Smash the Silos, Build the Circle!: Institutional and Indigenous Collaboration in Digital Preservation Efforts. DPOE-N Workshop

Digital preservation is often presented as a technical responsibility involving systems, storage, metadata, and workflows. For Indigenous collections, however, preservation also requires institutions to examine how they build relationships, share authority, and understand their responsibilities to Tribal Nations. Smash the Silos, Build the Circle! approaches digital preservation as a collaborative and social justice practice grounded in Indigenous sovereignty, reciprocity, trust, and long-term relationship building.

This 3-hour webinar examines how institutions and federally recognized Tribes can

move beyond one-time consultations, institutional press releases, and passive “reasonable efforts” toward active and sustained partnerships. Drawing from twenty years of experience as an archivist and Cherokee Nation citizen working with Indigenous language and cultural

collections, the session will address institutional assumptions, prejudices, communication

failures, fragmented responsibilities, and other barriers to meaningful collaboration.

The webinar will examine institutional responsibilities when approaching Tribes and

considerations Tribes may use when evaluating institutional partnerships. Participants will engage with current digital-preservation and Indigenous-governance practices, including OAIS, FADGI, the NDSA Levels of Digital Preservation, CARE Principles, OCAP, and the Protocols for Native American Archival Materials.

A practical “Helpful Hints from Jerrid Lee” segment will translate experience into actions institutions can take to avoid extractive practices and build lasting relationships with Tribal communities.