would (52:24):
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Justin: care about what we're doing and i think the attitude is the major problem because (52:29):
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Justin: The tools are out there to push this metadata outwards. (52:33):
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Justin: It's just we haven't quite figured out or agreed upon how we're going to do (52:37):
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Justin: that. But the tools, I think, actually are there. (52:41):
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Jay: This is why open documentation is so important. And cataloging departments should (52:44):
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Jay: have their entire everything online freely available to people except for private information. (52:48):
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Jay: Because do you know how often I go to fucking Yale libraries, (52:55):
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Jay: like little cataloging wiki, especially when I used to work in a music library? (52:59):
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Jay: They got all their shit there. It's so useful. (53:03):
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Jay: Even if it's only applicable to them, it's useful to see what other libraries are doing. (53:06):
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Jay: Because it's like, why reinvent the wheel? You're not the first person in the (53:10):
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Jay: world who's had to think about how do we implement this local vocabulary in (53:14):
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Jay: this specific way or whatever. (53:20):
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Jay: Libraries have done that before. We just need to be sharing our information (53:23):
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Jay: with each other. Like, that's how I've learned most of my stuff. (53:27):
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Jay: Like, what I know on the job is, like, finding out what other libraries have (53:32):
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Jay: done when they post it online on their websites or they make their, (53:36):
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Jay: like, confluence wikis public or a libguide or something. (53:40):
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Jay: Like, even something as basic as that or, like, a GitHub repo or something is, (53:44):
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Jay: I don't know, it's just really helpful in general. (53:48):
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Katherine: No, I think that would be amazing. I would love to see just a way that we could (53:51):
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Katherine: just share all these ideas. (53:57):
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Katherine: Because I know, for example, someone I know from the Tribal Libraries Committee, (54:00):
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Katherine: they created a classification system for their library. (54:03):
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Katherine: They're just one public library. (54:07):
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Katherine: And it was based on the Brian Deere classification system that came out of Canada. (54:10):
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Katherine: So it's like, when we're sharing these ideas, we can come up with other solutions (54:14):
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Katherine: that can just incorporate these really good ideas. (54:21):
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Katherine: So, no, I would love that. (54:24):
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Justin: Yeah. And on that of, again, just harping back to my point of, (54:27):
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Justin: oh, someone won't care what we do. (54:32):
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Justin: One thing my library started doing is the posters that we make for various months (54:34):
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Justin: and programming and stuff. (54:39):
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Justin: They're entirely specific to our university, but we put them in our repository (54:41):
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Justin: and they get massive numbers because other librarians are out there going, (54:46):
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Justin: what can I make? What can I do? (54:51):
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Justin: So even if it's entirely specific to what you're doing, if you just put it out (54:53):
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Justin: there, people are looking at it. People care. People like this stuff. (54:56):
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Katherine: That was my favorite part about for the PCC group. (55:00):
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Katherine: We did a survey to kind of get an idea of the things that were happening on (55:04):
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Katherine: the ground for these institutions and just getting to hear about all these different (55:09):
