Out of the Archive

Antoinette LaFarge
Digital Media, Art
UC Irvine

Throughout the United States are small archives holding unpublished manuscripts by women and people of color whose achievements are no longer well known. Ranging from memoirs and essays to fiction and poetry, these texts offer firsthand witnesses to history written by people living outside the mainstream of their culture. Although known to librarians and scholars, they remain largely inaccessible to ordinary citizens and offer little to attract publishers in today’s market. Co-organized by UCI Professor Antoinette LaFarge and UC Santa Barbara Lecturer Maya Gurantz, “Out of the Archive” is a proof-of-concept project that asks: What will it take to bring such unpublished archival manuscripts to the public in an organized way?