Preserve the Archive: IHS Digital Infrastructure

Sacred knowledge does not preserve itself. Libretas, ceremonial texts, botanical records, musical transcriptions, photographs, the writings of elders and scholars — these materials exist right now in private homes, aging collections, and the memories of people who will not be here forever. When they are gone, what they carried is often gone with them.

The Iroko Historical Society was built to change that. IHS is a postcustodial digital archive, which means we do not ask communities to give up their materials. We work alongside practitioners and knowledge holders to create high-quality digital records that stay under community control. The community decides who can access what, on what terms, and for what purposes.

Gifts to this fund support server infrastructure, metadata development, software systems, and technical staff time that make this archive possible. You are not donating to a concept. Active fieldwork relationships are already in place. The Iroko Framework, our open-source semantic vocabulary built specifically for Afro-Atlantic sacred knowledge, is already in development. This fund closes the gap between what exists and what is fully operational.