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Katherine: cool things that people are doing. (55:15):
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Katherine: And, you know, it's really helpful (55:17):
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Katherine: to have that kind of the survey as documentation of all these things. (55:19):
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Katherine: And then also we're getting to share that these bunches of people that fill (55:24):
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Katherine: out the survey also see that there are problems and we need additional staffing to address this at LC. (55:30):
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Katherine: That's how i frame it whenever i talk (55:37):
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Katherine: about whenever i was talking about the survey it was always like this will help (55:40):
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Katherine: us as documentation for making the case for making these improvements for increasing (55:45):
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Katherine: staff related to indigenous issues so yeah the documentation yes mm-hmm. (55:52):
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Jay: And for, cause I know what, something that comes up a lot in like in what, (56:01):
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Jay: what I've read and like when looking into this around like indigenous metadata practices, the whole, (56:07):
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Jay: you know, oh, let's make our documentation public information wants to be free. (56:15):
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Jay: Like that kind of very you know western librarian (56:19):
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Jay: like attitude can sometimes conflict with various (56:22):
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Jay: like indigenous ways of knowledge sharing in (56:26):
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Jay: an organization especially that have like restrictions on who (56:29):
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Jay: can be what like this was the whole point of the mukatu like platform and there's (56:32):
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Jay: those i forgot to look them up before the recording but lc like one of the smithsonian (56:38):
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Jay: folkways is using these alternative knowledge labels as well instead of Creative Commons stuff. (56:44):
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Jay: So in at least metadata and documenting these projects and stuff, (56:50):
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Jay: when you run into these instances where how knowledge is shared and with whom (56:55):
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Jay: conflicts with Western ideas of librarianship and knowledge, (57:02):
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Jay: what has that looked like so far if you've come across it? (57:07):
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Brandon: Yeah um so i've (57:10):
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Brandon: been able to do a little bit of work with some of those labels (57:14):
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Brandon: that you mentioned yeah and one of one (57:18):
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Brandon: of the organizations local context there i (57:21):
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Brandon: think they've been around i think they you know moved to local context (57:24):
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Brandon: but i think now there's definitely like they're (57:27):
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Brandon: garnering like a you know pretty wide network of (57:30):
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Brandon: libraries and archives that really want to implement them (57:33):
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Brandon: and the great thing is is that there's like different stages (57:37):
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Brandon: of implementation so you know (57:40):
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Brandon: a library for example that i was at (57:43):
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Brandon: we were able to implement what (57:46):
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Brandon: is called the notices so not like a label but (57:49):
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Brandon: these notices that come pre-relationship building (57:52):
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Brandon: or pre like formal collaboration with an. (57:56):
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Brandon: Indigenous community so that there's at least (57:59):
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Brandon: like this visible awareness within the metadata and (58:02):
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Brandon: to even get that label in the (58:05):
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Brandon: actual catalog i don't even know if (58:08):
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Brandon: it's there still and that was like two years ago so you know (58:11):
undefined

