Welcome to the event page for the Diné College Kinyaa’áanii Library Special Collection Series! The purpose of this page is to provide detailed background information on the series, the speakers, and the collection items that will be featured. After each symposium event, the recordings will be uploaded on this page.
This symposium series is made possible thanks to Rare Books School and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and is part of the Andrew W. Mellon Fellowship for Diversity, Inclusion & Cultural Heritage, of which Diné College Instruction & Digital Services Librarian Rhiannon Sorrell is a member of cohort 2. The aim of the symposia is to advance understandings of cultural heritage, archives, and/or special collections. These symposia will be held at the fellows’ home institutions, and will enable fellows to promote aspects of their archives or collections to broader publics.
The Diné College Kinyaa’áanii Library Special Collections Series is a public-facing symposium series highlighting key special collections resources at the library that define the educational and self-deterministic legacy of the college. Tribal history, language, and culture often end up in repositories outside of the communities from which they came. Many researchers and scholars look to large institutions such as state archives and university special collections for this knowledge. This series brings scholars, leaders, and instructors that helped build Diné College and the collections that document this history of self-determination in American Indian higher education to talk about these collections and what they have meant in empowering Diné people and advancing intellectual history and production on tribal homelands.
In this series, we invite speakers to talk about research themes connected to four collections we have at the Tsaile Kinyaa’áanii Library. This includes Navajo foods/recipes, the Navajo Community College Press books, and the Diné Educational Philosophy lectures.
This event is co-sponsored by the Andrew W. Mellon Fellowship for Diversity, Inclusion & Cultural Heritage (CHF) at Rare Book School, on behalf of CHF fellow, Rhiannon Sorrell.
