Wildcat Histories: Preserving Activist UK Student Organization's Legacies

Abstract: The University of Kentucky (UK), a predominantly white and male institution, has over 600 registered student organizations. Of those, under 100 are organizations for members identifying as BIPOC, LGBTQ+, international, not Christian, and/or women in male-dominated disciplines. These organizations are a key part of student life, providing a means to build support networks, have fun and serve their communities, and raise and act on concerns and challenges. The activities of these organizations over time help tell the story of the presence and contribution of underrepresented groups at the university, a story of resilience and activism. However, the UK Archives (part of the UK Libraries Special Collections Research Center (SCRC)) does not have many student organization records and does not have a relationship with many student organizations. Through the efforts of Daniela Gamez Salgado, a 2020- 2021 UK Libraries Undergraduate Diversity Scholar intern and 2018-2019 President of the Latino Student Union (LSU), the LSU donated records from spring 2019 to the Archives, including event and recruitment flyers, the end-of-semester review, and the Twitter feed, the Instagram page, and the Facebook page. Archivists know how to preserve and provide access to paper, audiovisual, and (to a certain extent) born-digital formats and websites, but capturing social media continues to be challenging. The UK Libraries-LSU proposed Wildcat Histories project would work with the LSU-donated social media as a pilot for developing procedures and guidelines for preserving student organization social media (whether donated to the archives or not). We would also conduct a communication and outreach initiative to BIPOC, LGBTQ+, or non-Christian student organizations that have been on campus for 10 or more years.