Brandon: it's like the compatibleness of these systems (58:14):
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Brandon: but there's also you know we were (58:18):
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Brandon: able to put it like on a website so that at least there's like (58:21):
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Brandon: this visible element to that like (58:24):
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Brandon: we this library is open to collaborating and (58:26):
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Brandon: i think that's really important and now that the way that they have it (58:30):
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Brandon: set up is that you have a notice and then a community can (58:33):
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Brandon: then reach out and then they the community decides (58:36):
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Brandon: what the actual label then is going to be and look it up localcontext.org there's (58:40):
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Brandon: different labels but i think that's a really great intervention especially in (58:46):
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Brandon: the metadata world where it's like here's something that the community decided (58:51):
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Brandon: and wants you to know about this particular organization. (58:55):
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Brandon: Resource. (58:58):
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Katherine: I haven't run into it myself. (58:59):
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Brandon: It's coming. (59:01):
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Jay: Yeah. Like, I remember when I was researching for my master's thesis, (59:02):
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Jay: God, that was almost a decade ago. (59:09):
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Jay: But like a lot of the studies and like published papers about this, (59:12):
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Jay: a lot of them were coming out of New Zealand and like work with like Maori librarians (59:16):
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Jay: and Maori libraries and museums and collections and everything. (59:19):
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Jay: And that got me looking into librarianship in New Zealand, right? (59:23):
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Jay: And they don't really have like the master's program and stuff like we do here in the States. (59:28):
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Jay: Instead, it's one of those things where you have to like register as a professional (59:33):
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Jay: librarian, like with their library association like every year. (59:37):
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Jay: And what you do to do that is you like map yourself against these competencies, right? (59:42):
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Jay: And to be a librarian in New Zealand, like officially. (59:47):
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Jay: One of the competencies you have to be able to map (59:50):
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Jay: experience or knowledge of or plans to learn (59:54):
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Jay: about is indigenous knowledge organization and (59:57):
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Jay: practices like you have to know that to be (01:00:00):
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Jay: a librarian at all in new zealand and even (01:00:03):
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Jay: like at the federal level like they have a lot of public (01:00:06):
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Jay: information about how maori intellectual property concepts (01:00:09):
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Jay: differ from like more western ideas of copyright (01:00:13):
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Jay: and intellectual property which librarians also have (01:00:16):
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Jay: to know it's usually around like licensing symbols and (01:00:19):
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Jay: stuff but like just how knowledge organization (01:00:23):
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Jay: and how it differs is like (01:00:27):
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Jay: something that like all librarians in new zealand know at (01:00:30):
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Jay: least at a very basic level and i'm (01:00:34):
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Jay: like that would be just so dope if that is just something we (01:00:36):
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Jay: could barely just like do you (01:00:39):
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Jay: know anything cool like right you (01:00:42):
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Jay: know like and you know what if in every like library school like in your library (01:00:46):
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Jay: 101 class you have to take or whatever there's like a day you know like bare (01:00:51):
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Jay: minimum like do people in library school learn about this stuff at all and it's (01:00:55):
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Jay: not always i know in wisconsin they have a class on it or like a specialty, but... (01:01:00):
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Katherine: I would have loved that. I feel like when I was going through the program, (01:01:05):
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Katherine: it ended up being the one Indigenous person in the class. (01:01:10):
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Katherine: So I get to teach everyone about being Indigenous. And it's kind of exhausting. (01:01:14):
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Katherine: It is exhausting. But it was very interesting to have that (01:01:22):
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Katherine: kind of like motivation to frame all my all my inquiries in this indigenous (01:01:28):
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Katherine: way because it just wasn't happening elsewhere so that's that was my my schooling (01:01:34):
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Katherine: i was just like i'm gonna learn you a thing. (01:01:40):
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Jay: That's a major my one big (01:01:43):
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Jay: criticism of the uiuc program is that it just does not have any indigenous focus (01:01:46):
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Jay: stuff at least it didn't when i was there whereas university of washington's (01:01:51):
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Jay: got a lot going on university of wisconsin madison's got a lot going on like (01:01:55):
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Jay: come on illinois you're number one chop chop say do you have something to say. (01:02:00):
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Sadie: Yeah i just i i was just thinking like i feel like that that's kind of the boat (01:02:05):
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Sadie: that the land acknowledgement thing misses is that it's like it's the very very (01:02:11):
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Sadie: start of it's just you have to know whose land you're on to even begin, (01:02:20):
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Sadie: any of this kind of work right if you're going (01:02:26):
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Sadie: to do things locally and then there are people who are like what do (01:02:29):
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Sadie: you even here in washington where half of our things are named like from like (01:02:32):
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Sadie: lushoot seed or something like that like that nobody outside of washington can (01:02:36):
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Sadie: pronounce it's like they're still just like oh wait what do you what do you (01:02:41):
undefined

