O - Global Perspectives

Understand global perspectives on effective information practices that are supportive of cultural, economic, educational, or social well-being.

Introduction and Explication

Digital Information Age technologies facilitate and expand human interconnectedness at the global scale (IFLA, 2024). The interoperability of information systems, resource sharing via linked data, the emerging open data movement, and the ubiquity of mobile devices enables information seekers to identify, retrieve, create, and share data and information almost immediately. For innovative, forward-thinking information professionals, this technology-driven global interconnectedness is a clarion call. To meet our professional mandate to provide our stakeholders with comprehensive and trustworthy access to and use of information and knowledge, we prioritize cultural competency, accountability, and fluency in bibliographic description as well as the design and delivery of programs and services. It also means we must acknowledge the profession's contribution to historical oppression and erasure of non-dominant cultural and social groups and individuals, seek to repair those relationships through respectful discourse and collaboration, and work in partnership with all peoples to develop standards, policies, and best practices by which the profession may redress biased representations of their knowledge in the historical narrative, and collectively celebrate and embrace our global information community. 

Culturally Competent Archives

Archives are not immune to biased and discriminatory resource selection, description, and interpretation. Today's professional archivist acknowledges the profession's role in perpetuating exclusionary practices that alienate significant global perspectives from the historical record (SAA, 2020). In keeping with our professional responsibility to "document and preserve the record of the broadest possible range of individuals, communities, governance, and organizations", we strive to "build and promote archival collections that document a multiplicity of viewpoints on social, political, and intellectual issues" (SAA, 2020). In addition to creating safe and engaging spaces, policies, programs, and services for all members of our multicultural and global information community, culturally-competent archivists utilize standards-based metadata to describe and communicate cultural preferences to users, document historic misrepresentation, and build respectful relationships with social and cultural groups and individuals who mistrust the Euro-centric archives.

Metadata Content Standards

The International Council on Archives (ICA) facilitates international cooperation for archival efficiency and effectiveness by advocating for and developing archival descriptive standards and practices that "closely aligned with the management of records in their context of origin and use, while at the same time accommodating traditional archival materials and the existing predominant method of archival description, fonds-based multilevel description" (ICA & Pitti, n.d.). These ICA developed standards include the General International Standard Archival Description (ISAD(G)); the International Standard Archival Authority Record (ISAAR); International Standard for Describing Functions (ISDF); and the International Standard for Describing Institutions with Archival Holdings (ISDIAH) (SAA, 2022). In the US, Describing Archives: A Content Standard (DACS), the archival metadata content standard created and supported by the Society of American Archivists, is an US-specific implementation of these ICA standards (SAA, 2022).

Professional Best Practices

To facilitate ethical archival best practices for Indigenous cultural heritage and knowledge collections, archivists may voluntarily employ and customize Traditional Knowledge (TK) and Biocultural (BC) Labels for use with digital/digitized collections or objects. The labels are specifically designed for the purpose of embedding traditional and or local Indigenous protocols for data use, display, and management; claiming or sharing cultural authority for a collection/item; articulating traditional Indigenous access and use protocols; and create multiple access permissions protocols (Local Contexts, n.d.). In addition to culturally-centered descriptive and administrative metadata standards and labels, archival practitioners seeking to incorporate an Indigenous worldview into their descriptive practices may turn to Protocols for Native American Archival Materials (First Archivist Circle, 2007). Those seeking guidance on best practices for anti-racist archival description may consult Anti-Racist Description Resources by Archives for Black Lives in Philadelphia (A4BLiP, 2020).

Evidence

Evidence 1:  Indigenous Data Sovereignty Links to an external site.

Indigenous Data Sovereignty is a discussion post I composed on behalf of my discussion group in Indigenous Cultural Institutions and Practices of Librarianship (INFO 281, F22). The post discusses two topics: (1) data sovereignty and US copyright law, and (2) the value of local contexts over archival neutrality. Despite persistent efforts by Indigenous peoples and the United Nations to establish voluntary policies and best practices that uphold data sovereignty over indigenous cultural heritage and knowledge, archival best practices in the US continue to center on the parameters imposed by copyright law (Montenegro, 2019). This misguided practice upholds the information profession's often unexamined beliefs that archival practice is neutral, objective, and universally applicable to all knowledge management scenarios (Montenegro, 2019).

