Community First: Indigenous Community-Based Archival Provenance

Archives contain records that document the lives, cultures, and histories of Indigenous communities that are often organized within a governmental or colonial creation structure. This structure can create barriers to access for Indigenous communities and researchers that depend on those records. This article re-imagines archival methods of organization and proposes archival provenance based on Indigenous community needs and understanding. Institutional, religious, and government archives across Canada contain the records which document the lives, cultures, and histories of First Nation, Inuit, and Métis communities. These archives are often hundreds of miles away from the Indigenous communities described in their holdings, and these archival records are frequently organized based on government or colonial structures. For example, Library and Archives Canada (LAC) is located in Ottawa, Ontario, contains records from Indigenous communities from every province and territory in Canada. This distance and how institutional archives organize records are barriers to Indigenous communities’ access to their own history. This article reimagines archival methods of organization and proposes models for archival provenance based on Indigenous community needs and understanding.1 We examine entrenched archival practice and emerging archival innovations such as community-based arrangement and community-guided organization of archives as a means of proposing alternative approaches to archival organization. We do this by rethinking archival ownership and provenance through the lens of Indigenous legal traditions, community ownership, and prioritizing Indigenous communities’ needs to have access to their records and the ability to care for their information in a culturally appropriate way. This article and our reflections on archival practice are rooted in our experiences working in community archives and witnessing individual and community frustration with archival organization and record location. Krista McCracken is a settler who lives and works in Baawating (Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, Canada). McCracken has worked at an Indigenous-centered archives, the Shingwauk Residential Schools Centre (SRSC), since 2010. They are grateful for the opportunities they have had to work alongside residential school Survivors and Indigenous communities and continue to learn by listening to Elders and Survivors. Skylee-Storm Hogan is Kahnawà:ke Kanien'kehá:ka on their father’s side with settler heritage on their mother’s side. Skylee-Storm began working with the SRSC as an assistant in 2015. Their work with the SRSC and Survivors’ resilience shaped their approach to and advice on public history projects. We recognize that our recommendations and reimagining of provenance are rooted in our relationships with specific Indigenous communities and nations. These ideas will not be universally true across Indigenous peoples internationally. Archivists and archival organizations should do the work to build relationships with local Indigenous communities and stakeholders and make adjustments to archival practice based on ongoing,