DCDC21 | Speed presentations: Engaging audiences during the pandemic
Channel: ResearchLibrariesUK
Date: 2021-07-05

DCDC stands for Discovering Collections, Discovering Communities. It is a cross-sectoral conference, hosted by The National Archives, RLUK and Jisc, that brings together the GLAMA sectors (galleries, libraries, archives, museums and academia) to shine a light on our shared experiences, innovations, interests and concerns. The DCDC21 Conference explored how crisis can act as a catalyst for change within libraries, archives, museums, and cultural organisations. https://dcdcconference.com/

A Voice for the Voiceless: Instagram as an Exhibition Space for Working-Class Book Inscriptions
Lauren Alex O'Hagan, Cardiff University

This presentation will discuss a recent Instagram exhibition ‘Prize Books and Politics: Rethinking Working-Class Life in Edwardian Britain’ and reflect on Instagram as an exhibition space that can be used as an innovative digital tool in times of crisis to promote research and digital scholarship and provide continued access and use of collections. Given the project’s success and feedback, the talk will argue that Instagram can help address issues of inequality and representation in collections by recovering the voices of working-class individuals and offering new narratives of working-class life and culture that challenge myths perpetuated by those in higher positions of power.

Anzac Stories - power of voice command 
Anna Raunik, State Library of Queensland 

The power of voice command to deliver an engaging and memorable experience for archival content was implemented during COVID-19 at State Library of Queensland, Australia. With few key voice commands smart device users can listen to oral histories connected to military service, observe a minutes silence, and request a poppy be laid on their behalf in memorial galleries.  

Before, during and after: how a digital engagement project embraced the COVID lockdown to promote new models of engagement
Miriam Silverman, Institute of Historical Research, and Matthew Davies, Birkbeck, University of London

Built as an online interactive map and repository for London’s histories, Layers of London is a digital resource created by the Institute of Historical Research and Error Agency. Before Covid, the team at IHR had been building awareness and growth via real life interactions, so they had to pivot quickly as the country entered lockdown. In this presentation, we will discuss how the crisis changed outreach, promoted new models of engagement and enabled deeper support of our volunteers and communities to ensure that the Layers of London site continued to grow, engage and educate in 2020 and beyond.

Scrapbooking COVID-19 and children’s experience of the Pandemic
Debbie Challis, London School of Economics

In this speed presentation Debbie Challis (LSE Library) shares how a scrapbook In the Women’s Library Collection archive. was the catalyst for a project on the influenza pandemic 1918-19 and recording children’s experiences of the COVID-19 pandemic. LSE Library worked with a primary school to develop resources for Year 5 students. In a rapidly changing environment, the practical and pedagogical challenges of designing resources for teachers to use in a classroom and then for home schooling will be shared. We will assess whether our aim to encourage individual reflection and amplify these children’s voices to a wider audience was achieved.

Digitally mediated youth engagement for GLAMs during the pandemic
Katerina Zourou and Elisa Pellegrini, Web2Learn

A collection of use cases developed by GLAMs in Europe during the pandemic as a showcase of concrete examples of youth engagement in their ordinary activities and their social/cultural value.