This month marks the 10th anniversary of Preservation Week®, a public awareness initiative that aims to promote preservation and conservation in communities with the help of libraries, institutions and museums. Although we are in the midst of a global pandemic and are unable to gather to celebrate the anniversary April 26—May 2, the mission and purpose of Preservation Week persists, perhaps in new and different ways.
Preservation Week inspires actions to preserve personal, family and community collections in addition to library, museum and archival materials. It also raises awareness of the role libraries and other cultural institutions play in providing ongoing education and outreach. This year’s theme is “Preserving Oral History” and the honorary chair is author, activist and cultural critic Roxane Gay. This theme offers the public the opportunity to explore oral histories both as acts of preservation and artifacts that require preservation.
In addition to the free webinars Using Oral History to Tell Your Family Stories and Community Archiving Strategies for Oral History, Preservation Week offers free event tools and resources on a variety of preservation topics, including guidance on handling library materials and collections during a pandemic. We also invite you to engage with Preservation Week on Facebook and Twitter, and update your Facebook profile with the temporary Preservation Week profile frame.
Preservation Week is a collaborative effort supported by the Association for Library Collections and Technical Services (ALCTS), a division of the American Library Association (ALA), Library of Congress and the Institute of Museum and Library Services.
