Speaker 1: Hello. So we've put on a short break from the podcast,
Speaker 1: but I just couldn't stay away. And recently Apple picked
Speaker 1: five Black creators disrupting their fields to spotlight for Black
Speaker 1: History Month. And I'm really pleased and humbled and honored
Speaker 1: to say that the Tangoti community were among the voices
Speaker 1: that Apple says are disrupting technology. And I could not
Speaker 1: be prouder. So thank you Apple for spotlighting black creators,
Speaker 1: and most importantly, thanks to all of you for listening.
Speaker 1: It really means so much to me. And in honor
Speaker 1: of all this, I'm revisiting one of my favorite episodes,
Speaker 1: my conversation with archivist Jocelyn Robinson about her work preserving
Speaker 1: black voices literally by archiving audio from historically black colleges
Speaker 1: and universities. I hope your month is full of celebrating
Speaker 1: Black history, the Black present, and beautiful Black futures. And
Speaker 1: we'll be back soon with more episodes of There Are
Speaker 1: No Girls on the Internet. Happy Black History Month. You
Speaker 1: hear everything in her voice, You hear her life in
Speaker 1: her voice, you hear the black experience inner voice. It's
Speaker 1: just um, yes, it's transportive, it's it's transcendent. There Are
Speaker 1: No Girls on the Internet. As a production of I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio and Unbossed Creative. I'm Bridget Todd, and this
Speaker 1: is there are No Girls on the Internet. The Internet
Speaker 1: is ephemeral. How can you archive something that happened on
Speaker 1: social media or something that existed completely online. That's actually
Speaker 1: one of the reasons why I created this very podcast.
Speaker 1: I saw all the ways that underrepresented communities contribute to
Speaker 1: the Internet and technology, but I saw those same contributions
Speaker 1: being overlooked or forgotten. I didn't want them to fade away.
Speaker 1: Audio was a bit like that too. Tape fades, hard,
Speaker 1: drives crash, and pieces get lost forever. In the a
Speaker 1: of searching text, audio is that much harder to hold onto.
Speaker 1: But there's something magical about the medium of audio. Hearing
Speaker 1: someone tell their stories in their own words just hits differently.
Speaker 1: That's why it's so important that we be intentional about
Speaker 1: whose voices we preserve. Joscelyn Robinson is an audio producer
Speaker 1: and preservationist, and she has long standing roots in the
Speaker 1: museum community. What if she thought we could survey the
Speaker 1: audio archives of the voices and stories housed it radio
Speaker 1: stations on the campuses of historically Black Colleges and Universities
Speaker 1: or HBCUs. So in her late fifties, she quitted a job,
Speaker 1: went back to school, and made it her mission. Joscelyn
Speaker 1: served as the very first archives fellow at Dayton, Ohio's
Speaker 1: only national public radio station, w y s O, where
Speaker 1: she produced Rediscovered Radio, a series built around w y
Speaker 1: s o's Civil rights era audio. Now, Joscelyn works with
Speaker 1: HBCUs to start a dialogue around preserving the audio at
Speaker 1: the radio stations. Her work, it's grounded and making sure
Speaker 1: we preserve our stories and in doing so that we
Speaker 1: preserve the magical audio. So how did you get into
Speaker 1: your work preserving audio and historically black colleges. In two
Speaker 1: thousand thirteen, I took a an audio production course at
Speaker 1: the local public radio station, and I just got bit
Speaker 1: by the bug. And by two thousand and fifteen, I
Speaker 1: had quit my day job and was producing part time
Speaker 1: and teaching part time. And um I had always in
Speaker 1: the back of my mind, had this idea that um I,
Speaker 1: you know, would love the thought of doing a long
Speaker 1: form audio at HBCUs because it's not something that's typically
Speaker 1: taught in mass communications courses and programs. And when I
Speaker 1: was working initially, UM, I used some chival audio from
Speaker 1: w y s SO that is mainly from the sixties
Speaker 1: and seventies into the eighties, UM, and so it reflected
Speaker 1: the civil rights era and also the movement into black nationalism,
Speaker 1: the peace movement, anti war movement of the seventies, and
Speaker 1: I just became enamored of of um historical materials kind
Speaker 1: of related to my background in the museum community. There's
Speaker 1: around a hundred roughly HBCUs it in exists today, and
Speaker 1: a third of them just about have radio stations. And
Speaker 1: I thought, you know, if w y s O has
Speaker 1: this kind of material, um it was also a college
Speaker 1: radio station, initially at Antioch College in Yellow Springs, if
Speaker 1: that college radio station has such incredible material, and I
Speaker 1: mean it's incredible material, and the voices of people whom
Speaker 1: were significant from those areas are represented there as well
Speaker 1: as the history of the local area and the college
Speaker 1: and the state, and you know what was going on
Speaker 1: in the world. But I thought, HBCUs, being the crucible
Speaker 1: of the civil rights movement in so many ways, must
Speaker 1: have some materials too, and so I had I had
Speaker 1: thought about it, and when I quit my day job,
Speaker 1: I went back to school and got a grad certificate
Speaker 1: in public history with a with a focus on archives,
Speaker 1: so that I would be knowledgeable about the archival process
Speaker 1: and about the materials and and and their preservation and um.