Sadie: mean and i'm like how how did you miss that if you were born and raised here, (01:02:45):
undefined

Sadie: because like, yeah, and I was reading my local tribe's page on their specific (01:02:51):
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Sadie: land acknowledgement advice. (01:02:57):
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Sadie: And it's like, it's because they were inundated with people going, (01:03:00):
undefined

Sadie: I don't know how to do this. (01:03:03):
undefined

Sadie: And so that is such a good resource to even start on. (01:03:05):
undefined

Sadie: So like, I don't know, I've been thinking about this a lot lately too, (01:03:11):
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Sadie: because I've been actually digging through my local tribe's websites and resources and stuff. (01:03:14):
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Sadie: But yeah, the land acknowledgement thing is just like people are like, (01:03:22):
undefined

Sadie: oh, one and done. I did the thing. (01:03:26):
undefined

Sadie: And it's like, that's so bare minimum. (01:03:29):
undefined

Sadie: And yeah, and then you get into what knowledge does that tribe or your local (01:03:32):
undefined

Sadie: community actually have? (01:03:38):
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Sadie: Do you know anything about that? So yeah, that should be, especially as knowledge, (01:03:41):
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Sadie: like information professionals, like that should be way higher up there than it is. (01:03:47):
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Jay: Yeah, Sam Popovich, who has been a guest on this program, once gave me advice (01:03:52):
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Jay: on Twitter because I was about to do a presentation, but I had seen criticisms (01:03:57):
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Jay: doing land acknowledgements, (01:04:02):
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Jay: especially from indigenous librarians I knew and other like indigenous folks (01:04:04):
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Jay: in my circle. And so I was like, (01:04:08):
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Jay: I feel like, like bad doing this because like, what is my university actually (01:04:11):
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Jay: doing? I'm just like, this means nothing. (01:04:17):
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Jay: Like, are there better things to do? And one thing Sam told me that he did, (01:04:19):
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Jay: like as a white librarian and Sam's in Canada, right? (01:04:23):
undefined

Jay: Yeah yeah same as in canada was like instead of doing a land acknowledgement (01:04:27):
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Jay: like if he couldn't like if whatever he was doing a presentation or something (01:04:32):
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Jay: on if it didn't contain anything, (01:04:37):
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Jay: about indigenous resources or indigenous people like if what he was talking (01:04:41):
undefined

Jay: about didn't touch on that at all then what would even be the point of doing (01:04:45):
undefined

Jay: a land acknowledgement if it wasn't if he wasn't even working on this stuff (01:04:49):
undefined

Jay: right so instead of doing that he was just like Everything I talk about has (01:04:54):
undefined

Jay: to be able to address this. (01:04:58):
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Jay: Otherwise, it's just empty words. (01:05:01):
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Justin: And materiality, too. Where I live, the Istokana, the Carisaca Macrudo people, (01:05:04):
undefined

Justin: a tribe of Texas, not a federal tribe, most of the work they do is about environmental protection. (01:05:12):
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Justin: It's like natural gas pipelines, SpaceX, (01:05:18):
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Justin: you know, destruction of federally protected land, which is, (01:05:23):
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Justin: you know, as you might know, if you know anything about the borders and Native peoples on the border, (01:05:28):
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Justin: pretty much every protection Native people have on law gets waived at the border. (01:05:34):
undefined

Justin: So, like, the graves protections... (01:05:41):
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Justin: All that stuff that gets waived so that people can build walls and stuff. (01:05:47):
undefined

Justin: And so what I would always do is say like, you know, Hey, they're fundraising. Here's the link. (01:05:51):
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Justin: You know, I would just go into my universities, you know, like, (01:05:56):
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Justin: Hey, we're going to learn about indigenous people day. And I'm like, (01:05:59):
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Justin: hi, what's up? Here's the link of putting it in the zoom. (01:06:02):
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Justin: Go put money in there. Go put, do something, please. (01:06:04):
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Justin: So if you can doing a land acknowledgement, be like, and here's their PayPal (01:06:08):
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Justin: and just hold up like a big QR code. I mean, like, seriously, like, do something. (01:06:12):
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Jay: That's actually what they did at the Music Library Association conference a couple years ago. (01:06:18):
undefined

Jay: They had a whole thing about, like, in, like, sort of rethinking land acknowledgments. (01:06:22):
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Jay: And what they did instead was they just talked about, like, indigenous composers (01:06:27):
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Jay: and musicians, both around St. (01:06:31):
undefined

Jay: Louis and in general, so that all of the librarians there could then go buy (01:06:34):
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Jay: that stuff for their collection. (01:06:37):
undefined

Jay: And they were like, this is the title, this is the person. And they even had (01:06:39):
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Jay: some of the composers there to like talk about the works and stuff. (01:06:42):
undefined

Jay: But that's how I learned about like, there was an opera composed by a Native (01:06:46):
undefined

Jay: American woman back in the early 1900s that was performed at the Met. (01:06:51):
undefined

