The Barnard Archives & Special Collections is open at limited capacity, by appointment only, to Barnard and Columbia students, faculty, and staff. We also offer limited remote research/scanning services for all researchers and access to our digital collections online. Please reach out to archives@barnard.edu with research requests, questions, or to be notified when in-person appointments are available.

What We do

Consultation & Digitization

Archival Consultation

In addition to consulting with researchers about their work in the collections at the Barnard Archives and Special Collections, we also consult with faculty, students, and staff about their personal digital archiving needs, planning for digital archives projects and grants, digital preservation plans, and research in other archival repositories.

In order to schedule a consultation, please contact us at archives@barnard.edu.

Archives Digitization Resources

When feasible, we welcome researchers (including Barnard students, faculty, staff, and external researchers) to use the Archives’ digitization infrastructure (scanners, overhead photography setup, A/V digitization rack, and software) for their own personal or research use (i.e. digitizing non-Barnard Archives materials). These facilities are available by appointment only, and only when not in use by Archives staff. Individuals who are making digital files using this infrastructure must do the digitization themselves, and Archives staff will support the individual to get set up with our documentation on how to digitize their materials. Individuals using this infrastructure are subject to U.S. copyright law, and use is at their own risk and at the risk of the documents (that is, we cannot guarantee when using obsolete technologies like VHS players that the hardware/player will not damage the item). We may also set limits on how many pieces of audiovisual materials can be digitized in order to reduce wear and tear on the machinery.

We cannot support the digitization of copyrighted material (unless the copyright is held by the individual making the digitization request) or of materials from the Library for use in courses.

Our current A/V digitization equipment can accommodate digitization or transfer of VHS tapes, audio cassette tapes, and mini DV tapes. Our scanner for paper, film, and negatives is an Epson Expression 10000XL.

Researchers must email archives@barnard.edu in advance (two business days preferred) to set up an appointment to use Archives digitization infrastructure. We cannot accommodate drop-in visits. Please email with the equipment you want to use (or ask us any questions about equipment) and a few times that you would like to come in between the hours of 10:30 am - 5:30 pm, Monday - Friday.

Additional digitization hardware and software is made available by the Columbia University Digital Humanities Center in 305 Butler Library. At the Columbia University Digital Humanities Center, members of the Columbia University community can utilize technology for scanning and editing texts and images, and digital video editing. We can also recommend reliable vendors for larger digitization projects.