Overview
In 2021, Program GLAM partnered with GLAM institutions in and outside Switzerland and collaborated with fellow chapters. The program built digital competence and technologies to improve access to cultural heritage and diversity. This year’s GLAM program was also packed with events celebrating 50 years of women’s suffrage in Switzerland. Existing and new collaborations coalesced around this theme. For example, we joined longtime partner Who writes his_tory? to lead an edit-a-thon concentrating on Swiss women filmmakers, described in detail in GLAM’s upcoming highlight section.
We strengthened and developed partnerships around the women’s suffrage celebration. And at the same time, we ensured a holistic Program GLAM and investigated ways to sustainably scale the program and build team capacity. One of many examples is Program GLAM’s work to share technological knowledge, which we achieved via two different approaches. First, we offered events that made tech-related knowledge more accessible, such as GLAM on Tour at the Enter Museum (a museum of technological artifacts and their manuals) and our various activities with the library of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich (ETH Library). Second, we further advanced our own technologies and continued sharing them with the GLAM community, Wikipedia chapters and people around the world. They include the WMCH Map Service and GLAM Statistical Tool, allowing users to learn about GLAM resources throughout Switzerland and other countries and to easily discern how best to improve related knowledge shared on Wikipedia.
Highlight activity
50 Years Swiss Women’s Suffrage was a hallmark of Program GLAM in 2021. Multiple events contributed to a year-long celebration that inspired fantastic community engagement and helped develop new GLAM partnerships under a unifying theme. In fact, a new opportunity emerged as professionals from participating GLAM institutions asked us to repeat a similar event in their own organization. All event formats worked well – online, hybrid and in-person.
Of particular interest was a virtual edit-a-thon about Swiss women filmmakers that was part of the schedule for the Solothurn Film Festival. Led by representatives of Who writes his_tory? and Wikimedia CH, the workshop focused on Wikipedia articles about women in film and women’s suffrage in three languages (German, French and Italian). This edit-a-thon was our chapter’s first bilingual workshop, taking place in both French and German. (Italian was also an option. While there were no Italian-speaking participants, articles in Italian were created and edited during the event.)
In 2016, volunteer group Who writes his_tory? began a German-language initiative to increase and improve Wikipedia information about art and feminism. With this 2021 event, Program GLAM and Program Community partnered to reach German- and French-speaking community members alike. Furthermore, the writing workshop was a fantastic way to integrate the Wikiverse into the film festival, continuing the Who writes his_tory? partnership with this decades-old heritage institution that celebrates Swiss film productions.
Key program activities
- Offered GLAM on Tour at the Enter Museum, allowing participants to interact with thousands of technological artifacts. Technical manuals and reference books helped to improve Wikipedia articles.
- Readied the GLAM Statistical Tool for a global rollout as it continues to garner great feedback from other chapters.
- Improved the WMCH Map Service software so that international cards can load faster, making the application more user-friendly for chapters and GLAM institutions outside Switzerland. Also, formulated new requirements for the WMCH Map Service, to be implemented in early 2022.
- Following the return of the Taliban in Afghanistan, set up a project page to share the International Council of Museums (ICOM) appeal to preserve the country’s art and cultural treasures on Wikipedia and other Wiki platforms. We have worked closely with ICOM on past International Museum Day events and did the same this year.
- With the German and Austrian chapters, joined #1Lib1Ref for the first time and created project pages in German and French, issuing a call to add reliable evidence to Wikipedia articles where it is missing.
- Produced various activities with the ETH Library – e.g. GLAMHack 2021 and WikiProject ETH Portraits. Uploaded library content onto Wikimedia projects (including a complete gallery of women elected to the national parliament in 1971) and organized workshops.
- Led activities for International Museum Day 2021 in collaboration with border chapters, including a Wikidata Contest, a social media campaign and an article with ICOM.
- Supported International Archives Week 2021, focusing on the theme “Empowering Archives."
- Contributed to the Memoriav OpenGLAM Online Symposium with an opening speech, a Wikiverse presentation and a Wikimedia Commons workshop in French with simultaneous translation in German.
