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Nine digital collections from ’s Cultural Memory Archive are now publicly available in the thanks to a grant from the (CLRC). The Digital Library Program at , in collaboration with La Casita, submitted the grant application to CLRC in 2020 to create digital access to the history and experience of Latine/Hispanic communities in Central and Upstate New York to advance scholarly research and understanding around this underrepresented culture in this region. The Libraries is the largest academic library in the CLRC region.

The collections include:

As the has observed in “A Guide to Documenting Latino/Hispanic History and Culture in New York State,” “Historical information is inadequately represented in the documentation of broad areas of Hispanic culture, including the fine arts, popular music and dance forms, and folk and traditional arts.”  Information pertaining to Hispanic businesses as well as the social, political and religious organizations of the community is also limited, and the historical record has poorly reflected Latine experiences related to immigration, discrimination and access to services.

These nine digital collections will begin to remedy the documentation gap relating to the ���ϲ����� Latine community, supporting further work and study in the fields of anthropology, sociology, art, history and Latine studies. La Casita maintains both its physical and digital objects and collections with support from the Libraries, the , the and in the College of Arts and Sciences, and the in the College of Visual and Performing Arts, as well as from community partners including the , the and other colleges and educational institutions in the region.

“The collaboration between La Casita, ���ϲ����� Libraries, CLRC and the NY Heritage Digital Collections is a wonderful, combined effort that benefits all parties and the greater community, ensuring that these important resources are preserved and discovered by scholars, researchers and community members,” says Elisa Dekaney, associate provost for strategic initiatives.

 includes over 400,000 digitized books, manuscripts, maps, letters, photographs and memorabilia. New York Heritage provides access to stories spanning the history of New York, with contributions from over 430 libraries, museums, archives and other community organizations.

“It is very exciting to see one of La Casita’s long-term goals, to make our Cultural Memory Archive accessible online, finally become a reality,” says Tere Paniagua ’82, executive director of the University’s Office of Cultural Engagement for the Hispanic Community. “This is a project developed by La Casita’s Bilingual Library, one that we have been working on for over a decade. Many graduate students from the University’s have contributed to the project, and now that the platform was created for these first nine collections, we welcome more students to take on the task of building new online collections.”

Déirdre Joyce, head of digital stewardship and the Digital Library, added that “the Digital Library Program supports library, campus and community partnerships that find creative ways to publish and express their unique, local digital output to wider digital audiences. In this case, we were delighted to leverage the Libraries’ membership with CLRC on behalf of La Casita, thereby making this content–and  and the stories of this diverse, ���ϲ����� community–broadly discoverable in New York Heritage. We look forward to continuing this important collaboration.”