Enabling Historical Thinking through Interorganizational Cooperation

This poster problematizes selected presentations and outcomes of an IFLA satellite conference on the history of professional organizations of librarians and information scientists. Representatives from organizations, including ASIST and library associations around the world from four continents (Europe, North America, Asia, Africa) will meet at the Mundaneum in Mons, Belgium. The theme of the conference is “Preserving our origins: Approaches to the organization, curation, and historiography of the record of national and international organizations in libraries, information, and documentation.” An irony within information science is that its many professional associations often fail to identify and preserve their own history. Their work is documented, but often not well preserved, and hidden from a wider audience. Born digital materials are especially vulnerable to loss (Neal, 2015). This poster identifies problems and best practices in managing the documents of historical value of volunteer-led associations and invites ASIST members to contribute to the historical work of the association. The goal is to identify common problems in preserving association histories. The poster will present several projects discussed at the IFLA satellite conference, as well as proposed ways forward that will advance historical work for the information professions.