Demographic

Age: 68

Gender identity: Male / He/Him

Race: Mixed Japanese-Canadian

Indigenous: No. 

Class: Professional now, but comes from a working class background. 

Other identity (e.g. linguistic, religious): Raised in a Japanese Buddhist family, identifies as a gay man. Was a part of counter-culture political and social movements in his youth. 

Education: No formal education in library and archives, but has been managing and working in archives and artist-run-centres since the 1980s. Has had a lot of training through hands-on experience, workshops, and conferences. 

Language(s): English, some Japanese. 

Personal responsibilities: Highly involved in community activist groups and on various community boards. 

Location: (relationship to Lower Mainland – from here, were from here, from elsewhere): Born in the Washington state, family immigrated to Richmond, BC as fishermans in the 1930s. His family was affected by Japanese internment in the 1940s and were relocated to the Kootenays where he was born and grew up. Danny moved back to Vancouver in his early 20s to attend the Vancouver College of Art and Design in the ‘70s. 

Widgets: Tools & Platforms

• Crowdsourcing – Hive
• Curation – HistoryPin
• Flagging Harmful Language: Description-Audit
• Archival Platforms – Islandora, AtoM, Collective Access

Brief Biography

Danny is a 68 year old gay mixed-race man (Japanese-Canadian) who works as an archivist in an Artist-Run-Centre in Vancouver. He is not formally trained in higher ed, but has worked in and managed archives since the ‘80s. He is interested in Japanese labour and craft histories for professional and personal use and is currently preparing a panel on these topics. He prefers physical records over digital records but is interested in and sees the value of activating the archives for virtual and in-person programming and community-building. Danny sometimes feels overwhelmed by technology and technical jargon. He also finds screens hard to read and complex websites difficult to navigate. He is great at doing complex searches in databases and search engines. He is keen to build new relationships with archivists and researchers to bring greater visibility to the ARC archives through curated digital collections. 

Character description

While Danny is a skilled and experienced archivist, he can often get confused and frustrated when navigating complex websites. He is very competent doing complex searches in databases and search engines. He is accustomed to doing research, assisting researchers, and using archival materials for programming. He values consent, community consultation, and right to personal privacy as an archivist and activist.

Interest in archives & Life experience

Why interested in archives: Personal interests (family history) and professional interests (work). 

Community affiliations: Tonari Gumi, Nikkei National Museum & Cultural Centre, Vancouver Pride, Vancouver Queer Film Festival board member 

Represented in archives: Has seen big improvement in representation and visibility of Japanese and gay histories in archives over the last decade, but often felt left out of mainstream narratives. 

Professional affiliations: Art Libraries Society of North America (ARLIS/NA), Association of Canadian Archivists (ACA), Audio and Moving Image Association (AMIA). 

Access needs and mobility: Has mild arthritis and gets headaches from staring at a screen for too long. Small text is also a barrier to reading. 

Motivations

Why:

• Wants to bring visibility to underrepresented histories and communities (Gay, Japanese) in Vancouver and the lower mainland.
• Wants to fulfill and enhance programming at the ARC through the use of archives.
• Wants to build community and connect with more artists, archivists, and researchers to bring greater visibility to the ARC’s archives
• Wants to share more thematic / curated collections of his personal and professional archival research online.

Frustrations

Barriers: Has some difficulty understanding technical jargon, navigating complex websites, and has a general distrust / distaste of computers. Prefers textual and non-textual records over digital records.

Info and Tech Access & Experience

Hardware: Work – Mac desktop ; Personal – Windows laptop. Adept at both operating systems. 

Software: Office, Adobe, Mac OS. Basic functionality. 

Network connectivity: Good wireless connectivity at work and at home. Fiber optical connection at work. 

Experience with archival tools: Yes, very experienced. Especially with AtoM, Collective Access and Islandora. 

Experience with archival frameworks: Yes, very experienced. 

Comfort with learning technology: Moderate. Often needs some guidance and explanation but can generally grasp the basic concepts and functions. Has worked in proximity to people who have a lot of specialized technical knowledge and skills, such as coding and digitization.

Goals

What do they want to do: Wants to learn more about Japanese-Canadian labour histories in the lower mainland in preparation for a panel discussion that invites scholars and artists to talk about labour and craft histories. Also interested in local history for personal and professional purposes. 

What relationship do they want to the archives: Wants to find relevant materials quickly and efficiently by having good search functions and descriptive metadata, ideally in English and Japanese. He also enjoys spending time browsing the archives and searching thematically through tags. He wants to have an enjoyable experience in the archives while also meeting his research goals.