Jay: I was like, shit, I didn't know that. That's fucking cool. (01:06:56):
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Jay: And then I went and like, I want to buy this for my collection and stuff. (01:06:58):
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Jay: But, and we ended up getting some of the stuff from some of the composers there. (01:07:02):
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Jay: Like when, you know, because I learned about them there. So like that was one (01:07:05):
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Jay: thing that conference did instead of like a conference sort of, (01:07:09):
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Jay: oh, we're just going to do land acknowledgement. (01:07:12):
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Jay: Like here, here's a whole session where you can learn about indigenous materials (01:07:13):
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Jay: to buy for your library. And I was like, that's fucking cool. (01:07:18):
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Katherine: That is. That's amazing. (01:07:21):
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Jay: Music Library Association rules, actually. It's very cool. I miss it. I miss you. (01:07:24):
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Jay: Let's see. Yeah, we've been going like an hour and a half now. (01:07:33):
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Jay: Also that we don't want to keep y'all too long, I guess, is there sort of any (01:07:37):
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Jay: final like thoughts y'all had or like things you want our listeners to know, (01:07:42):
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Jay: especially, like I said, we have a lot of library school students or people (01:07:46):
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Jay: interested in library school who listen to us. (01:07:49):
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Jay: So is there anything you would want our audience to know about the work you're (01:07:52):
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Jay: doing or ways that they can get involved, like anything like that? (01:07:57):
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Katherine: I think I would emphasize that indigenous (01:08:00):
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Katherine: knowledge is land-based and it's relationship-based and it has so much, (01:08:05):
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Katherine: wisdom that it brings. So I think, (01:08:13):
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Katherine: I don't think even non-Indigenous students should be afraid of, (01:08:17):
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Katherine: you know, using Indigenous sources or just trying to credit Indigenous styles. (01:08:22):
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Katherine: I think we, there needs to be a level of advocacy from non-Indigenous people. (01:08:29):
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Katherine: So I would say, have those conversations with Indigenous people that you know, (01:08:35):
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Katherine: everywhere you go, because there are so many of us, we all have great things to offer. (01:08:41):
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Katherine: So, and we're people. So. (01:08:48):
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Brandon: Yeah. I mean, you know, especially in library school, (01:08:51):
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Brandon: you know, I think I experienced this, and I'm sure many others have, where it's like, (01:08:55):
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Brandon: you can tailor your assignments to your particular (01:09:01):
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Brandon: interests and so if you're in a class and (01:09:04):
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Brandon: it seems like oh i don't think this could connect to indigenous people i (01:09:07):
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Brandon: would just encourage like you know maybe like yeah like (01:09:11):
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Brandon: how how would this impact indigenous community or indigenous (01:09:13):
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Brandon: collection that that's what i did i tried to (01:09:17):
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Brandon: tailor my assignments as much as possible to that and (01:09:20):
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Brandon: i will put in a plug for san jose state university they (01:09:23):
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Brandon: do offer an indigenous cultural institutions class and (01:09:26):
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Brandon: it was nice really really really informative and now (01:09:29):
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Brandon: it's taught i think if if not every semester at (01:09:32):
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Brandon: least every every you know fall or fall or spring (01:09:35):
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Brandon: so yeah i i think just being (01:09:38):
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Brandon: able to consider like how our work as (01:09:40):
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Brandon: information professionals how it might impact indigenous communities whether (01:09:43):
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Brandon: that's through collections development metadata you know community engagement (01:09:48):
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Brandon: just just thinking about it holistically not like it's some side project but (01:09:52):
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Brandon: like how how is it holistically in relation to the work that we do. (01:09:57):
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Justin: Yeah, and before I forget, I'm going to speak directly to the white people in (01:10:01):
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Justin: the crowd particularly, is think of what kind of particularly, you know... (01:10:05):
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Justin: In the upcoming few years, what kind of white person do you want to be is the (01:10:10):
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Justin: question you should always have in the back of your mind. Like, what am I doing? (01:10:15):
