Do It Yourself! Queering the Archive

Archives shape the way cultural memory is produced and accessed, partly through their systems of description. As Brunow (2018, 180) argues, cataloguing and metadata are “performative acts of power” that determine what becomes visible and what remains hidden. Discourse has increased in the past few years on how archives influence the visibility and accessibility of queer records, however, this is less researched “outside of community archive settings” (Freeman 2023, 453). Kirste (2007, 137) observed that moving image archives often lack the specific knowledge of queer culture as LGBTIA+ archives do to describe the material in a way that it is discoverable to the related queer community. This discoverability is also described more recently by Freeman as a key goal: “[W]e must make our materials visible and accessible to users in a way that is intelligible and obvious to them.” (Freeman 2023, 453).

The need for a rethinking of the metadata of queer records became clear in my preliminary mapping of queer related materials in the MonteVideo, Time Based Arts and NIMk archives, spanning the 1970s-1990s. This revealed both the potential and the limits of current description and keywords. Firstly, the records remain difficult to locate in the database and the online catalogue, since the keywords of “gender”, “sexuality” and “identity” fail to capture all facets of queerness, and furthermore return an overwhelming number of unrelated entries. Secondly, searching terms like “queer” or “gay” yields very few results, where records only show up that have these words specifically in their description. However, not every artwork made by queer individuals is specifically about their queerness. This overt presence of queerness is moreover oftentimes not the case for queer (related) records in the LI-MA archive. This emphasises the current need for prior knowledge, either of artists’ identities or specific events. If this knowledge is not documented, these records are in danger of disappearing from our queer cultural memory within the next few generations. Thirdly, a lot of artworks that I have identified as queer or queer related in this preliminary mapping, are not coded with any keywords, subject or genre codes. This observation again emphasises the need for a rethinking of how to make queer records visible, accessible and importantly discoverable for the queer community and researchers.

Queerness resists stable classification, and traditional taxonomies tend to universalize and sanitize, obscuring the nuance of the lived queer experience (Kord 2022, 517; Watson 2024, 249-250; The Queer Metadata Collective et al. 2024, 5). As Feeman (2023, 464) argues, queer records often only become searchable through derogatory historical language, which can retraumatize users even as it does make the records visible. However, completely new and very specific metadata risks making materials invisible outside insider networks (Kord 2022, 517; Freeman 2023, 453). This points to what Watson (2024, 254) calls the impossibility of queer metadata, since queerness resists being contained within fixed taxonomies, yet archival systems demand categorisation. A change in description is fruitful, as seen in community archives, where researchers and users have reported positively on the findability of material and navigating the archive at large (Feeman 2023, 465).

Addressing these issues requires a rethinking of cataloguing as a collaborative and situated practice, where description emerges from dialogue with the community we describe. This pilot project responds to this need by inviting collective reflection on how queerness might be described, located and made visible.

For this pilot project I have selected four cases from the MonteVideo, Time Based Arts and NIMk collections from the 1970s-1990s. These represent a variety of challenges in describing queer records: Outdated, possibly problematic, and/or harmful language, absences of queer metadata despite explicit queer content, narrow or incomplete tagging, and the invisibility of queer material. Furthermore, this selection reflects a variety of subjects, formats and each year of my case study’s time period. This variety will allow us to discuss how queer visibility, historical contexts, and ethical description can come together. For each artwork information is provided about the way the artwork is currently coded with keywords, subjects and genres. The artworks are available to watch on mediakunst.net, which you will immediately be referred to by clicking on the artwork. I have added some discussion prompts for each artwork to get the conversation started. The main focus of this activity is to review the metadata of these artworks, and discuss the implications that possible changes might have. I invite you all to think critically with me and to express your thoughts and concerns.

To conclude, this proposed activity offers LI-Ma an opportunity to bridge archival expertise with the lived knowledge of the queer community represented in its collection. By engaging artists, scholars and community members in the process of naming, the project can transform cataloguing into a collaborative and ethical practice. Through this initiative, LI-MA can both address existing gaps in the visibility of queer records and test out an open, reflective and participatory approach to metadata.

Brunow, D. 2018. “Naming, Shaming, Framing: Ambivalence of queer Visibility in Audiovisual Archives.” In The Power of Vulnerability: Mobilizing Affect in Feminist, queer and Anti-racist Media Cultures, edited by A. Koivunen, K. Kyrölä, and I. Ryberg, Manchester University Press.

Freeman, Elliot. 2023. “Defying Description: Searching for queer History in Institutional Archives.” Archival Science 23, 447-470.

Kirste, L. 2007. “Collective Effort: Archiving LGBT Moving Images.” Cinema Journal 46 (3), 134-140

Kord, Alexandea. 2022. “Evaluating Metadata Quality in LGBTQ+ Digital Community Archives.” Cataloguing & Classification Quarterly 60, 514-535.

The Queer Metadata Collective, K. Adolpho, A. Bailund, E. Beck, J. Bradshaw, E. Butler, B. Bárcenas, M. Caelin, R. Carpenter, A. Day, T. Day, D. Dixon, A. Dover, S. Frrizzel, G. Goodrich, B.L. Hendrickson, T. Keller, C. Misorski, D. Murphy, R. Newlin, K. Rawdon, E. Riccardi, A. Rodriguez, G. Tardy, A. Tarnawsky, A. Thompson, E. Uchimura, B.M. Watson, A. Williams, C. Yragui. 2024. Best Practices for Queer Metadata. University of Texas. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.12580531

Watson, B.M. 2024. “The Homosaurus, Queer Vocabularies, and Impossible Metadata.” The Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America (118) nr. 2, 247-225.

"After having worked at various film festivals and cultural institutions, I decided to expand my academic and research profile with an internship which bridges hands-on archival work with research. I am particularly drawn to critical and queer theory, and creative approaches to archiving. This I explored in particular during my master thesis with the topic of queering Amsterdam’s punk audiovisual heritage. During my Conservation and Research internship at LI-MA, I will be handling the inventory of the MonteVideo, Time Based Arts and NIMk archive as well as conducting research on how LI-MA can ensure visibility for their queer records in these archives." - Claire van den Broek

For any comments, questions or concerns that you would rather discuss privately, you can reach me at clairevandenbroek@li-ma.nl