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CONFERENCE ON LATVIAN DIASPORA ARCHIVES AND MATERIAL CULTURE

Minneapolis, Minnesota April 12-14, 2012

Elmer L. Andersen Library, 222 21st Ave S, Minneapolis, MN 55455

Thursday, April 12 (Elmer L. Andersen Library, Room #120)

10:30 am Conference check-in (and late registration) – Atrium of the Elmer L. Andersen Library

11:30 am Opening of the conference and getting to know our hosts

Immigration History Research Center (University of Minnesota), American Latvian Association, Museum „Latvians Abroad“

ENG + LV

12:00 am Welcome lunch

1:00 pm Tour of Elmer L. Andersen Library and archival cavern

Immigration History Research Center (University of Minnesota)

ENG

1:30 pm How did we get here? – Emergence and preservation of Latvian diaspora culture

Andris Straumanis, Department of Journalism (University of Wisconsin-River Falls)

ENG

2:00 pm Getting to know our partners in the USA

Haven Hawley, Immigration History Research Center (University of Minnesota) Michael Biggins, Head of Slavic and East European Section (University of Washington Libraries)

ENG

2:45 Coffee break

3:00 pm Getting to know our partners in Latvia

Aivija Everte, National Library of Latvia Inese Kalniņa, State Archive of Latvia Maija Hinkle, Museum „Latvians Abroad“

LV + ENG

4:00 pm Learning from our Latvian colleagues in the U.S. and Great Britain

Lilita Bergs, Latvian Museum under the auspices of the American Latvian Association Inese Auziņa – Smith, Latvian Documentation Center in Great Britain

LV + ENG

4:45 pm Break (dinner at participants‘ own expense)

6:30 pm Learning from each other: Baltic collections in North America

Maira Bundža, Western Michigan University

ENG

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Friday, April 13 (Elmer L. Andersen Library, Room #120)

8:30 am Coffee and light breakfast

9:00 am Finding a common language: basic concepts in archival work

Daniel Necas, Immigration History Research Center (University of Minnesota)

ENG

10:15 am Coffee break

10:30 am From where I stand ... - Understanding differences between libraries, archives, and museums. Ask an expert panel: Why you collect? And how you collect? – Basic principles in collection development.

Haven Hawley, Immigration History Research Center (University of Minnesota) + community questions Expert panel: Lilita Bergs, Michael Biggins, Aivija Everte, Maija Hinkle, Inese Kalniņa, Daniel Necas

ENG

12:00 pm Lunch

1:00 pm Various levels of processing – Which one to chose?

Haven Hawley and Daniel Necas, Immigration History Research Center (University of Minnesota)

ENG

2:45 pm Coffee break

3:00 pm – 4:30 pm

Resources and standards of preservation – working groups focusing on print, archives, and material culture.

Staff of participating institutions will facilitate working groups on archives, print materials, and material culture.

ENG + LV

6:30 pm Social evening and dinner at the Minneapolis and St. Paul Latvian Ev. Lutheran Church, hosted by the American Latvian Association and the Latvian Organization Association of

Minnesota (for details see enclosed invitation) Address: 3152 17th Ave S, Minneapolis, MN 55407

Saturday, April 14 (Elmer L. Andersen Library, Room #120)

8:30 am Coffee and light breakfast

9:00 am Getting to know the Digital World Haven Hawley, Immigration History Research Center (University of Minnesota)

ENG

9:45 am (break at 10:15 am)

Sharing information in a Digital Age – Examples of projects of digital data management, providing access, and ensuring preservation.

Aivija Everte, Latvian National Digital Library Inese Kalniņa, State Archive of Latvia Maija Hinkle, American Latvian Association - Oral History project Ints Dzelzgalvis, ALAIDD

LV

12:00 Lunch

1:00 pm – 2:30 pm

Where do we go from here? – Identifying critical needs and steps for the future

Working groups LV

 

