Library of Congress's Blog, page 108

Pic of the Week: Cajun Music from Louisiana

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Photo by Shawn Miller

The BeauSoleil Quartet performed the lively and soulful music of Louisiana Cajuns on June 28 in the Coolidge Auditorium as part of the Library’s Homegrown Concert Series. For four decades now, the quartet has been taking traditional ingredients—waltzes, two-steps, Cajun French lyrics, hot fiddle licks and irresistible accordion—and spicing them up with eclectic percussion, acoustic guitar and an open and creative attitude toward music. In 1998, BeauSoleil became the first Cajun band to win a Grammy Award, and it added a second in 2008. In 2011, it was inducted into the Louisiana Music Hall of Fame.

History’s Greatest Birthday Card: The Polish Declarations

This is a guest post by Sahr Conway-Lanz, a historian in the Manuscript Division.

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Watercolor depicting the view of Kazimierz Dolny, in Poland’s Lublin Province, by prominent Polish artist Wladyslaw Skoczlylas. The image adorns volume 2 of the multivolume Declarations of Admiration and Friendship that Poland presented to the United States in 1926.

Former Librarian of Congress James Billington once called the Polish Declarations of Admiration and Friendship for the United States “possibly the largest expression of affection one nation ever made to another.” In 1926, for the 150th anniversary of the birth of the United States, the Polish people presented President Calvin Coolidge with 111 volumes signed not only by many of the political and cultural leaders of Poland, but also by more than 5 million school children and their teachers.

Poland had effectively given the American nation a gigantic birthday card, expressing its people’s extraordinary goodwill. With the completion of a recent digitization project in collaboration with the Polish Library of Washington and the Polish Embassy, all 111 volumes of the Polish Declarations are now readily available to the world through the Library of Congress website.

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Signature page for the Polish Ministry of Public Works, contained in volume 1 of the Declarations.

The gracious acknowledgment of the sesquicentennial of American independence had become a national project for Poland out of the gratitude and esteem that Poles had for U.S. aid during World War I and American support in reestablishing Poland as an independent state. Since 1795, Polish lands had been divided between the Russian, German and Austrian Empires, but Poland reemerged as an independent state in 1918 at the end of World War I. The United States had backed an independent Poland as part of the postwar settlement. In his peace proposal, President Woodrow Wilson made Polish independence one of his famous 14 points.

The declarations also thanked Americans for providing wartime relief aid to the Polish people and praised a group of American volunteer pilots for fighting with a newly independent Poland against the Soviets in 1920. The volumes’ dedication saluted the United States as a guiding star for all modern democracies, but, in the uncertain times of the 1920s, Polish leaders were also hoping to cement friendly ties with a potentially influential ally.

Beyond merely representing an emblem of international goodwill, the Polish Declarations were also a remarkable achievement and remain an amazing resource. The energy that went into the creation of the declarations was astounding. Many of the signatures for the volumes were collected across Poland during local celebrations of the United States’ July 4 anniversary and fully one-sixth of the Polish population signed their pages. Prominent Polish artists decorated the volumes with illustrations. Photographs of schools and their pupils, poems and other creative flourishes adorned the gift.

For researchers today, the Polish Declarations are a tremendous genealogical source, providing a unique snapshot of a Poland that would soon be transformed by the catastrophes of World War II.

Pride in the Library: LGBTQ+ Voices in the Library’s Collections

This is a guest post by Meg Metcalf, women’s, gender and LGBTQ+ studies librarian in the Main Reading Room.

[image error]The collections of the Library of Congress tell the rich and diverse story of LGBTQ+ life in America and around the world. To share this story, the Library organized a three-day “pop-up” display from June 8 through 10 featuring selections from its extensive LGBTQ+ holdings. For a quick guided tour, check out the video below.

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The materials on display highlighted the creativity, innovation and courage of the LGBTQ+ community throughout history and showcased the work of writers, performers, activists, public figures and service members through books, manuscripts, newspapers, recordings and ephemera. These voices preserve our American story and its international connections.