Speaker 1: In the course of doing that, I kind of fell
Speaker 1: into a preservation activity that was initiated at the Library
Speaker 1: of Congress, the Radio Preservation Task Force, And that just
Speaker 1: opened up this whole world of people who were seeking
Speaker 1: out and figuring out how to preserve and use these
Speaker 1: materials all over the world. So I was aware of
Speaker 1: this this world, but I became kind of immersed in it,
Speaker 1: and I became a member of the African American and
Speaker 1: Civil Rights Radio Caucus of the Radio Preservation Task Force,
Speaker 1: and went to conferences and did presentations with this idea that, um,
Speaker 1: wouldn't it be great if we could survey the materials
Speaker 1: at historically black colleges and universities And someday, if I
Speaker 1: can find the funding for it, That's what I'm gonna do.
Speaker 1: Johnston got a grant from the National Recording Preservation Foundation
Speaker 1: to s h B c U s about what kind
Speaker 1: of audio were housed at their campus radio stations. How
Speaker 1: tragic is it to think that an audio recording of
Speaker 1: rosa parks could be collecting dust and some campus basement somewhere. Well,
Speaker 1: Johnston wanted to make sure these radio stations had access
Speaker 1: to the ability to archive their audio. What I found
Speaker 1: was that UM radio stations at most colleges are not
Speaker 1: necessarily included in the institutional records management or preservation efforts
Speaker 1: that they that the college normally takes takes on, and
Speaker 1: that it was an opportunity to connect the radio stations
Speaker 1: with the institutional archives on their campuses and at least
Speaker 1: get a dialogue going, if not get the institutional archives
Speaker 1: to take on the task of preserving the audio audio material.
Speaker 1: So what wasn't exactly about HBCUs. Why did you feel
Speaker 1: like it was so important to be doing that work
Speaker 1: on HBCU campuses, having sort of an intimate understanding of
Speaker 1: the challenges that are faced by HBCUs and also their
Speaker 1: importance to UM, the American Higher education UM landscape, but
Speaker 1: UH and to our communities. And there were times when
Speaker 1: you know, teachers, doctors, UM lawyers, UM engineers were you know,
Speaker 1: trained primarily at HBCUs and UM. And that's one of
Speaker 1: the things that distinguishes historically black college from a predominantly
Speaker 1: white institution, so um so to me, they are precious.
Speaker 1: They are sacred ground and um and they are in
Speaker 1: their communities UM and you know here in Ohio world
Speaker 1: bit isolated. But as I got to know the other
Speaker 1: um uh my my counterparts at other campuses and got
Speaker 1: to know their their their institutions, you know, and realizing
Speaker 1: how important they are to um black people in this
Speaker 1: country and particularly in the Southeast, they are hallowed ground
Speaker 1: and and anything that took place there is is worthy
Speaker 1: of of of not just preservation but also um uh
Speaker 1: honoring to to to look to it as a as
Speaker 1: an example of resilience. I don't know that we can
Speaker 1: even imagine those of us who do not live in
Speaker 1: the former Confederate States what life was like and and
Speaker 1: how our institutions, UM, our churches are, our communities, but
Speaker 1: but especially centered around um are. Historically black campuses were
Speaker 1: refuges uh, places of uh you know, where the intellect
Speaker 1: and ingenuity and um creativity of black people could um
Speaker 1: shine and thrive and um you know that that's an
Speaker 1: important um legacy to honor and with audio it's such
Speaker 1: an intimate and um uh you know emotionally charged UM medium,
Speaker 1: and I think that um, you know, finding materials, which
Speaker 1: is very difficult. Radio is ephemeral and UM and not
Speaker 1: a lot of recordings were made. At times, making recordings
Speaker 1: was expensive. You know, a quarter inch tape was expensive.