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Justin: Because, you know, whiteness is constructed. It is a power relation. (01:10:19):
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Justin: It is not your ethnic identity. You had an ethnic identity and your family at (01:10:23):
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Justin: some point gave it up in order to become white. (01:10:26):
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Justin: Betrayal of whiteness is loyalty to humanity. So let's get that race traitering going on out there. (01:10:29):
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Justin: And so yeah I don't mean to derail or anything from the rest of what everyone (01:10:36):
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Justin: was saying but it was on my mind and I think it bears repeating go read Noah (01:10:41):
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Justin: Ignatieff think deeply about, (01:10:45):
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Justin: considering that this is librarianship and librarianship is very white think (01:10:49):
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Justin: very deeply about what kind of white person you want to be and how that reflects in your practice. (01:10:53):
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Jay: Oh and everybody go join American Indian Library Association it's great. (01:10:59):
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Brandon: Yes yes yes yes is. (01:11:03):
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Jay: Yeah hype them up they're awesome give them your money. (01:11:05):
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Justin: And i think i got the traditional (01:11:08):
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Justin: knowledge labels is that the licenses you were (01:11:12):
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Justin: talking about the smithsonian okay so i've (01:11:14):
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Justin: got that i've got that in the notes so that'll be there too because i'm (01:11:17):
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Justin: not familiar with that because when you're talking about very cool (01:11:20):
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Justin: yeah when you're talking about the maori thing because i've actually (01:11:23):
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Justin: used new zealand quite a lot whenever you talk about like intellectual (01:11:26):
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Justin: property because things that get trademarked have (01:11:30):
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Justin: to go past like the like a trademark and branding board and there is always (01:11:32):
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Justin: maori representation on there that has sort of like some veto power which kind (01:11:37):
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Justin: of kind of exists in the united states in a very very different way in which like tribal nations own, (01:11:42):
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Justin: intellectual property on things but it's not like it's not the same thing in which like, (01:11:51):
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Justin: they have a seat at like the copyright office or whatever to be able to say (01:11:56):
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Justin: like, no, this is not copyrightable because this is traditional knowledge or whatever. (01:12:01):
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Justin: So it would be nice if we had something like that. And I'm sure, (01:12:06):
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Justin: but that's, that's one of those instances in which like the government leading (01:12:10):
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Justin: the way allows the profession. (01:12:13):
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Justin: So it's one of those limitations of librarianship in the U S. (01:12:15):
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Jay: Yeah. Again, I learned about those at the music library association conference. (01:12:19):
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Jay: I went to shouts out again. (01:12:22):
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Justin: Okay. (01:12:25):
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Jay: Cool. (01:12:26):
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Justin: Well, Catherine and Brandon, thanks so much for coming on. Is there anything (01:12:27):
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Justin: you want to point people to? (01:12:31):
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Justin: Social media, websites, anything like that? Or do you want people to leave you alone? (01:12:33):
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Brandon: I mean, no. (01:12:40):
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Katherine: So i'll probably share i have a link (01:12:46):
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Katherine: tree i have like my portfolio and it (01:12:49):
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Katherine: has like my linkedin and also my art because i do indigenous indigenous beadwork (01:12:52):
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Katherine: okay yeah shouts out so yeah i'll probably share that um and a quick yakoki (01:12:58):
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Katherine: fena thank you very much for having me on here and. (01:13:06):
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Brandon: Yeah i'd say you know i i liaise in (01:13:10):
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Brandon: my role as a librarian to indigenous studies i work you know support indigenous (01:13:13):
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Brandon: studies research so if anyone ever wants to you know talk more about that my (01:13:17):
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Brandon: email is bcastle at umass.edu but i think yeah i would also just like to say (01:13:20):
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Brandon: i'm thank you very much for having us this was really nice to talk about with you all so thank you so. (01:13:26):
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Sadie: Glad to have you and good night. (01:13:33):
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