Materials on display included

Primary and secondary sources featuring the inspirational lives of activists and community leaders, such as Frank Kameny, Lilli Vincenz, Bayard Rustin and Sylvia Rivera.
The artistry of iconic cultural figures like Leonard Bernstein, Audre Lorde and Alvin Ailey. From the music of Aaron Copland’s “Appalachian Spring” to Jonathan Larson’s lyric sketches for “Rent,” these iconic entertainers made their mark on American history.
LGBTQ+ contributions to the fields of science, technology and business through the work of Sara Josephine Baker, Sally Ride and James Beard.
The evolution of the printed word and LGBTQ+ publishing through book arts, primary source periodical materials and discoveries in the Library’s Walt Whitman Papers.
Moving examples of oral histories of LGBTQ+ veterans from the Veterans History Project.
International LGBTQ+ life through the words and artwork of artists and activists from such countries as Mexico, Armenia, Poland and the Philippines.
Braille and talking books from the Library of Congress National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped.
Panels from the AIDS Memorial Quilt and a display including photographs of the AIDS Quilt Committee at the Library of Congress. June’s pop-up display marked the first time in 25 years that the Library of Congress AIDS Memorial Quilt panel was exhibited at the Library.

Download the full list of exhibit items here.

New Online: Margaret Bayard Smith Papers

This is the first of two related guest posts by Cassandra Good, associate editor of the Papers of James Monroe and author of “Founding Friendships: Friendships Between Men and Women in the Early American Republic” (2015), and Susan Holbrook Perdue, director of digital strategies at the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities and adviser to a variety of historical editing projects.

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Margaret Bayard Smith

For anyone interested in the founding era in Washington, D.C., the writings of Margaret Bayard Smith (1778–1844) and Anna Maria Brodeau Thornton (ca. 1775–1865) and are essential sources. Both lived their entire adult lives in the capital city and, as members of the city’s elite, were friends with one another and important political figures of the era. Their proximity to power made them unusual, but their writings also illustrate what it was like to be a woman in the early republic.

The papers of Smith and Thornton are in the Library’s Manuscript Division, and now they are online for the first time. This post focuses on Smith; a second post will cover Thornton.

Smith was born in Philadelphia in 1778 to Margaret Hodge Bayard and Colonel John Bayard, who served in the American Revolution, Pennsylvania Assembly and Continental Congress. She was educated at a private school for young women in Bethlehem, Penn., and as a young woman spent time in New York City as part of a circle of young intellectuals, including the popular novelist Charles Brockden Brown.

In 1800, she married her second cousin Samuel Harrison Smith. The couple moved to the new capital city at Washington, where her husband began publishing a newspaper, the National Intelligencer, at the invitation of Thomas Jefferson, whose political views the Smiths supported. Through this position, the couple entered early Washington’s elite social circles, and Bayard Smith met and befriended many of the prominent political figures of the era, including James and Dolley Madison, cabinet secretaries, ambassadors and their wives.

Despite her prominent social role, Smith preferred to spend time at her family’s country home, Sidney, on the site of what is today the Catholic University of America. She was a prolific writer, describing public affairs and social life in letters to her sister Jane Bayard Kirkpatrick and recording her private thoughts and poetry in her commonplace books (notebooks with copied extracts, drawings and personal reflections) as she raised her four children.

In the 1820s, with her children older, she began publishing her writing. She wrote two novels: “A Winter in Washington” (1824) and “What is Gentility?” (1828), both set in Washington, and her essays and stories appeared in magazines, including the popular women’s magazine, Godey’s Lady’s Book.

In 1900, Smith’s grandson, John Henley Smith, who had inherited her papers, presented some of her letters to the Columbia (Washington, D.C.) Historical Society and worked with Gaillard Hunt, later (1909–17) chief of the Library’s Manuscripts Division, to publish a highly selective edition of 107 letters, most focused on important men, from Smith’s papers. That edition, “The First Forty Years of Washington Society,” published in 1906, became the standard source on Smith. Over the past century, historians have often cited it—in fact, it is one of the most frequently referenced works in histories of the capital in the early republic—and it shaped Smith’s historical image.

In 1910, Smith’s papers were donated to the Library of Congress. Unusually extensive for the papers of a woman of Smith’s era, they contain much more material than the published volume, totaling approximately 3,600 items, including letters, diaries and commonplace books that offer a very different perspective on her personality and feelings. Unlike the cheerful published letters, Smith’s other writings show she was often unhappy and disliked political society. She declared that her commonplace books were “a true history of my life, a transcript of my heart.” In them, she recorded her personal struggles and her poetry, copied essays from published sources and pasted newspaper clippings.