Speaker 1: The clayback equipment was was you know expensive, and and
Speaker 1: and maybe a few and far between at times that changed,
Speaker 1: you know, when the when cassettes became UM more prominent,
Speaker 1: but but certainly when it was real to real you know,
Speaker 1: that's a big bulky machine with a big bulky tape.
Speaker 1: So um, you know, to try to find anything. And
Speaker 1: and also you know the thing about radio stations is
Speaker 1: that they often change format when when the license changes hands.
Speaker 1: And what happens is whatever was happening before kind of
Speaker 1: gets swept up and thrown out into the dumpster. So
Speaker 1: to make sure that that anything that might be of
Speaker 1: significance at an HBC radio station is you know, found
Speaker 1: and preserved, is kind of it's a mission for sure.
Speaker 1: Audio shall medium. That intimacy is one reason why he
Speaker 1: became a podcaster in the first place. Hearing someone tell
Speaker 1: their story it's just different than reading it in print.
Speaker 1: Through her work, Jocelyn preserves this intimate magic for future generations.
Speaker 1: I often wonder if listening if if people listening to
Speaker 1: two audio producers talk about audio production, is is like boring.
Speaker 1: But I have to say, when you talked about the
Speaker 1: intimacy of the medium of audio, like that's what made
Speaker 1: me fall in love with it. And I'll never forget
Speaker 1: um my grandmother. She she's now passed away. She is
Speaker 1: from Charlotte, North Carolina, and she is a you know,
Speaker 1: uh black Southern matriarch of a big Southern family. And
Speaker 1: at the University of North Carolina reached out to her
Speaker 1: to do this archival project where she sat down and
Speaker 1: and talked about her life with a researcher. And I
Speaker 1: had read clips of this before and I really enjoyed
Speaker 1: reading it. But one day I found the audio of her,
Speaker 1: her telling of her telling these stories, and it something
Speaker 1: about hearing her voice was so different. You know, I
Speaker 1: had I had read, I had read what she had
Speaker 1: said before, but hearing her say it in her own words,
Speaker 1: I just I've always felt that there's something intimate and
Speaker 1: magical about the medium of audio. Just you know, it's
Speaker 1: so intimate, it's in your ears, and it just can
Speaker 1: hit your can hit you in a different way I feel,
Speaker 1: and I don't know. I guess I've always when people ask,
Speaker 1: you know, why audio, I never really have a good answer,
Speaker 1: but I think it just always comes back to that intimacy. Well,
Speaker 1: one of the things that creates that intimacy, if you
Speaker 1: think about it, is that if you were thinking of
Speaker 1: other media, and we're thinking of especially a visual media,
Speaker 1: what you see is what is in the frame. What
Speaker 1: you see is what the person who made that image
Speaker 1: or even whether it's moving or not, but what the
Speaker 1: person you're seeing, what the person that made that image
Speaker 1: um chose you to see what they curated for your eyes.
Speaker 1: And with audio, I tell people you can't use photoshop
Speaker 1: on audio. You cannot you cannot change what you what
Speaker 1: you hear. Microphones are dumb, they're not smart. They look
Speaker 1: up everything. So what you hear is what was heard.
Speaker 1: You hear all of it. You hear the train whistle
Speaker 1: in the background, you hear the sirens, you hear the
Speaker 1: birds singing or the crickets chirping. And so not only
Speaker 1: do you hear all of that, you hear the emotion
Speaker 1: in someone's voice. You hear them take a breath and
Speaker 1: think about what it is they're about to say. You
Speaker 1: hear them choke up, you hear them laugh, you know,
Speaker 1: so it's and and you hear it all um without
Speaker 1: a filter, the same way that that you know that
Speaker 1: with the visual um, that image is curated so um.