Referencing, the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP), the National Congress of American Indians (NCAI) Resolutions; and the CARE Principles for Indigenous Data Governance, the post emphasizes the culturally-inclusive value of using Traditional Knowledge (TK) Labels in conjunction with Dublin Core metadata elements to describe Indigenous cultural heritage and knowledge objects. TK Labels offer a strategy for balancing “tensions between a western desire for more universal access through interoperability” with “the needs of Indigenous communities for localized and culturally responsive documentation and description tools” (Montenegro, 2019). Incorporating community-defined TK Labels into colonial metadata schemes like the Dublin Core appropriately and overtly challenges the faulty notions of universality and neutrality in archival description, thus empowering Indigenous nations to inform, revise, and potentially limit access to their cultural heritage information at a local, culturally responsive level, regardless of the parameters imposed by US copyright law (Hunt, 2021). TK Labels operate most effectively when applied within the context of the CARE Principles for Indigenous Data Governance which supplement the open data movement’s FAIR Principles for responsible data stewardship and advocate for the inherent sovereign right of Indigenous people “to create value from Indigenous data in ways that are grounded in Indigenous worldviews and realise opportunities within the knowledge economy” (Global Indigenous Data Alliance, 2023).

This discussion post meets the criteria for Competency O by articulating my comprehension of the deeply-embedded structural challenges faced by Indigenous people seeking to manage their cultural heritage and knowledge from and Indigenous worldview. It discusses the perpetuation of the myths of neutrality and objectivity in US archival practice and challenges ethical archivists and other information professionals to voluntarily adhere to the principles of UNDRIP and CARE to ensure Indigenous data sovereignty is maintained (or regained) in archival description, and access and use policies and procedures.  

Evidence 2:  AI, Privacy by Design, and the Global South Links to an external site.

A discussion post written for my seminar in AI, Data, and Ethics (INFO 287, F23), AI, Privacy by Design, and the Global South addresses data privacy risks posed to citizens of the Global South by big data, artificial intelligence (AI) systems, and the ubiquitous Internet of Things. The discussion defines the Global South – “a meta category in the study of world politics” – as a socio-economic, political, and geographic region defined by the ongoing impacts of their colonized histories, authoritarian regimes, and expansive poverty (N. Mooradian, personal communication [Block 7 Lecture], 2 October 2023). Like their Global North counterparts, citizens of the Global South regularly utilize Web 2.0 technologies for leisure and entertainment purposes and,  as such, regularly interact with artificial intelligence (AI) systems that collect, analyze, use, reuse, repurpose, recombine, and reanalyze their personal data (TEDx Talks & Arora, P., 2017). Unfortunately, they may not benefit from robust and governmentally-enforced data privacy protections. This puts them at particular risk for data misuse and privacy violations due to the exploitation of big data at the international scale which occurs within the crypto-colonialist context and perpetuates Eurocentric data capitalism and appropriation, thus amplifying biases and exacerbating risks to their human rights (Couldry & Mejias, 2019).

From an ethics-based library and information science (LIS) point of view, this exploitation of "the new consumer base upon which technocratic corporate entities increasingly profit” violates the freedoms and autonomy consumers/data subjects in the Global South (Arora 2016, p. 1693). As advocates for just democratic societies, archivists and other information professionals may embed the principles and best practices of Privacy by Design (PbD) to develop and implement stakeholder education instructional tools and outreach and engagement strategies which may empower the peoples of the Global South and faciliate a grassroots-level demand for robust data privacy protections. Moreover, the information profession has an urgent ethical duty to amplify this concern by engaging with government and industry leaders and advocating for the ethical implementation of a proactive, transparent, human-rights  directed, and user-centric “indigenous design of big data applications for emerging economies” (Arora 2016, p. 1693).

This document represents my Competency O-specific knowledge, skills, and professional values by articulating the data privacy risks faced by vulnerable populations in the Global South, challenging exploitative data collection and use practices, and offering a principles-based framework by which archivists and other information professionals may reflect on their own organization's management of stakeholder data within the global information context.

Evidence 3: Global Challenges for Community Archaeology Information Practices Links to an external site.

An assignment/blog post written for Information Communities (INFO 200, F21), Global Challenges for Community Archaeology Information Practices addresses the diverse information needs and contexts of digital public archaeology (DPA) enthusiasts across the globe. The evolution of DPA reveals numerous challenges and solutions for information practitioners at the international scale including but not limited to the impact of collaborative, multivocal practice on knowledge sharing, and open access to data.

Like professional digital public archaeologists, information professionals involved in socio-cultural history investigation and heritage site management recognize the value of context to collaborative, interdisciplinary, and inclusive stakeholder engagement; knowledge interpretation and representation; and ethical data management. DPA professionals intentionally embrace democratic inclusivity by challenging the long standing, systemic exclusion of a multiplicity of voices in national (politicized) historical narratives (Beale, 2012).  They collaborate with amateur participants to gain local and contextual insight when interpreting archaeological artifacts and seek information on their experiences of living in a place rather than their biological relationship to place (Westmont and Antelid, 2018). This approach to archaeological interpretation has "foster[ed] a new way of managing how certain minority groups, such as migrants, relate to heritage and their place in it" (Westmont and Antelid, 2018). Additionally, both DPA and library and information science (LIS) professionals increasingly embrace open data initiatives (within the boundaries of intellectual property protections) to broaden and diversify knowledge dissemination and interpretation; extend data efficiency; and increase data and knowledge usefulness beyond the scope of a single project or discipline, “even when there are undeniable issues of digital exclusion, especially in countries where the adoption of and access to the web has been blocked or slowed” (Beale, 2012). Example cases include a community archaeology project in Quseir, Egypt that challenges discriminatory approaches to intellectual ownership of cultural heritage objects, and a heritage project in Sweden designed to engage migrant communities in local heritage investigations.

