Folasade Adepoju is Chief Librarian at the National Library of Nigeria
Lessons from iPRES 2024
In September, I was one of the first time attendees at iPRES 2024 in Ghent, Belgium from September 16 to September 20. I was able to attend in person, which was a priceless opportunity, all thanks to DPC. The conference brought together brilliant minds, professionals, academics, vendors, and enthusiastic rookies like me and gave me the platform to learn, unlearn, relearn and network.
I attended four days of paper presentations by several authors detailing their work, efforts, and accomplishments. While we are working hard back home in Nigeria toward digital preservation, listening to the speakers, their papers, infographics, bake-off sessions, lightning talks, collaborative game development, creating a community of practice, etc. in the conference room made me wonder if we will ever get to that point as a library. At one point, I got emotional with the exceptional efforts others across the globe are putting in the advancement of their digital preservation space.
A recurring theme among the speakers was the difficulties presented by the constantly ever-changing technologies. For newbies like me who work in the National Library, where "preserving for posterity" is one of our core mandates. I was concerned about how to deal with the problems of limited bandwidth, frequent power outages, a lack of technical expertise, and improper technology infrastructure acquisition. Without a working policy in place to preserve digital content, how can we stay up to date with these ever-changing technologies? Fortunately, I felt hopeful again after hearing professionals advised me to "start small, don't hesitate to reach out to me if you ever need help, I will share my organizational policy with you, let's have online webinars, and use the DPC model and RAM to evaluate your subsequent projects..."and other reassuring conversations and advice.
My Progress Beyond the Conference
Returning home, my first approach was to implement the knowledge I had acquired from the conference which was the formation of a group of passionate professionals that would eventually become a community of digital preservation practitioners. My second step was the commencement of my ongoing project aimed at digitally preserving Dr. Ladi Kwali's work. Dr. Ladi Kwali was a celebrated potter from Kwali, which is now part of the Kwali Area Council of the Federal Capital Territory. She grew up in a family in which the women folk made pots for a living. The Kwali community of the Gbagyi area has for some decades produced pots that are easily identifiable with the community. Thus, it makes sense that she made pots that were distinctly Gbagyi while also using distinctively personal idioms.
Image 1 and 2: Showing the FCT Museum where the physical collections are housed. Some are already breaking and cracking. Ladi Kwali is the image moulding the pot.
Image 3: Folasade Adepoju within the Gbari Centre
I was motivated to pursue this project after seeing the brief trailer of ‘A Combmaker's Tale’, at the movie show during the conference. On my visit to her birthplace and the FCT's Arts and Culture department, I discovered that the Smithsonian Institution in Washington and the British Museum hold a collection of Dr. Ladi Kwali's ceramics, including water vessels and other pottery forms. And a collection of her works is physically housed within the museum of Federal Capital Territory Arts and Culture department and the Ladi Kwali Pottery Centre, Suleja. Unfortunately, they are subject to shattering and cracking because of the condition of the facility where they are housed, and no appropriate metadata has been created to describe them. For this project, I will be using the knowledge of the DPC model I’ve acquired for its implementation. Hopefully, to present our progress at iPRES 2025..
Once again, I am immensely grateful for the scholarship, courtesy of DPC and other organisations that made it happen. Special thanks to his royal highness, the Etsu of Kwali, Mr. Luka Ayedo Nizassan and Dr. Midah Kwali Ayuna, the Director of Center for Gbari Research And Documentation (CGRD) and to my team of passionate professional; Gladys Kemboi from the University of Illinois, Onaopemipo Adeoye from the University of Cape Town, Usman Babagana from the University of Maiduguri, Oluwatosin Akobe from Kogi State College of Education, Ankpa, Oluremi Dosumu, and Elijah Azeez from the National Library of Nigeria, on the project, let's work together and smarter to ensure that our historical heroes and heroines are preserved digitally for generations to come.
Image 4: Folasade Adepoju with the Traditional Ruler of Kwali on the right and the Director of the Gbari Centre on the left.
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