Speaker 1: So I think that that's what creates that sense of
Speaker 1: of of total experience, even though um, it's just coming
Speaker 1: through your ears. And there's something about that vibration that
Speaker 1: you know, it's on a vibrational level. You know that
Speaker 1: even in a recording, even in effect simile, you can, um,
Speaker 1: you can feel that vibration. When I first got into podcasting,
Speaker 1: I was very self conscious because I was very new
Speaker 1: at it, and so I would try to edit my
Speaker 1: audio to make it seem as though, you know, I
Speaker 1: was just the most well spoken person. I never you know,
Speaker 1: used a filler word. I never like stopped and restarted.
Speaker 1: I never had to catch my breath. I never you know,
Speaker 1: cleared my throat while I was thinking. And it's funny
Speaker 1: because those are all the little markers of somebody figuring
Speaker 1: something out in real time. And that's actually why you
Speaker 1: listen to audio, because you get these unfiltered, unedited moments
Speaker 1: that don't that you aren't photoshops like you said. And
Speaker 1: I think the more or that I when I realized
Speaker 1: that the reason why I like audio is because you
Speaker 1: get to hear the crickets chirping, and then this and
Speaker 1: then that, and allowing that those little nuances to to
Speaker 1: stay in my own audio, it really just I feel
Speaker 1: like it all clicks for me. It really it really
Speaker 1: helped me in the in the craft of audio storytelling.
Speaker 1: Mm hmm. It's I think what it does is it
Speaker 1: it helps us stay in touch with our humanity, you
Speaker 1: know it even if it's even if something we're listening
Speaker 1: to is is highly um uh produced, um, you still
Speaker 1: get that that sense that that uh, you know, you're
Speaker 1: you're hearing it. It's that hearing is and and and
Speaker 1: listening are active, you know, um sorts of things. It's
Speaker 1: that you're not passive. You have to you have to
Speaker 1: pay attention, you know, you have to you you you
Speaker 1: have to let your brain absorb you know, what's being
Speaker 1: heard and and and makes sense out of it. So,
Speaker 1: I mean, I think there's a humanness to to um
Speaker 1: uh audio work that that really um you know, kind
Speaker 1: of transcends, uh. The fact that we are using these
Speaker 1: highly technical and technological tools to to um preserve it
Speaker 1: and um disseminate it more. After this quick break, let's
Speaker 1: get right back to it. So do you have a
Speaker 1: maybe do you have an example of like a favorite
Speaker 1: piece of audio that you have found in your work
Speaker 1: or one that stuck with you. Um. Wow, that might
Speaker 1: be a big question. That's a big question. You know,
Speaker 1: I spend so much time UM listening that UM, I
Speaker 1: listened to a lot of things and UM, you know,
Speaker 1: I think that's what what I love about the archival
Speaker 1: audio actually is that it transports me. You know, it
Speaker 1: takes me back to a place there is um a.
Speaker 1: I think it was probably a PACIFICA produced UM interview
Speaker 1: with Maya Angelo that just you know still knocks my
Speaker 1: soft socks off. And it's it's it was part of
Speaker 1: w y s O s collection because back in the day,
Speaker 1: um uh, folks used to swap tape. So it was
Speaker 1: a tape that ended up somehow in w y s
Speaker 1: O s UM tape library, but was produced UM I
Speaker 1: believe at w b A if I'm not mistaken. So
Speaker 1: it was it was um you know, from from years past,
Speaker 1: and she sings on it um. She she not only
Speaker 1: speaks her poetry, but she also sings a spiritual This
Speaker 1: is uprising up next the late Great Angelou. It's in
Speaker 1: the reach of my arms, the span of my hips,
Speaker 1: the stid of my step, the curd of my lips.
Speaker 1: Because I'm a woman, phenomenally phenomenal woman. That's me. If
Speaker 1: you listen to it again. Anyways, we were just saying,
Speaker 1: you hear everything in her voice. You hear her life
Speaker 1: in her voice, you hear the black experience in her voice.
Speaker 1: It's just Um, yes, it's transportive, it's it's transcendent, so transformative.
