Columbus, Georgia: Hear Us Talking

The Purpose of This Exhibition

This exhibition aims to educate our community on the history of Columbus by using historical items held by the Digital Library of Georgia. The project team wanted to use these items to tell stories of traditionally marginalized peoples in our community's history. In addition, we hope to engage and inspire our residents by inviting them to submit items for digitization in conjunction with Chattahoochee Valley Libraries and the Digital Library of Georgia so that we may provide further access to local history and preserve it for future generations.

Digital Exhibits (DigEx) Program

Georgia Public Library Service's DigEx Program aims to empower libraries to use their unique digitized materials to tell stories of their libraries and communities.  The exhibits are produced using Omeka S, an open-source web publishing platform designed to assist institutions in creating digital collections. 

Three Georgia libraries were chosen to participate in this program in 2021-2022:

Live Oak Public Libraries, for its exhibit on Hyman Wallace Witcover: Designer of Savannah's Architectural Jewels who was one of the leading architects of Savannah’s historical architecture.

Marches of Glynn Libraries, for its exhibit Rituals of Wartime Labor in Brunswick, Georgia featuring photographs from the Brunswick Shipyard during World War II. 

Chattahoochee Valley Libraries, for its exhibit Columbus, Georgia: Hear Us Talking which examines the local history focusing on stories of traditionally marginalized peoples. 

The creation of this exhibit has indeed been a community project. Chattahoochee Valley Library's staff was assisted by Georgia Public Library Service, The Digital Library of Georgia, the Omeka team at George Mason University, an advisory committee, and the Columbus, Georgia community. The work began in October 2021, and the deadline to make our exhibits live was June 1, 2022. 

Harmful Language

We aim to portray this exhibit material respectfully to the individuals and communities who create, use, and are represented in its presentation. However, for various reasons, users may encounter offensive or harmful language, for example, language that is racist or insensitive. While some descriptions in our exhibit are written by staff, others reflect language that was used by the people and organizations that created the material (direct quotes are a typical example; it is standard practice not to change them when present). In addition, the language from the original archival material can provide information about the people who created it. In such cases, the work of the exhibit curator is to provide additional context.

We encourage users to provide feedback to help us tackle this issue. We recognize that terminology evolves over time and that efforts to create respectful and inclusive descriptions must be ongoing. Please contact us if you encounter a problematic description by notifying us at genealogy@cvlga.org. The description will be reviewed and updated in a way that balances the preservation of original context with an awareness of the effect of language on our users. Revisions may include providing additional context and/or replacing problematic terminology. We welcome your feedback.

Takedown Requests

Items on this site were exclusively sourced from the Digital Library of Georgia. This site complies with the DLG's Collection Development Policy and, in particular, its Removal Policy. Items may be removed from this site at the discretion of the site owners for one or more of the following:
•   Site is not consistently available and reliable
•   Inaccurate data, facts, or information
•   Proven violation of copyright
•   Site or content is no longer available for free to the public

Fair Use

This site is for educational purposes only and complies with copyright laws and fair use guidelines. Fair use is a doctrine in the United States copyright law that allows limited use of copyrighted material without requiring permission from the rights holders, such as commentary, criticism, news reporting, research, teaching, or scholarship. Under a four-factor balancing test, it provides for the legal, non-licensed citation or incorporation of copyrighted material in another author’s work. 

Accessibility

We strive for full accessibility of our website and exhibition. If you find a part of the exhibit inaccessible please contact us at Genealogy@cvlga.org so that we may resolve it as soon as possible.