Beyond revealing her emotions and private life, the papers are rich with details of the politics of the early national era. Readers can get a further taste of the richness of Smith’s writing in her 1809 accounts of James Madison’s inauguration (original and published transcription) and her visit to Thomas Jefferson’s home, Monticello (original and published transcription). Those looking for political references will find the most in the correspondence with her sisters, Maria Bayard Boyd and Jane Bayard Kirkpatrick. Discussions of religion and slavery are found throughout the papers. The eight reels of microfilm now online are helpfully broken down by date, correspondent’s name or both in the finding aid.

We are certain other researchers will be as grateful as we are now for the opportunity to easily delve into the life of this remarkable woman.

May It Please the Court: “Drawing Justice: The Art of Courtroom Illustration”

(The following is an excerpt from an article by Sara W. Duke from the May/June 2017 issue of LCM, the Library of Congress Magazine. Duke, curator of popular and applied graphic art, writes about how courtroom illustrations capture the styles of the times in which cases are heard.  Read the entire May/June issue here .)

“Drawing Justice: The Art of Courtroom Illustration,” a new exhibition at the Library of Congress, showcases the Library’s extensive collections of original art by talented artists hired by both newspapers and television to capture the personal dynamics of legal trials. Skilled at quickly conveying both individual likenesses and the atmosphere of the courtroom, these artists reveal, in intimate detail, the dramatic and, at times, mundane aspects of trial proceedings. Artists often pay attention to details like understated dress, expensive suits, a stylish hat, or clothing more appropriate for a party than a sentencing, offering insight into changing trends in fashion.

Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis returned to court in 1982, having already sued paparazzo photographer Ron Galella, arguing he was in contempt of a 1975 court order. Here, Galella’s lawyer Marvin Mitchelson interrogates her, while Judge Irving Ben Cooper presides. Cooper argued that Galella was not going to change his behavior voluntarily, and it was therefore necessary to “positively and effectively stop Galella’s unbridled behavior” by penalizing him for his contempt of the court’s 1975 order. Marilyn Church, who drew the former first lady, wrote, “Oddly, there was little evidence of the high-fashion elegance that she was so famous for. Most days she wore the same brown blouse to court, a garment made of synthetic fibers that had seen better days.”

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© Marilyn Church, 1982. Gift of the family of Marilyn Church, Prints and Photographs Division. Used by permission of artist.

 

In 2004, Martha Stewart and her former Merrill Lynch stockbroker, Peter Bacanovic, went to trial on charges of securities fraud and obstruction of justice at the U.S. District Court in Manhattan. A former stockbroker herself, Stewart chose an understated outfit as she listened to the testimony of Merrill Lynch employee Brian Schimpfhauser, as her defense attorney Robert Morvillo stood by. Judge Miriam Goldman Cedarbaum presided over the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York in Manhattan. On March 5, 2004, the jury found Stewart and Bacanovic guilty. Stewart served five months in Federal Prison Camp Alderson in West Virginia and an additional two years of supervised release, which allowed her to return to her business empire.

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© Marilyn Church, 2004. Prints and Photographs Division. Used by permission of artist.

 

Flamboyant crime boss John Gotti, “the Dapper Don,” faced trial on several occasions. In 1992, he appeared in United States v. John Gotti and Frank Locascio in the U.S. District Court in Brooklyn. Gotti, sporting a red tie and handkerchief, sits next to his attorney, Ken Kukec. Defense attorney Albert Krieger hands Anthony M. Cardinale, another defense attorney, papers, while Murray Appleman, the sole witness for the defense, testifies. Judge I. Leo Glasser leans forward to listen. When his second in command, Salvatore “The Bull” Gravano, turned on him and became a government witness, Gotti was convicted on charges of murder, racketeering, obstruction of justice, illegal gambling, tax evasion and loan-sharking. He died of throat cancer in 2002, while serving a life sentence in prison in Springfield, Missouri.

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© Marilyn Church, 1992. Prints and Photographs Division. Used by permission of artist.