Speaker 1: Um yeah, that's That's one of my favorite pieces of
Speaker 1: audio for sure. According to the Women's Audio Mission, a
Speaker 1: nonprofit that trains women engineers and producers, less than five
Speaker 1: percent of the people creating the sounds music in media
Speaker 1: that make up the daily sound check of our lives
Speaker 1: are women or gender not conforming folks. And as a podcaster,
Speaker 1: I know that our audio endscape definitely excused white and mail,
Speaker 1: but it also tends to skew young, a dynamic that Jocelyn,
Speaker 1: who quit her day job to train as an audio
Speaker 1: producer in her late fifties, challenges so what was it
Speaker 1: like getting involved in audio production as a woman in
Speaker 1: her late fifties. What I felt like I was bringing
Speaker 1: to the table was a you know, a lifetime of experience.
Speaker 1: So the technical part of it was not a big
Speaker 1: stretch for me. UM. And in fact, you know, the
Speaker 1: first time I sat down with Hindenburg and started to
Speaker 1: um edit my own tape, UM, you know, I was,
Speaker 1: I was in the zone. I was in the flow
Speaker 1: all I mean almost immediately. So, UM, I'm a musician,
Speaker 1: you know, I I've I've done other creative pursuits in
Speaker 1: my life and UM, and it was you know, I
Speaker 1: recognized pretty quickly that I was doing something that was
Speaker 1: filling my heart and soul in ways that other things
Speaker 1: I had been doing UM was not so um you know.
Speaker 1: So so the that part of it came pretty easily.
Speaker 1: And then because I was working in some community based
Speaker 1: UM you know production um uh areas, it wasn't really
Speaker 1: UM an issue so much that here was this person
Speaker 1: who in her fifties just you know, just starting out.
Speaker 1: And I had a lot of success pretty early on
Speaker 1: because I was doing work that I knew. I had
Speaker 1: a series called Rediscovered Radio in which I took the
Speaker 1: archival audio at w y s O and UM used
Speaker 1: it to uh make short pieces, UM short document entery
Speaker 1: pieces that aired UM on the radio station, you know
Speaker 1: during the UM drivetime shows, so during morning edition and
Speaker 1: all things considered. So I learned to work with the
Speaker 1: with the NPR clock almost right away. UM. I was
Speaker 1: doing interviews as well as UM contextualizing the historical audio
Speaker 1: and putting it all together and UM that the first
Speaker 1: I did two seasons of it, so UM you know,
Speaker 1: I've done dozens and dozens of them. So I got
Speaker 1: to work at the craft, UM like hands on UM
Speaker 1: already producing for air material that UM you know, UH
Speaker 1: was UM you know, the kind of production work that
Speaker 1: I think you don't necessarily get to do. Even as
Speaker 1: a young person. I was. I was the producer of
Speaker 1: of of the series. I was able to take the
Speaker 1: maturity that I had from the other parts of my life,
Speaker 1: plus the fact that you know, I've been this high
Speaker 1: level administrator and I know how to get things done. UM.
Speaker 1: So I didn't have a lot of of UM down
Speaker 1: time or you know, when I jumped into it, I
Speaker 1: really got to jump into it. So so there was that,
Speaker 1: But I have seen what I would consider ages m
Speaker 1: in the in the field. And in fact, that's a
Speaker 1: conversation that we're having at AIR right now about what
Speaker 1: that looks like. And um, not only for people newly
Speaker 1: entering the fields in a uh pivot, you know, in
Speaker 1: their in their careers, but but people who have been
Speaker 1: in the business for many, many many years and have
Speaker 1: weathered all its changes as as it has progressed, and
Speaker 1: are finding themselves now getting boxed out or or overlooked
Speaker 1: for something younger, newer, fresher kinds of things. So now,
Speaker 1: I think, because I work with historical materials and I
Speaker 1: have a certain amount of of um firsthand knowledge some
Speaker 1: of the events and and so forth. Um, you know,
Speaker 1: it has served me really well. But you know, I
Speaker 1: also have found that I need to push my um
Speaker 1: uh my skill set and my my producing chops. I
Speaker 1: have to just keep pushing it beyond that so that
Speaker 1: I'm doing work that is um um you know, topical
Speaker 1: and um you know again new and fresh and and
Speaker 1: and you know, keeping not just myself but listeners, um
Speaker 1: engaged with what's going on in the world. So UM, yeah,
Speaker 1: I've just been really fortunate. It was all kind of
Speaker 1: a perfect storm of goodness. That's kind of storm. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, you talked about agism and how I don't know,
Speaker 1: I guess I feel like we have this very pervasive
Speaker 1: culture where we're obsessed with thirty under thirty lists and
Speaker 1: people who are sort of young and successful. And that's
Speaker 1: a that's a great story, but it does just it
Speaker 1: does discount the wisdom and the skill set and the
Speaker 1: experience that comes with age. And I feel like we
Speaker 1: are so obsessed with youth that we can overlook that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: if you if you came to audio production in your fifties,
Speaker 1: that would mean that you would come with an entire
Speaker 1: skill set, you know of and experience, like like many
Speaker 1: years of experience. And I think that because we're obsessed
Speaker 1: with youth, we don't allow for that to be as
Speaker 1: meaningful and as good of a thing as it really
Speaker 1: truly is, Oh no, no doubt, you know. And and
Speaker 1: a lot of that is very cultural, and you know,
Speaker 1: I mean it. One of the things that I have
Speaker 1: been working with lately has been community based storytelling projects
Speaker 1: and UM and much of that is focused on gathering
Speaker 1: and preserving and sharing the stories of elders and going
Speaker 1: back to UM, you know, a cultural mindset in which
Speaker 1: the wisdom of elders is held in high esteem and um.