- Collaborated to ensure that the world-famous fossil collection of Muséum d’Histoire Naturelle Neuchâtel is now available on Wikimedia Commons and its attached scientific data is searchable on Wikidata.
- Developed and financed Wikidata introduction courses for GLAM in German and English in cooperation with the OpenGLAM CH working group.
- Facilitated a successful event with the political think tank Foraus to create and edit Wikipedia articles about women in foreign politics.
Program impact
- We created a thematic focus that tied back to the mission: 50 years of women’s suffrage in Switzerland. It gave many of the year’s activities cohesion and focus, which helped us reach new GLAMs and volunteers with a subject that interested them.
- Part of the women’s suffrage events included a collaboration with Program Community to lead the first bilingual (French/German) workshop, ensuring that a larger part of the Wikipedia community could join the event.
- We also developed new partnerships, including a partnership with the Swiss Jesuits, who have a first-class library in Zurich and a large archive on the order’s activities in Switzerland. They showed great interest in strengthening their partnership with Wikimedia CH. The first Wikipedia workshop took place in 2021, with a continuation planned for 2022.
- Our GLAM Statistical Tool continued to receive great feedback from other chapters. This feedback helps us ready the tool for a global rollout.
Looking ahead
As Program GLAM turns its focus to 2022, we will introduce a new theme to leverage this year’s lessons. The Year of Sound celebrates the 100th year of radio in Switzerland and focuses on music, soundwaves, and other audio heritage. Just as with our women’s suffrage celebration, we intend to engage co-organizers and build a cohesive set of events around the new theme. We’ve already issued a call to Wikimedians, GLAMs and partners to participate, edit related Wiki content and/or plan events. Also, a workshop at the Swiss Postal Services, Telegraphy and Telephony (PTT) archives is already planned, as is a conference at the Enter Museum.
Of course, we will continue serving the interests across the spectrum of GLAM topics beyond the Year of Sound. Our longtime practice has been to scale programming that has proven successful in the past. The structure of GLAM on Tour events — whereby Wikipedians are invited to an exclusive, multi-day excursion at a select GLAM institution — is one that our community has always favored. As such, we are planning four GLAM on Tour events for 2022, including one confirmed with the Zurich Central Library.
Along with programmatic planning, Program GLAM will focus on improving and scaling operations in 2022. We will explore how to build the team’s capacity to manage our expanding program. Also, we will help integrate Wikimedia tools and workflows into Swiss GLAM institutions.
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Photo credits
- Swiss National Museum, Zurich. Photo by Ank Kumar, own work, CC0.
- An ad for WMCH Map Service. Image by Ilario, own work, CC BY-SA 4.0.
- The Swiss women's suffrage campaign. Photo by Comet Photo AG (Zürich), from the collection of the ETH Library. Published on Wikimedia Commons in cooperation with Wikimedia CH, CC BY-SA 4.0.
- 50 years of women's right to vote in Switzerland, celebrated as Wikimedia CH's theme for 2021. Image by Lantus (talk), Wikimedia Deutschland, CC0.
- Tape recorder from the Swiss brand Revox, probably model D36 from the early 1960s, in the Enter Museum, Solothurn. Photo by Bobo11, own work, CC BY-SA 3.0.
- Heidi Specogna, a Swiss filmmaker, at Zabriskie Point, Death Valley (USA). Photo by Amzine123, own work, CC BY-SA 4.0.
- A balloon campaign for women's suffrage, Bahnhofstrasse, Zurich. Photo by Wolfgang Lindroos, Comet Photo AG (Zürich), from the collection of the ETH Library. Published on Wikimedia Commons in cooperation with Wikimedia CH, CC BY-SA 4.0.
- Swiss radio channels, SRG SSR (Swiss Broadcasting Corporation). Photo by Romi.Hofer, own work, CC BY-SA 3.0.
- Lake Thun and Niesen, a mountain peak in the Bernese Alps. Photo by Gabrielle Merk, own work, CC BY-SA 4.0.