 

In a 10-minute hearing on July 19, 1985, in the New York State Supreme Court in Manhattan, Sydney Biddle Barrows, dubbed the “Mayflower Madam” for her patrician bloodline, pled guilty to a misdemeanor charge of promoting prostitution. For artist Aggie Kenny, the hat became the focus of her drawing: “[It] gave shape to the face.” Barrows’s plea followed a week of negotiations between her lawyers and the prosecutors after an order by Judge Brenda Soloff would have required information about each charge to be made public. Barrows was fined $5,000 for the crime.

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© Aggie Kenny, 1985. Gift of Tom Girardi, Prints and Photographs Division. Used by permission of artist.

Serving with Pride: LGBTQ+ Veterans’ Oral History Workshop

This is a guest post by Meg Metcalf, women’s, gender and LGBTQ+ studies librarian in the Main Reading Room.

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Owen Rogers of the Veterans History Project (left) and Meg Metcalf, the author of this post, at ”Pride in the Library,” a three-day exhibit held in June to highlight the Library’s extensive LGBTQ+ collections.

Why are oral histories important to collect? What unique perspectives might we gain from oral histories that other formats don’t offer? What does “empowering the narrator” really look like? What ethical concerns and obligations do we face as interviewers? What resources are available to assist with the process of collecting and preserving these important narratives?

These were just a few of the questions on the table at “Serving with Pride: LGBTQ+ Veterans’ Oral History Workshop,” held on June 9 and co-sponsored by the Veterans History Project (VHP), LC-GLOBE and the Humanities and Social Sciences Division. I organized the workshop with Owen Rogers, a liaison specialist with the Veterans History Project (VHP), who provided useful advice and demonstrated hands-on knowledge regarding the various phases of conducting and preserving oral histories.

To emphasize the impact that these unique resources can have, several oral history examples were featured. Here are just a few of the incredible and moving stories of LGBTQ+ veterans that have been preserved by the Veterans History Project and the Library of Congress.

Frank Kameny

“I was going to do . . . what I could to see to it that gay people here in Washington got a square deal.”

— Oral History Interview , January 2003

The Library of Congress is home to the Frank Kameny Papers. Kameny was a prominent gay rights activist and Army veteran of World War II. In addition to his personal papers, the Library also has a number of publications in which Kameny or his work is mentioned, including “The Mattachine Review” and “The Homosexual Citizen.”

At 1:55 in his oral history interview, Frank Kameny describes being asked about his sexuality at the time of his enlistment.

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Miriam Ben-Shalom

“Nobody joins the military for a date.”

— Oral History Interview , November 2004

A veteran of the Cold War, Miriam Ben-Shalom served as a drill sergeant. In her audio interview, conducted in 2004 before the repeal of the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy, she asks, “I want to know: When do I get to be an American—whole and complete, same as anybody else?”

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JaeLee Waldschmidt

“If I could have served in the service as a trans woman, I probably would have done 20 years.”

— Oral History Interview , February 2015

JaeLee Waldschmidt enlisted in the Navy in 2003. She left the service of her own accord in 2012, and her interview discusses the challenges transgender individuals in the military face. In her oral history interview, JaeLee says to those who might be struggling with their gender identity: there’s hope.

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Interested in Learning More?

Interested in LGBTQ+ programming at the Library of Congress? Check the LC-GLOBE Facebook page or Twitter, or visit the Library of Congress Pride Portal. And don’t forget to follow along on social media using the hashtag #LCPride
Doing research in the area of Gender and LGBTQ+ Studies? See the LGBTQ+ Studies Research Guide. Also, be sure to take a look at our recommended LGBTQ+ E-Resources page (Subscription Databases accessible on-site only).
Visit Digital Collections from the Veterans History Project, including Experiencing War: Serving in Silence and Speaking Out: LGBT Veterans.
Search the Veterans History Project to find even more examples!
Check out How to Participate in the Project from the Veterans History Project.
Questions? Contact the Veterans History Project or one of our reference specialists via Ask a Librarian.

2017 Main Stage Authors Announced!

(The following is a repost from the National Book Festival blog. The author is Lola Pyne of the Library’s Office of Communications.)

