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This data is extracted from the original Project Proposal
written by Julie Evans and David Ward and submitted to the Research
Support Libraries Programme in May 1999.
What is the CASBAH Project?
CASBAH
has been a demonstrator project funded by the Research Support
Libraries Programme (RSLP) with the aim of identifying and mapping
national research resources relating to Caribbean Studies and
the history of Black and Asian people in the UK. Funding was
awarded in June 1999 after a two-stage bidding process and formal
project activities took place between January 2001 - June 2002.
The rationale
for the project is that resources for these fields - particularly
for the history of Black and Asian people in the UK - are currently
underdeveloped in terms of the library resources and finding
aids that researchers are able to identify and exploit. In both
of these fields, however, there is a both a strong academic
and a wider national educational need to strengthen and develop
resources in order to facilitate and encourage research that
will benefit both the academic and the wider community.
The project
has collaborated with 16 partner institutions, whose own collections
cover relevant national holdings across all sectors, in order
to map the location of materials in these subject areas and
make them more easily identifiable and accessible. Pilot surveys
of archives were first conducted to identify key record groups
and survey work has also involved identifying printed and audio-visual
resources held by UK libraries so as to highlight national collection
strengths and weaknesses. Regional archive surveys were then
conducted to further develop a tested methodology for surveying
repositories in CASBAH subject areas.
For this
project the term 'Caribbean' should be taken to refer to the
English-speaking countries and peoples of the Caribbean. The
term 'Black' is used to refer to people of African descent or
people whose ancestry lies either directly, or in part, in the
black African or Caribbean diaspora. The term 'Asian' is used
to refer to peoples with recent or direct links with Asian countries,
in particular those with recent or direct origins in Bangladesh,
India, Kashmir, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. Both terms include
Asian and Black peoples of 'dual heritage' or mixed 'race'.
Please see Scope of the Project
for a more detailed explanation of terminology.
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Project Modules
The aims of the project have been developed through the development
of five inter-related modules:
- Archives
- Printed and audiovisual resources
- Collaborative collection management initiatives
- Training and awareness
- Project web site and subject gateway
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What
collections have been surveyed?
Survey work for identifying archive, printed and audio-visual
materials naturally began with the collections held by partner
institutions. The partners' and ICS's own holdings represent
the most significant national printed, audio-visual and archive
collections relating to Caribbean studies and the history of
Black and Asian people in Britain. The outcomes from these initial
surveys laid the groundwork for an expanded programme of surveys
developed in collaboration with project partners and using links
developed over the project's life. A survey strategy was decided
upon for archives which resulted in five regional pilot surveys
being conducted in Manchester, Leicestershire, Glamorgan, Belfast
and Glasgow, across a comprehensive range of themes and record
types. For printed and audio-visual resources a different approach
was adopted. A specially designed questionnaire, with detailed
guidance notes, was created and posted to a sample of 184 university,
public and special libraries. Further information about the
surveys can be found in both the Reports and Database
sections of this site.
For a description of the collections and the activities of
partner institutions and organisations, please click here.
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Why are
these resources important to Higher Education and researchers
in the wider community?
Research in higher education informs teaching throughout the
educational process and recent government initiatives encourage
co-operation between the different educational strata, as well
as between HE and the wider community. There is an increasing
interest in the history of ethnic minorities in the UK and this
project - by identifying, raising awareness of, and enhancing
access to research materials - has aimed to facilitate, encourage
and enable research by focusing on and mapping archival, printed
and audiovisual collections. No organisation or project has
ever taken a holistic approach to mapping UK library holdings
for Caribbean studies, either in printed or electronic form.
This is also is the first time printed and audiovisual materials
for Caribbean Studies have been listed specifically for research
purposes. This, together with the fact that no directory currently
exists for Black and Asian history resources, marks the project
out as not only timely, but necessary and groundbreaking.
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How have
the collections been described?
The aim has been to produce collection level descriptions
and make them available via the web-accessible database hosted
on the project's web site. Where collection level descriptions
from archive surveys are available they have been created according
to ISAD (G) standards, meeting the Society of Archivists' minimum
conformance set. The National Council on Archives' Rules for
the Construction of Personal, Place and Corporate Names have
also been followed. For printed and audiovisual resources, collection
level descriptions have been created in accordance with the
UKOLN schema, meeting the RSLP criteria for Printed and Audiovisual
collection level descriptions. The survey reports feature information
about lower-level resources which were found during surveys
but which we have not been able to include in the database [please
see the Reports section of the website]. Each entry in the database
should have subject terms, taken mainly from the UNESCO Thesaurus
but including also terms created specifically for CASBAH.
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How can
you contribute to the work of the CASBAH project?
Throughout the life of the project the CASBAH team
have sought advice, and received support from, a wide range
of organisations. We continue to welcome feedback from representatives
of higher education institutions, the library, archive and information
sectors, educational and community-based organisations and other
agencies, plus researchers and interested individuals who support
research in the fields of Caribbean studies and Black and Asian
History in the UK.
As
a demonstrator project CASBAH has completed its original
aims and all of the data is now available from our web site.
But there is still much work to be done in order to provide
access for researchers to the valuable resources relating to
Caribbean studies and the history of Black and Asian people
in Britain which currently lie hidden and unindexed in archives
and libraries across the UK. Continuing the survey work is essential
if researchers are to have access to the primary resources they
need in order to write inclusive histories which reflect the
needs of the whole community. If you are a researcher, academic,
archivist or librarian, or represent a funding body and are
interested in helping to develop ideas to take CASBAH's
work forward, please contact the Head of ICS Library.
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