Archiving BUNI (Bucknell in Northern Ireland)

Carl Milofsky and Brianna Derr (Bucknell University)

This poster presents the Bucknell University Northern Ireland Archive (also here), which makes available video and analytic notes from the Bucknell in Northern Ireland Program. This is a three-week, study-abroad program based in Derry/Londonderry, Northern Ireland. More than 120 hours of tapes were recorded between 2002 and 2005. They include guest speakers and student interviews with local informants.

The archive makes metadata available on its website that includes detailed transcripts of about 50 tapes, necessary because of poor sound and heavy accents. Milofsky provides analytic comments for seventeen tapes along with discussion questions that help to guide viewing. These form the basis of a fourteen week course that we offered last spring as a 300-level SOCI course at Bucknell but that now is available on line for anyone to take.

The Archive represents a four-year partnership between Prof. Milofsky and Video Technology Specialists Erin Murphy and Brianna Derr. About ten students have worked on the project typing detailed transcripts, uploading data to the Digital Commons, and producing thematic syntheses. Students have done several projects including syntheses of tapes, an honors thesis, productions for class, and a project for the Undergraduate Research Program. A showcase of student videos is available on the archive.

Narrative, informal, interview data on The Troubles are not widely available. Archive material will be useful to scholars studying this period of Irish history. It also will be useful to students and citizens in Northern Ireland and elsewhere who will be informed by these fascinating tapes.