The English 161A Archiving Social Movements class, led by Visiting Assistant Professor Whitney DeVos (PO ’08), Pitzer College, curated the Archiving Social Movements exhibit in Spring 2023 with the goal of engaging in the act of archiving to highlight voices of oppressed groups, marginalized communities, and social movements as a form of activism. Students explored Special Collections and Archives at The Claremont Colleges Library to curate examples of social movements like the Black Civil Rights Movement, Chicanx Movement, and the United Farm Workers movement with items ranging from pamphlets, zines, photographs, banners, posters, programs, art, tattoo designs, and more. In the exhibit, the curators present the histories of struggle surrounding these artifacts, so that they, as well as visitors to the exhibit, can also ask what sorts of forgotten or occluded futures they invoke. The curators wish to preserve and archive voices and histories that are currently missing from the archival record. They ask you to contribute in order to fill these silences.
What can you contribute?
DIGITAL IMAGES/PHOTOGRAPHS/VIDEOS: We are interested in images depicting activism and social movements, like images of protests, strikes, sit-ins, organizational meetings, or signage.
WRITINGS: We seek original writings by individuals (diaries, journals, poetry, essays, short stories, novels, etc.) related to social movements and activism.
DOCUMENTATION: We are interested in collecting documentation of social movements like newspaper clippings, meeting agendas and notes, letters, and other materials related to social movements and activism.
EPHEMERA: We seek 2-dimensional materials such as flyers, booklets, pamphlets and signs relevant to any social movement.
In order to donate material, you need to:
• be the owner of the materials.
• ensure content does not include personal information (phone numbers, social security numbers, medical information, etc.).
Please contact Special Collections at
SpecialCollections@claremont.edu to make arrangements to donate any physical items which cannot be uploaded through this submission form.