Earlier this week, Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden made an exciting video announcement detailing the stellar authors who will headline this year’s Library of Congress National Book Festival. She was joined in front of a live audience by The Washington Post’s book editor, Ron Charles, to reveal and discuss the Main Stage authors, their current books and what we can expect to hear from them when the 17th annual book festival rolls around on Sept. 2, 2017.

So without further ado, click play on the video below to relive the announcement. It features other exciting details about the 2017 National Book Festival, including the fact that the entire Main Stage program will be shown live on Facebook the day of the event! (Spoiler alert, you can also scroll down for the list of Main Stage authors.)

2017 Main Stage Lineup

David McCullough
Diana Gabaldon
J.D. Vance
Thomas L. Friedman
Condoleezza Rice
David Baldacci

Check out the video announcement to learn more about each of these authors and show up to the festival to see them present live on the Main Stage!

The 2017 Library of Congress National Book Festival, which is free for everyone, will be held at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center on Saturday, Sept. 2. The festival is made possible by the generosity of sponsors. You, too, can support the festival by making a gift now.

This Day in History: Statue of Liberty

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Profile view of the left side of the Statue of Liberty’s head. Photo by Jet Lowe for the Historic American Engineering Record.

The Statue of Liberty arrived at its permanent home on Bedloe’s Island in New York Harbor at 1 p.m. on June 19, 1885, “snugly packed in the hold of the French transport Isère,” according to a New York Times report the following day. Multiple delegations of dignitaries, 20,000 citizens, and “every species of craft known to the sea” was out on the water to greet the Isère, so that the “water was gay with color for miles around.”

It would take another 16 months to erect the 151-foot-tall copper and iron statue, a gift from the people of France to the people of America—it had to be broken down into 350 separate pieces and packed into 214 crates for transport across the Atlantic.

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A photo of Bartholdi’s final study model, which he submitted with his application for copyright registration in 1876.

But as reflected in the collections of the Library, its fame preceded its completion—President Grover Cleveland formally accepted the finished statue on October 28, 1886—and it lasted long afterward. Even today, advertisements and other creative works continue to draw inspiration from the famous emblem of freedom and democracy.

Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi, the statue’s designer, submitted a photo of his final study model of the statue when he applied for copyright registration in 1876, America’s centennial year—the statue commemorates the centennial of the American Declaration of Independence. Six years before Bartholdi’s application, Congress centralized the U.S. copyright registration and deposit system at the Library. “The Statue of American Independence” as the Statue of Liberty was first named, was registered on August 31, 1876.

In the decade before the statue’s assembly, newspapers and magazines popularized images of it, and memorabilia proliferated. Advertisers of everything from patent medicine to light bulbs also capitalized on—and expanded—the statue’s celebrity.

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An ad is imprinted on the statue’s base in this lithograph registered for copyright protection in 1884 by New York publisher Root and Tinker.

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A theatrical advertising poster copyrighted in 1883 by Imre and Bolossy Kiralfy, producers of burlesques.

 

 

 

New York publisher Root and Tinker, for example, registered a color lithograph of the statue in 1883, thought to have been commissioned to raise funds to build the statue’s giant pedestal, designed by architect Richard Morris Hunt. The next year, the publisher registered a reissue of the same lithograph with “Low’s Jersey Lily for the Handkerchief” imprinted on the statue’s base. The statue’s image appears in many such ads, including posters for theatrical productions.

Following installation of the statue, it continued to captivate the popular imagination as documented by an 1897 burlesque-show advertisement, a period railway travel poster, and even an 1898 motion picture by Thomas Edison’s firm.

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By World War I, the Statue of Liberty was firmly established as an American icon. Its image was used to sell war bonds and to encourage young men to enlist in the military, and sheet music publishers incorporated it on cover illustrations.

More recently, the Historic American Engineering Record documented the Statue of Liberty in great detail. More than 450 images from the project are accessible on the Library’s website.

To learn more about the Library’s holdings related to the landmark statue

See  selected newspaper articles about the Statue of Liberty in Chronicling America. Search on Statue of Liberty, Lady Liberty, Bartholdi and Bedloe’s Island to find more early articles.
See more images of the Statue of Liberty on the Library’s website.

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A 1918 poster by Joseph Pennell promoting the sale of bonds to support U.S. efforts in World War I.