Speaker 1: And that is you know, very much a a traditional
Speaker 1: um traditional communities hold elders and high esteem and um.
Speaker 1: You know, trying to move back towards that I think
Speaker 1: is very important. But you know, work with oral histories
Speaker 1: and um with uh, you know, interpreting some of the say,
Speaker 1: for instance, interpreting some of the events that some of
Speaker 1: the historical audio might um uh be representing. Is you
Speaker 1: know who better than someone who was actually there and
Speaker 1: who experienced it, you know, in their own lifetime. So
Speaker 1: you know, really honoring the voices and the stories of
Speaker 1: elders as part of this work, and finding that you know,
Speaker 1: many of those elders are quite capable of of um
Speaker 1: you know, producing and being um, you know, active participants
Speaker 1: in that story gathering and that storytelling. So UM you know,
Speaker 1: that's I think really important work. But but but truly,
Speaker 1: it's it's it's very it's a it's a it's a
Speaker 1: cultural thing in the US. For sure, it's not quite
Speaker 1: as um I think, uh, you know intense in other places,
Speaker 1: is it as it really is here? It definitely is
Speaker 1: a cult of youth in the US, and UM, you know,
Speaker 1: one of my favorite things to tell people is like,
Speaker 1: there's this old Richard Prior bit where the junkie and
Speaker 1: the wino are talking and the junkie says something him
Speaker 1: to something to him of the effect it's like, you
Speaker 1: old fool, and the wino says, boy, you don't get
Speaker 1: to be old being no fool. I love that. I
Speaker 1: love Let's take a quick break, let's get right back
Speaker 1: in it. I hope to tell you, I mean, I
Speaker 1: hope this isn't like too much information, But UM, I'm
Speaker 1: speaking to you today from my brother's condo in Richmond, Virginia,
Speaker 1: and I live in Washington, d C. And Um, the
Speaker 1: reason why I'm here is because our father, UM had
Speaker 1: a had an unexpected health emergency. So I'm here so
Speaker 1: that I can take care of him while he's been
Speaker 1: in the hospital this week. And he's he's on the upswing.
Speaker 1: He's doing much better. But when I brought him in
Speaker 1: on when he came to the hospital on um Monday night,
Speaker 1: and he was not doing so well, all I could
Speaker 1: think was that I wish I had brought my recorder
Speaker 1: so that we could have a conversation so that I
Speaker 1: could remember, I could hear his stories and get them
Speaker 1: on audio. Like that was all I can think was, God,
Speaker 1: I wish I had my recorder. God, I wish I
Speaker 1: had my recorder so the we could have we could
Speaker 1: you know, have a conversation, because often worry that, you know,
Speaker 1: we all love to have our elders in our lives
Speaker 1: and then when they pass on, we would like it
Speaker 1: would be How meaningful would it be to be able
Speaker 1: to have an archival of those stories in their own words?
Speaker 1: That was all I could think, was like, I hope
Speaker 1: I haven't missed my chance to to get his stories
Speaker 1: on audio. That was like the number one thing in
Speaker 1: my mind. Never leave home without it. That's what I'm learning.
Speaker 1: That's a that's a producer trick, I mean. And and
Speaker 1: sometimes I'm like, why am I hauling this stuff around?
