Basements and Attics, Closets and Cyberspace: Explorations in Canadian Women’s Archives

Invisibility Exhibit: The Limits of Library and Archives Canada’s “Multicultural Mandate”

Invisibility Exhibit: The Limits of Library and Archives Canada’s “Multicultural Mandate” Karina Vernon Silence marks lack of neither language nor identity. Rather, it is a form of communication that those who rely on the hegemonic word of private authority cannot hear. –M. NourbeSe Philip Currently, Library and Archives Canada finds itself in an awkward position with regard to its “multicultural mandate.” Articulated in its 2003 working paper, “Architects of Change: How the National Library of Canada Is Responding to the New Cultural Landscape,” this mandate declares that “[m]ulticulturalism lies at the very heart of Library and Archives Canada. It is integral and fundamental to the institution as it is to Canada itself.” “Canadians,” it insists, “must be able to find their own communities’ heritage and culture within our collection, or to access it in others’. They must see themselves, their past, in what we hold” (LAC, “Architects”). But tellingly, in a report titled “Directions for Change” published a year later, Library and Archives Canada admitted that accomplishing this multicultural mandate 19 3 19 4 K a r i n a V e r n o n will involve some shifts in collecting emphases to ensure Aboriginal and ethnocultural communities’ documentary heritage, reflecting their experience within Canadian society, becomes better represented in our collection . At times, LAC may assist a community to document its heritage, at the same time assuring that it is collected, preserved and made accessible —whether locally or as part of the LAC collection. (LAC “Directions”) In other words, the collections at Library and Archives Canada do not currently reflect the “heritage and culture” of all Canadians, only those of the nation’s historically dominant cultural groups. Its multicultural collections , it seems, are lacking. Library and Archives Canada is well aware of the latter fact. In 2004, LAC created the Multicultural Initiatives Office, first to address the perceived lacuna in terms of what it calls its ethnocultural collections, and second to “act as a champion for multiculturalism and build networks to ensure that LAC represents and serves the geographic, linguistic and cultural diversity of all Canadians” (LAC, “Knowledge Institution”). The year that it was created, this Multicultural Initiatives Office initiated a series of community consultations with members of “ethnocultural communities ” across the country to determine why, to put it bluntly, people of colour and ethnicized people do not use or contribute to public archives in Canada—at least, not to the extent that LAC would like. Between October 2004 and February 2006, the Multicultural Initiatives unit of Library and Archives Canada assembled email, telephone, and in-person focus groups with individuals from six racialized and ethnicized communities, as well as librarians and archivists who aim to serve these communities (LAC, Community Consultations). The Multicultural Initiatives Office met with members of the South Asian community in Surrey, British Columbia; the Chinese community in Vancouver, British Columbia; the Somali community in Ottawa, Ontario; the black Anglophone and Haitian communities in Montréal, Québec; and finally, the Italian community in Ottawa, Ontario. The rationale for selecting these particular communities and not others is outlined in the Methodology section of the Community Consultations : Report of Activities and Outcomes: Some broad approaches governed the identification of invitees for each of the six in-person community consultation sessions hosted by Multicultural Initiatives and regional public library partners between October 2004 and February 2006. It was deemed important to solicit input beyond Ottawa and to conduct focus groups in disparate regions of Canada where feasible (in this case, Vancouver, Ottawa, Montréal). A balance was sought between newcomer perspectives and input from well-established heritage communities. i n V i s i B i L i t Y e X h i B i t 19 5 The report added that A secondary goal was to make contact with those who have not typically had significant dealings with LAC to date in order to maximize the twoway learning value of these sessions; while the focus groups facilitated information-gathering, they also presented opportunity to make Library and Archives Canada, as a new knowledge institution, known to potential constituents who may not have had LAC on the radar to date. According to its report, then, by assembling focus groups with members of Chinese, Somali, Haitian, Italian, and South Asian communities, LAC “strikes a balance between newcomer perspectives and input from wellestablished heritage communities,” and garners input from communities that have not...