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Cover for sheet music titled “Liberty Statue Is Looking Right at You,” published in 1918.

Pic of the Week: Wonder Woman Visits the Library

Photo by Shawn Miller.

Lynda Carter (right), the famed actress known for her role as Wonder Woman, talked comics with Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden on June 14 in the Library’s Coolidge Auditorium.

From June 14 through 17, the Library is celebrating the world of comics with its “Library of Awesome” pop-up exhibit and other programming being presented in conjunction with Awesome Con, Washington, D.C.’s annual convention of comics, cosplay and pop culture.

More than 100 iconic comic-book issues are on display, featuring themes including Wonder Woman, Marvel Comics, DC Comics, children’s comics and sci-fi comics.

If you’re in Washington, come to the Jefferson Building of the Library between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. to see the fantastic display for yourself!

Details about the display and other programming are available here.

Remix, Slang and Memes: A New Collection Documents Web Culture

This is a guest post by Nicole Saylor, head of archives at the American Folklife Center of the Library of Congress .

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A page of entries from the meme database KnowYourMeme.com.

The Library of Congress just announced the release of the Web Cultures Web Archive Collection, a representative sampling of websites documenting the creation and sharing of emergent cultural traditions on the web.

Why is this important? Increasingly, people take to their smart phones, tablets and laptops to enact much of their lives through creative communication, making the web a predominant place to share folklore. It is where a significant portion of the historical record is now being written.

Archived from the web starting in 2014, the new—and growing—collection of collaborative cultural creation includes reaction GIFs (animated images, often bodies in motion, used online as responses or reactions to previous posts in a communication thread); image macros (photographic images on which a funny caption is superimposed); and memes (in this context, internet phenomena).

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A reply or reaction GIF tagged “flirting, smile, baby” from replygif.net.

Because the collection aims to document online communities that have established, shaped and disseminated communication tropes and themes, it also includes sites that capture icon-based communications, such as emoji, and those that establish or define vernacular language. Examples of these include “Leet” and “Lolspeak,” two examples of written English language that derive from internet usages. Leet emerged from 1980s software piracy communities, referring to “elite” code wranglers. Lolspeak primarily features in memes and carries collective meaning as the form of English that cats might use.

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Example of instructional sharing on GeekCrafts.

Some sites represent the DIY (do-it-yourself) movements of crafting and making—for example, Instructables. Still others focus on the distribution and discussion of digital “urban legends” and lore, such as Creepypasta, or vernacular creative forms, such as fan fiction.

The project is a contemporary manifestation of the AFC’s mission to document traditional cultural forms and practices, and results from the collaborative work between the AFC and those steeped in digital culture, both scholars and enthusiasts.

“First and most basically, what’s happening on the internet—all the situated vernacular, all the creative expression, all the remix, all the slang; every in-joke and hashtag and portmanteau—is folklore,” commented internet scholars Whitney Phillips and Ryan M. Milner in a recent interview. “It’s exactly the sort of traditional expression (that is to say, expression that communicates traditional cultural elements, i.e. passes traditions along) that folklorists have focused on for over a century.”

Indeed, contemporary folklorists such as Lynne McNeill, Robert Glenn Howard and Trevor Blank all draw upon folklore concepts when exploring online communities; Howard and Blank have commented on the topic in recent Library blog interviews.

We expect the Web Cultures Collection to be of high research value across a range of disciplines, from cultural studies to linguistics. Other earlier attempts to document web cultures are available in the AFC reading room, including more than a linear foot of printouts of 419 scam emails, which reflect the staff’s long-standing recognition of the need to preserve folk expression on the web.

In recent years, the Library’s web archiving program has provided a way to move us beyond the now-archaic practice of preserving web content by printing it on paper. Credit also goes to former Library staff member Trevor Owens, whose dissertation research on online communities made him a terrific partner in this effort. In July 2014, Owens and others hosted a CURATEcamp in Washington, D.C., focused on preserving the web as cultural platform. This event helped us further develop the collection and its scope.

The Web Cultures Web Archive Collection is dynamic, in that we will continue to add content from each archived site on a regular basis. Additionally, the AFC invites cultural practitioners and scholars who study internet culture to nominate sites to help make the collection reflect the dynamic nature of the web itself. Please send your nominations to folklore@loc.gov.