Speaker 1: I don't use it. It's here, you know, But but
Speaker 1: I have a bag that I love that has my
Speaker 1: my um my kid in it, and I just make
Speaker 1: sure that if I'm going to be someplace where I
Speaker 1: don't know what's going on, necessarily um that it's in
Speaker 1: the car, you know, I just it's I just take
Speaker 1: it with me. Everywhere. But the other thing is, you know, um,
Speaker 1: you have a recorder probably you know, in your back
Speaker 1: pocket and done, um, done, right, you can capture some
Speaker 1: pretty decent audio with a smartphone and um so in
Speaker 1: a pinch, you've got something right there that that you
Speaker 1: could use. And um, you know, Story Corps has done
Speaker 1: a marvelous job of of making it possible, you know,
Speaker 1: democratizing the whole notion of of of preserving stories. And
Speaker 1: um there there interface for recording is really really good.
Speaker 1: But you can get a pretty decent recording if you
Speaker 1: have an iPhone with um um Voice Memo. So Voice
Speaker 1: Memos is a perfectly good recorder. On this podcast, I
Speaker 1: try to What I try to do is sort of
Speaker 1: create a kind of audio archive of underrepresented people and
Speaker 1: their contributions to technology, to digital culture, to Internet culture specifically,
Speaker 1: because I feel those things can be kind of ephemeral.
Speaker 1: They can, you know, the Internet changes so quickly and
Speaker 1: people forget about what came before, and so, um, I
Speaker 1: wanted to chronicle some of this. What would you be
Speaker 1: your advice be to make sure that more underrepresented communities
Speaker 1: and voices are having their stories included in records and archives.
Speaker 1: Um So that we know they existed well, particularly with
Speaker 1: UM podcasts. There are a number of people who are
Speaker 1: developing UM UM podcast archives and UM seeking those folks
Speaker 1: out is important. But also public libraries are are are
Speaker 1: undertaking some UH audio preservation. We work with the Green
Speaker 1: County Public Library here to UM preserve some of the
Speaker 1: digitized material from UM the w Y s O Collection
Speaker 1: which UM UH which includes UH oral histories and and
Speaker 1: so forth from the civil rights era. So so making
Speaker 1: sure that you you know, approach your existing institutions to
Speaker 1: be able to UM make sure that they're including your
Speaker 1: materials in their collections as as a member of that
Speaker 1: community UM, I think is an important important thing to
Speaker 1: do UM. And I think that that's something that archivists
Speaker 1: as a profession are looking at more of knowing that
Speaker 1: they are gatekeepers for cultural materials and knowing historically what
Speaker 1: that has meant, which has meant which in which you know,
Speaker 1: white supremacy has created barriers too that UM material all
Speaker 1: being collected and preserved. So you know, there are many
Speaker 1: many archival projects and archives that are I think opening
Speaker 1: their collecting um UH. You know, policies to UH to
Speaker 1: right wrongs that have been perpetrated in the past. So
Speaker 1: I think it's a changing um situation. But but certainly again,
Speaker 1: you know, the HBCU community is a place where our
Speaker 1: stories are are are important in our are considered, uh
Speaker 1: you know, worthy of preservation. And once again I can't
Speaker 1: seeing the praises of something like a community based project
Speaker 1: UM that I'm doing UM at West State and Stories,
Speaker 1: which is working with the African American communities in in
Speaker 1: in Dayton, Ohio to collect and preserve stories or um
Speaker 1: uh what story Corps can do with community based projects? UM,
Speaker 1: they have a whole tutorial that can teach an organization
Speaker 1: about how to collect and gather stories and preserve them
Speaker 1: through the Story Corps at the Library of Congress or um,
Speaker 1: you know, through their own means in the libraries or
Speaker 1: what have you, in the in the community. So UM,
Speaker 1: you know there's that, But I think part of it
Speaker 1: too is there's an understanding, UM you know that that
Speaker 1: materials are UM a somewhat ephemeral um themselves. Uh you know, Uh,
Speaker 1: magnetic tape deteriorates, uh, color photographs fade um you know,
Speaker 1: Uh film uh sticks together and can no longer be
Speaker 1: played or even digitized, and the whole digital environment also,
Speaker 1: um is not permanent there. You know, if you have
Speaker 1: materials that are preserved, so so you think on a
Speaker 1: hard drive and that hard drive fails, that material has
Speaker 1: gone forever. So you know, digital preservation is as the
Speaker 1: whole world unto itself, and um, you know, look for
Speaker 1: libraries often will have um, you know, little preservation workshops
Speaker 1: for families and individuals and and sometimes there's a lot
Speaker 1: to be found there. But then there are some wonderful
Speaker 1: websites that have um, you know material uh that people
Speaker 1: can um uh read to to figure out how to
Speaker 1: preserve their photographs or preserve their old tapes or or
Speaker 1: or what have you. And the Library of Congress has
Speaker 1: a really good website for that, so you know there's
Speaker 1: there's information out there. Um. But it really does help
Speaker 1: to talk to somebody who's in the know. And oftentimes
Speaker 1: that's you know, somebody you can find at your local library.
