“The finding aid is the first thing that people see, we don’t want to put anyone off viewing the collection”: how practitioners navigate queerness in finding aids

This paper reports on findings from semi-structured interviews with 29 archival practitioners who work on the creation and maintenance of finding aids related to LGBTQIA+ archival materials. The paper highlights key findings focused on how practitioners navigated the design and use of queer-specific...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Archival science Vol. 25; no. 4; p. 43
Main Authors: Wagner, Travis L., Allgood, Evan M., Caballero, Mateo
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: Dordrecht Springer Netherlands 01.12.2025
Springer Nature B.V
Subjects:
Aids
Anthropology
Archival description
Archives & records
Archivists
Cisgender
Computer Appl. in Arts and Humanities
Cultural and Media Studies
Cultural Heritage
Dictionaries
Donors
Embodiment
Ethical standards
Ethics
Heterosexuality
Information professionals
Information Storage and Retrieval
Knowledge
Language
LGBTQ people
Libraries
Library of Congress Subject Headings
Library Science
Literature
Metadata
Original Paper
Political representation
Sexuality
Subject heading schemes
Terminology
Archival representation
Qualitative research
LGBTQIA+ communities
Finding aids
Reparative description
ISSN:1389-0166, 1573-7500, 1573-7519
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:This paper reports on findings from semi-structured interviews with 29 archival practitioners who work on the creation and maintenance of finding aids related to LGBTQIA+ archival materials. The paper highlights key findings focused on how practitioners navigated the design and use of queer-specific finding aids with an emphasis on the tensions between historical terminology, various LGBTQIA+ identities, and the contemporary expectations of queer-inclusive language. Additionally, findings highlight how practitioners rely on their own personal embodied knowledge in conjunction with the knowledge of donors and queer community members to ensure ethical and affirming archival description. In particular, this emphasis on embodied knowledge highlighted a shift in ethical practice which, for many participants, departed from traditional archival praxis and required them to change their approach to the construction of finding aids. Finally, findings emphasize the importance of queer tools such as the Homosaurus and other queer reparative description initiatives, given their community-vetted nature. The paper concludes by identifying both theoretical and practical implications for the work and suggests future directions for research based on findings.
Bibliography:ObjectType-Article-1
SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
ObjectType-Feature-2
content type line 14
ISSN:1389-0166
1573-7500
1573-7519
DOI:10.1007/s10502-025-09513-w