South Asian Born-Digital NGO Reports Collection Project

An NYU project to identify, prioritize, archive, preserve and make discoverable and accessible to scholars curated elements of documentation from and about South Asia produced by government agencies, NGOs, think tanks, community organizations, research centers, underground groups, religious sects, political parties, women’s groups, social activists, human rights organizations, LGBTQ advocacy groups, and other content creators. These web pamphlets, online reports and documents, field notes, statistical documentation, think pieces, meeting proceedings, manifestos, party platforms, election campaign materials, activist materials, propaganda leaflets, posters and banners, etc. in the past would have been produced in print form, and could be selectively acquired by libraries to add to their research collections. But now, they are typically produced only on the web, where they are disseminated as ephemera. This kind of content is critical for historical and social science research, and to document the rise and evolution of social movements, but because the organizations themselves are often grassroots communities with little support, they devote their meager resources to their community work and creating the documentation, rather than archiving it or making it permanently accessible themselves. As a result, this is ephemeral content whose presence (and discoverability) on the web is often very unstable, unless collected and archived by the library community.

If not captured and preserved now, this material will disappear for current and future scholars. As an extension to the South Asian Studies collections at NYU Libraries, this born-digital documentation preservation project is presented as growing open-access resource for scholars everywhere.

For more information or to recommend contents for this collection, contact Aruna Magier, South Asia Librarian, NYU