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CONFERENCE SPEAKERS Inese Auziņa-Smita (Smith) was born in Rīga and with her family fled Latvia in late 1944. After several years in displaced persons camps in Germany, she and her family emigrated to Australia in 1949 and then on to the United States in 1958. She earned a B.A in Romance languages from Ohio State University. After receiving her M.L.S. from the University of Michigan, Inese worked for the next 15 years as a university librarian in various countries. Changing careers, she became a lecturer in information science (1981–2010) at Loughborough University in England where she is currently a visiting fellow. From 1989 until 2008 she was a member of the Board of the Library Association of Latvia. She has served on the Latvian National Council in Great Britain since 1986 and is head of its section on cultural documentation. She is the founder/manager of the Latvian Documentation Centre (LDC, est. 1988) and the Latvian Archive (est. 2002) in the United Kingdom. Inese has carried out research on Latvian exile publishing and libraries and on librarianship in Latvia, and is the author of many journal articles as well a number of books. She was the general editor of Latvieši Lielbritanijā (Latvians in Great Britain – Volume 1, published in 1995) and is currently preparing volumes 2–4. For her contribution to Latvian culture, she was awarded Latvia’s Order of Three Stars IV class (Triju Zvaigžņu ordeņa virsniece). Lilita Bergs was born in Liepaja , Latvia. She spent the years following World War II in displaced persons camps in Germany, arriving in the United States in 1949. She received her B.A. and M.A. degrees in anthropology from Syracuse University. With a special interest in ethnography and archaeology, she began her museum career as a curator at the Rochester Museum and Science Center (NY) in 1969. She retired in 2005 after a 36-year career working in administration, public affairs, marketing and regional tourism development at a number of history and art museums (Old Sturbridge Village (MA), The Museums at Stony Brook (NY), Watkins Community Museum (KS), and the Rockwell Museum of Western Art (NY). In 1978 she began serving as volunteer curator for newly-formed Latvian Museum, established under the auspices of the American Latvian Association in the United States. Currently she is director of this all-volunteer museum, one of only two Latvian material cultural collections in the United States open to the general public. Michael Biggins since 1994 has been the Slavic, Baltic and East European studies librarian at the University of Washington (Seattle), where he also teaches Slovenian language and literature and at present serves as the interim Nordic studies librarian. From 2001 to 2004 he was chair of the Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR) of the North American Association for Slavic, East European and Eurasian Studies (ASEEES); he served two consecutive terms as chair of the CLIR Subcommittee on Collection Development (2005-2010); and he has been involved in various other nationally coordinated efforts aimed at preserving or providing access to research materials for Slavic and Baltic studies. In his spare time he is an avid literary translator from Slovenian to English, responsible for some fourteen published novels, memoirs, and book-length collections of poetry. Maira Bundža is an associate professor at the University Libraries, Western Michigan University. She earned a B.A. in psychology from Cornell University, and an M.L.S. from Western Michigan University. In her fifteen years as the Latvian Studies Center Librarian, Ms. Bundža gathered (and in 1997 dispersed) the largest collection of Latvian materials in America, wrote about Latvian collections around the world, and compiled a Baltic Library Directory. Now working at Western Michigan University as a reference librarian, she is responsible for developing the scholarly institutional repository for the university. She is currently working on a handbook for researchers of the Baltic countries and their peoples, and will be spending the summer on sabbatical in the Baltics continuing this research. Aivija Everte earned a M.S. in sociology from the University of Latvia and has been a professional librarian at the National Library of Latvia for over 20 years. Manager of Collection Development since

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2007, she also serves as head of the Library’s Committee for Collection Development. Latvian diaspora publications have frequently been a part of her work as well as a personal interest. Ms. Everte has published numerous articles about art libraries in Latvia, on information technology related to art research and about the National Library of Latvia’s collection. She is the recipient of Latvia’s Ministry of Culture Award in recognition for her accomplishments in the field of library science. Elizabeth Haven Hawley is program director at the Immigration History Research Center (IHRC), serving as head of collections and public historian for the center. The IHRC conducts research on migration and develops archives focused on North American immigration. The IHRC collections comprise the largest multi-ethnic archives in North America documenting immigrant experience. Dr. Hawley is a specialist in historical printing techniques. For the last eight years, she has trained special collections professionals at the Rare Book School at the University of Virginia in descriptive bibliography and served as printer-in-residence for the school's intensive summer programs. She received her M.S. and Ph.D. at Georgia Institute of Technology and worked at The Breman Jewish Heritage and Holocaust Museum (Atlanta) before her appointment at IHRC. Maija (Veinbergs) Hinkle was born in Latvia and has lived and worked in the United States since 1950. She earned a Ph.D. in physiology and biophysics from New York University and taught for 15 years at Cornell University. Since 1989, she has worked on the oral history of Latvian-Americans and Latvians, interviewing, organizing and disseminating oral history projects and results under the auspices of the American Latvian Association’s Oral History Project and the National Oral History Project of Latvia at the University of Latvia. Since 2007 Dr. Hinkle has served as chair of the Board of Directors of the nascent Latvian disapora museum in Latvia, „Latvians Abroad- Museum and Research Centre”. Inese Kalniņa is a graduate of the Jurisprudence Program at the Baltic International Academy. She is manager of the International and Personal Archives section at the National Archives of Latvia, Latvian State Archive. Her responsibilities include collecting and managing Latvian diaspora archives, both from individuals and from organizations. Daniel Necas is research archivist at the Immigration History Research Center (IHRC) with more than a decade of experience assisting researchers at the IHRC. Trained as a scholar in linguistics and literature, he is the IHRC's multi-lingual specialist and has translated a number of historical publications. He has helped develop the Digitizing Immigrant Letters Project and currently is working with the IHRC director to develop Central European partnerships to expand the project. Andris Straumanis is an associate professor in the Department of Journalism at the University of Wisconsin-River Falls. He also taught journalism and mass communication at UW-Eau Claire. Before the start of his academic career, Straumanis spent more than a decade working as a professional journalist and communication specialist. In 1980, while pursuing his master's degree at the University of Minnesota, he became the first Latvian research assistant in the Immigration History Research Center. His research interests focus on community journalism and the ethnic media, especially the pre-war Latvian immigrant press. From 1999-2012 Straumanis was editor of the website Latvians Online.

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CONFERENCE ORGANIZERS

American Latvian Association, Inc.

400 Hurley Avenue,

Rockville, MD 20850-3121, USA

Phone: +1 301 340 1914 Fax: +1 301 340 8732

Homepage: www.alausa.org E-mail: alainfo@alausa.org

311 Elmer L. Andersen Library

222 21st Ave S, Minneapolis, MN 55455, USA

Phone: +1 612 625 4800 Fax: +1 612 626 0018

Homepage: www.ihrc.umn.edu/

Email: ihrc@umn.edu

Museum and Research Center „Latvians Abroad“ („Latvieši Pasaulē“)

Dzirnavu iela 66A, Dz. 56

Rīga, LV 1050, Latvia

Phone: +371 22300397 Fax: +371 6728 4913

Homepage: www.diasporamuseum.com

E-mail: lapainfo@gmail.com