South Africa: National Archives and Records Service of South Africa to host the XXVII Eastern and Southern Africa Regional Branch of the International Council On Archives (ESARBICA) Biennial Conference from 14 To 18 August 2023.
The National Archives and Records Service of South Africa (NARSSA) in partnership with the Gauteng Department of Sport, Arts, Culture and Recreation (GDSACR) and the University of South Africa (UNISA) will host the XXVII Eastern and Southern Africa Regional Branch of the International Council on Archives (ESARBICA) Biennial Conference in Boksburg, Gauteng, South Africa from 14 to18 August 2023 at the Birchwood Hotel.
The conference will be preceded by a pre-conference training workshop for junior archivists from 14-15 August, led by knowledgeable experts from the sector. We expect 40 Junior Archivists from the region to attend this important training.
The main conference programme will be convened on 16 and 17 August and will be attended by practitioners and academics in the archives and records management sector from the region, which includes Sudan, Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Malawi, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Mozambique, South Africa, Lesotho, Eswatini, Namibia, