Global and International Studies Program, Experimental Humanities Program, Anthropology Program, American and Indigenous Studies Program, and Ethnomusicology Present
"The Archive of the Archive: An Ontology of Indigenous Sound Recordings"
Monday, September 26, 2016
Olin Humanities, Room 102
5:00 pm EDT/GMT-4
5:00 pm EDT/GMT-4
Aaron A. Fox, Columbia University
In this paper I examine the documentary trail of legal agreements, memoranda, correspondence, and contracts that mark the history of the “Laura Boulton Collection’s” acquisition by Columbia University as intellectual property, and the subsequent distribution and management of the associated rights by Columbia, Indiana University, and the Library of Congress. My argument is that this hidden "archive of the archive” provides the necessary context for understanding what “the archive” is. While the ostensible motivation for this construction was scientific and scholarly, I show that every actor in the story had a covert economic interest in the fiction that the collection was a unitary object that could be owned, sold, or transferred in the name of science.For more information, call 845-758-7284, or e-mail [email protected].
Time: 5:00 pm EDT/GMT-4
Location: Olin Humanities, Room 102