foreign [Music] Heritage my name is Kevin McLean speaking to you from Blackfoot territory in Southern Alberta Canada my guests are instructor and digital collections archivist Irina Schmidt and wallet temra's officer of Research Services of rare books special collections from the American University in Cairo sometimes known as AUC today they will be sharing on the Decades of preservation work carried out by their institutions rare books and special collections Library RB scl work which was recently recognized by UNESCO as the recipient of its hickey memory of the world prize congratulations to you both on this career high achievement welcome Irene and Walla I want to see how grateful I am to you and AUC because we all benefit so much to be exposed to passionate folks like you you inspire us every day thank you so very much hello thank you very much for the invitation and we're very happy to be here can you briefly describe auc's libraries and the learning Technologies rare books and special collection Library is a learning technical Library both libraries provide the access to a tools and content and Research Services of course to advance learning teaching and research the American University in Cairo began developing its academic Library within two years of its foundation in 1919. so the AUC Library can claim a century-long legacy of contribution to the university and to the uh research service worldwide so the rare books and special collections Library also known as rbsel for short supports research and teaching by collecting preserving and disseminating primary sources about ancient medieval and modern Egypt and The Wider region about the collections are the collections focused on egyptology Coptic studies Islamic art and architecture travel literature and many more and of course materials come in all formats books manuscripts postcards photographs old magazines the historical Maps architectural drawings and of course oral history so um as for the rbscl Departments uh the rbscl houses a digitization center and of course a conservation lab uh responsible for the conservation uh treatment and preservation of the Treasures of the rare books library in all formats so this was in brief about the AC libraries and its foundation and collections is historical information about our University which is 100 years older we have materials that food cultural accreditation improve them and they have a modern material who tells story about the present and from some ideas about the fashion thank you so what was the history of the award-winning rare books and special collections Library project it's rationale its objectives its aims yeah I'm so our collection how much effort was given to preserve to repair it and I thought we have to we have to celebrate another time the library or inside the University or inside the issue if you have to tell the people outside the country United mail thank you for Publications and and I said well this is a great chance I spoke with my team with my collection and we decided to go for it because [Music] collection Library putting information about them materials about collecting this material repairing this material upon the providing digital preservation and wait and last year in August 2022 we were 95 we won the prize so I would like also to add that the GT price certainly puts AUC and its Library uh specifically the rare books and special collections library in the Limelight helping to make the many special collections uh better known and to attract researchers and make it more visible to the public who 6 or who are interested in cultural heritage in general um also with five with 55 nominations from 41 countries the international jury of experts unanimously recognized the expertise and the outstanding work of the rare books and special collections library in preserving and enabling access to Egyptian Heritage or the documented Heritage of Egypt um so it was a great honor that the AUC libraries received this price and the in a prestigious ceremony held in the South South Korea last year it's it's hard to talk this this honor and recognition so yeah I'm really excited for you what parts of your practice bring you the greatest joy maybe things that have you excited to show up at work every day everything I think I see him my colleague collaboration teamwork I'm having the knowledge the digital material in the right way reaching the midline creating the our current resolution images provided access to the material having emails from researchers or academics students or giving them co-creating this material physical material into digital and provided by Digital Collection well for me being in direct contact with the researchers from all over the world is what I like the most but what really brings me joy and pride of course me and my team is the recognition we receive from these researchers or students after serving them and contributing to their academic outcome so the recognition is simply a translation of how happy and proud We are being part of any academic product or outcome uh in the world so on the opposite side to Joy what what would be something that you would find difficult and challenging about your day-to-day life your work life well if you don't have them sometimes we must have the flu it depends on the profit it depends on the material some of our material might have come and shape that we do have radical equipment Edition and three-dimensional objects you have to improvise you have to use a perfect scan but they look no different specific equipment for that one example is making a small Studio to digital painting canvas this thing can come with the frame and then the bigger than a one entire and we have a look for solution finding a red light jingle um working this together with the contribution lab creating a black background [Music] and looking online [Music] um how you have to do and what Uncle will have to put light in here so the painting will be will evenly and the outcome is that we create high quality images and this part will have a specific Studio so you buy improvising he actually achieved the goal that look impossible and now this material has been used by University Administration to give an access to the relationships well the challenge is to always maintain the high standards of research on Library Services provided to the AC community and to all researchers of course uh also to be able to reach out to the new generations who are mainly attracted to technology and social networks which makes us uh more Avid to find uh the most updated ways to serve the AUC Community or the academic community in general and those always require resources that yeah yeah human and funding resources so do you recognize creativity as part of your problem solving approach to digitization or providing access services and if so do you have examples of how that creativity was applied in its results um this is what I mentioned before the challenges the creativity is the how you actually apply creativity in your daily tasks solution but creativity actually they make you work better let's say the appointment data and you can do that giving the standard information all the conference more time reading online and describing in that way that I use I will find it easily that way the creativities come I have an amazing team of catalog limited data teams cool using the old knowledge to find a new notice if you understand what I mean I've learned what they learn in the past to create something new and that would we do and in the Bible for myself I'm looking after digital preservation or aligning the creating policies or creating extra documents again I have to apply creativity how to make it successful how to make the long living document is there an Institutional or Community user result of RB scl's work that inspires you to do more and if yes what was the result and why um [Music] what they do um I have a team of the deduction people team [Music] when they come together I'm sure we because this knowledge was built we have two types of Technology it's really amazing to see how one member is Progressive [Music] better if we make our process better if you're achieving good results and this team work cooperation and important not just to make us Brown actually the library plan the university um and that it is that inspired about doing that and and getting thank you it's bad as to do more a well throughout the years the rbscl has participated in big and important exhibitions either nationally or internationally and its collections were the base of many important books and Publications as well but of course receiving the UNESCO Dixie memory of the world prize is the biggest motivation to always give more and do more sometimes I say we stand on the shoulders of giants and our success in in the moment right now is the result of other equally passionate people who either we work with we get to stand beside or people that we never even knew that came before us and and did you know the work that we were doing before them or before us in that I'm going off but in the museum environment I think you know it's like collections management archives operations um what we do in the day during our day is is based on work that happened you know maybe in your case maybe it was 100 years ago or in our case it was 60 years ago or something you know and every day we we owe um what what we're doing to to people that we didn't even know so okay I have a couple more questions um this is what I'm really interested in if there was a part of your practice or work philosophy you wanted others to adopt or consider what would that be and why um I would say don't be afraid to make me part of our morning it's about what's up and then the milk mixed in better and another philosophy would be don't avoid for the right moment to do something perfect you never know if what we created right now I love to say uh a school for this process sometimes with the nose with perfect or not once you start doing just having this outline of the process during of doing the profit you don't know are we doing in the relative of wrong way and then you shape but as we go along and after that we reached the goal that has to be done you progress if you wait until something perfect program they will never stop but having that we have now we have the biggest fan to achieve the long and fair to reach the goal and make the whole urbanization drop so for me I would say three things commitments positive attitudes and constant training I see that these three philosophies or strategies always lead to a good and professional outcome and also for always being efficient during any time of the year all right thank you so very much for your time today um you really are an inspiration to us all and so just thank you for what you're doing thank you so amazing [Music]
2023-06-20