How Users Imagine Archival Research

How Users Imagine Archival Research: JPCA Explore and Digital Curation at the Smithsonian National African American History and Culture Museum.

In 2021, the National Museum of African American History and Culture created a first-of-its-kind position at the Smithsonian Institution: a senior-level curator with the wide-ranging portfolio of “digital interpretation.” Filling this position has called for creative education, especially when working with curatorial colleagues with a range of experiences and interests in digital humanities. In the past year, we’ve had a unique opportunity to introduce the possibilities of digital discoveries internally through the JPCA Explore project.

The Johnson Publishing Company Archive (JPCA) is the largest collection of 20th-century African American publishing materials, including a core collection of over 3 million photographs. The JPCA was purchased in 2019 by a consortium of funders - the Ford Foundation, the J. Paul Getty Trust, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Mellon Foundation, and the Smithsonian Institution. Since 2022, it has been formally co-stewarded by the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture and Getty.

JPCA Explore is an experimental discovery lens in the larger in-development JPCA digital eco-system. Based on a hand-selected subset of 3,000 images, Explore uses a bespoke metadata schema to invite users with zero research experience to create their own discovery paths by selecting inter-connected images. Explore was designed with an eye towards how the general public imagines archival discovery- moving from file to file, noticing connections, discovering the unknown. It has also served as an internal education tool, demonstrating the possibilities of digital humanities work as well as the intensive resources that are required to make those possibilities real.

This talk will focus on the development of JPCA Explore and how it reflects wider issues around creating human-scale digital projects that still represent the magnitude of larger collections. By creating an interface with a focus on archival discovery, and at the same time completely ignoring archival hierarchical structures, this project seeks to implement Black Digital Humanities concepts to create new avenues into this archive.

Please note: this event will be held in person and live-streamed for attendees online. For those who attend in person, there will be festive refreshments and a chance to network after the event.

Biography

Dorothy Berry is the Digital Curator at the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture. Holding an MA in Folklore and Ethnomusicology and an MLS from Indiana University’s School of Informatics, Computing, and Engineering, she was recognised with Library Journal’s “Movers and Shakers” award and the Society of American Archivists’ Mark A. Greene Emerging Leader Award (2020–2021). Dorothy's first book, The House Archives Built and Other Thoughts on Black Archival Possibilities, was released on 16th October 2025. Following a sold out initial print run, the book is now available for pre-order.

Her work centres on harnessing digital innovation to deepen engagement with African American history, particularly through archival discovery. Whether developing interpretive tools in the museum context or designing precise metadata frameworks, she strives to make Black history both accurate and engaging online. Dedicated to broadening access to cultural heritage, they seek creative ways—digital and physical—to reconnect communities with their often displaced histories.

Event Information

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This event will be recorded and will be made publicly available via the CDCS website shortly after the event.

As of March 2022, the government formally removed all Covid restrictions in the UK. We ask that you continue to be considerate of others’ personal space, and please do not attend if you feel unwell or have any of Covid symptoms.