In 2018, CRKN merged with Canadiana.org, an organization dedicated to the preservation and access of Canada’s documentary heritage since its establishment in 1978. As a merged organization, CRKN will continue its core licensing activities for scholarly journal content, while expanding support for the digitization and preservation of, and access to, Canadian heritage content.
Through the services of Canadiana, CRKN is:
- Increasing access to the Canadiana collections
- Offering digitization services for CRKN members, stakeholders, partners, and third-party clients
- Expanding the Canadiana collections with in-demand content
- Offering preservation services and options through the CRKN Trustworthy Digital Repository (TDR)
- Developing the Canadiana preservation and access platforms to meet common standards
- Improving metadata and discoverability of the Canadiana collections
- Engaging with the stakeholder community to identify opportunities and potential partnerships
We Have Work to Do
Providing access at no charge to the Canadiana collections was an important first step in our continued assessment and enhancement of the Canadiana collections and our preservation and access platforms. Since starting the project to reproduce early Canadian publications in 1978, and subsequently, moving to digital in 1999, we have learned a lot about institutional and historical biases that are demonstrated in curatorial approaches and descriptive metadata.
As we expand access to the content available in the Canadiana collections, we also acknowledge that we have work to do both in terms of assessing the content for appropriate rights assignments, and in decolonizing descriptions, search terms, keywords, and other classifications to ensure that they are culturally sensitive. Under the guidance of the Preservation and Access Committee, we are:
- Reviewing digitization priorities and developing guidelines to ensure that we continue to best serve our community
- Developing technical enhancement plans to improve user experience and access to content
- Expanding our stakeholder community by connecting directly with the end-users of Canadiana content, archivists, researchers, historians, and interested Canadians
- We are committed to transparency throughout this process and welcome questions and feedback.
To contact us about the content in the Canadiana collections, including the identification of items that are culturally insensitive or inappropriate, please send an email to: info@crkn.ca.