This assignment acts as is evidence of my understanding of global perspectives on effective information practices that are supportive of cultural, economic, educational, or social well-being (Competency O) by identifying internationally-relevant issues and evidence-based strategies/solutions used by DPA professionals which reflect and inform those valued and employed by LIS practitioners. I draw a parallel between the standards and best practices of the LIS and DPA domains, advocate for socio-cultural and political equity, and encourage the inclusion of marginalized and/or amateur voices in the interpretation of the historical record.

Conclusion

Digital Information Age information professionals recognize how technologies have created greater access to and use of information at the international scale and facilitated expansive opportunities for information seekers to connect with one another to share and create knowledge. The use of sociotechnical systems such as AI also offers benefits to society; however, for vulnerable populations such as the citizens of the Global South, the use of socio-technical systems like AI may put their data privacy and other human rights at great risk. Further, when describing and managing Indigenous cultural heritage and knowledge objects, information professionals across the globe must take responsible action to adapt mainstream, Euro-centric archival practices so they effectively maintain their provenance, original order, and culturally appropriate access and use parameters, and accurately represent the Indigenous worldview. By doing so, ethical archivists and information professionals empower vulnerable and/or marginalized groups and individuals to participate in - and profit from -  the knowledge sharing economy.

References

Archives for Black Lives in Philadelphia. (2020a). Anti-racist description resources. Archives for Black Lives. https://archivesforblacklives.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/ardr_202010.pdf Links to an external site.

Arora, P. (2016). Bottom of the data pyramid: Big data and the Global South. International Journal of Communication, 10(0), 19. https://ijoc.org/index.php/ijoc/article/view/4297 Links to an external site.

Beale, N. (2012). How community archaeology can make use of open data to achieve further its objectives. World Archaeology, 44(4), 612-633. https://doi.org/10.1080/00438243.2012.743252 Links to an external site.

Couldry, N., & Mejias, U. A. (2020). Costs of connection. Stanford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781503609754

First Archivist Circle. (2007, April 9). Protocols for Native American archival materials. Www2.Nau.edu. https://www2.nau.edu/libnap-p/protocols.html Links to an external site.

Global Indigenous Data Alliance. (2023, January 23). CARE principles. Global Indigenous Data Alliance. https://www.gida-global.org/care#:~:text=CARE%20Principles%20for%20Indigenous%20Data%20Governance Links to an external site.

Hunt, N. (2021, September 20). TK labeling. Local Contexts. https://localcontexts.org/tk-labeling/ Links to an external site.

International Council on Archives, & Pitti, D. (n.d.). Records in Contexts (RiC): a standard for archival description developed by the ICA Experts Group on Archival Description. ICA. https://www.ica.org/resource/records-in-contexts-ric-a-standard-for-archival-description-developed-by-the-ica-experts-group-on-archival-description/#:~:text=The%20four%20existing%20ICA%20standards Links to an external site.

International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA). (2024, March 26). Trend report. Trends.ifla.org. https://trends.ifla.org/ Links to an external site.

Local Contexts. (n.d.). Labels. Localcontexts.org. Retrieved April 3, 2024, from https://localcontexts.org/labels/about-the-labels/ Links to an external site.

Montenegro, M. (2019). Subverting the universality of metadata standards: The TK labels as a tool to promote Indigenous data sovereignty. Journal of Documentation, 75(4), 731–749.https://doi.org/10.1108/JD-08-2018-0124 Links to an external site.

Mooradian, N. (2014). Closing the gap between policy and ECM implementation using Privacy by Design. Information management, 20–26.

Society of American Archivists (SAA). (2020, August). Core values statement and code of ethics. Society of American Archivists. https://www2.archivists.org/statements/saa-core-values-statement-and-code-of-ethics Links to an external site.

Society of American Archivists (SAA). (2022, November 30). Describing archives: A content standard (DACS). Www2.Archivists.org. https://www2.archivists.org/groups/technical-subcommittee-on-describing-archives-a-content-standard-dacs/describing-archives-a-content-standard-dacs-second- Links to an external site.

TEDx Talks. (2017). Who is in charge of the future of the internet? | Payal Arora [Video]. In YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kiQa78tgbMk Links to an external site.

Westmont, & Antelid, A. (2018). The place to be: Community archaeology as a tool for cultural integration. Journal of Community Archaeology & Heritage, 5(4), 237–249. https://doi.org/10.1080/20518196.2018.1529550 Links to an external site.