Matt interviews Charles Henry, the President of the Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR), a non-profit organization that works with libraries, cultural institutions, and higher learning communities to improve research, teaching, and learning environments through the digitization and preservation of cultural heritage.
Charles believes preserving cultural heritage connects us with humanity’s collective experience and knowledge, and gives us a sense of identity. However, cultural memory loss can easily occur and climate change poses a significant threat. In fact, it is believed that 98.8% of American archives are likely to encounter at least one climate risk factor by the year 2100.
CLIR has been working for decades on the preservation and access to cultural heritage. Projects include theDigital Library of the Middle East, one of the world’s largest online archives of Middle Eastern and North African artifacts, and theHBCU Library Alliance Partnership, which fosters awareness of and access to collections held by Historically Black Colleges and Universities.