Speaker 1: I love how oftentimes it always comes back to library
Speaker 1: is like we forget what a resource they are. Oh,
Speaker 1: they're they're so important, you know, um yeah, they are
Speaker 1: community touchstones for sure, and in many communities, and you know,
Speaker 1: it's it's really one of those places where where civic
Speaker 1: life can can take place UM. And that's their charge,
Speaker 1: and that's that's what they're there for. So it's not
Speaker 1: just a repository for for books but UM and reading material,
Speaker 1: but there's so many other things. In today's libraries are
Speaker 1: places where there are maker spaces, and they have podcasting
Speaker 1: studios and they do training and podcasting and or audio
Speaker 1: or oral history gathering and all of those things. So
Speaker 1: you know, they're really great resources for for all of it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, you're a great resource too. You've really created
Speaker 1: this model of how institutions can be thinking about preservation
Speaker 1: and how all of us can be thinking about preserving
Speaker 1: the stories for our own families and our own communities
Speaker 1: so the next generation can learn from them and we're gone.
Speaker 1: So you know, to that end, what do you hope
Speaker 1: that people say about your work a hundred years from now? Well,
Speaker 1: I hope that for one thing, that that the HBCUM
Speaker 1: materials are are still available and accessible to students and
Speaker 1: researchers and UM community members to to to tap into
Speaker 1: two to know what life was like UM in some
Speaker 1: respects before you know, the Civil rights movement was able
Speaker 1: to UM turn a tide of experience for black people
Speaker 1: in America and what happened throughout that and and then
Speaker 1: beyond and um. You know, if you don't pay attention
Speaker 1: to history, you're doomed repeated of course, and and and
Speaker 1: that's something that I think we're realizing today that we
Speaker 1: are experiencing UM because we haven't paid good, paid good
Speaker 1: enough attention. We haven't paid attention well enough to do
Speaker 1: what's happened in the past and and and what's been
Speaker 1: done in the past, and and you know, that's an
Speaker 1: important thing to do. So, you know, a hundred years
Speaker 1: from now, I wanted to start with the HBCUs, But
Speaker 1: I'm also hoping that that the model that we set
Speaker 1: through the projects that UM are about preserving UM radio
Speaker 1: material from historically black colleges and universities, it was a
Speaker 1: model for for others to follow, and that other marginalized
Speaker 1: and um uh, you know, others whose whose voices have
Speaker 1: been left out of the American dialogue have have have
Speaker 1: a a template to follow so that they two can
Speaker 1: can preserve their voices. Our voices and our stories matter.
Speaker 1: Preservation isn't just for institutions. We should all be thinking
Speaker 1: about preserving the stories and our communities and our families
Speaker 1: for future generations to come. Don't let them fade away.
Speaker 1: We hope you enjoyed this special celebration of women making
Speaker 1: change at HBCUs. We'll be back with more. There Are
Speaker 1: No Girls on the Internet. Soon. Got a story about
Speaker 1: an interesting thing in tech, or just want to say hi,
Speaker 1: You can reach us at Hello at tangodi dot com.
Speaker 1: You can also find transcripts for today's episode at tangodi
Speaker 1: dot com. There Are No Girls on the Internet was
Speaker 1: created by me Bridget Tod. It's a production of I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio and Unboss creative Jonathan Strickland as our executive producer.
Speaker 1: Terry Harrison is our producer and sound engineer. Michael Amato
Speaker 1: is our contributing producer. I'm your host, Bridget Tod. If
Speaker 1: you want to help us grow, rate and review us
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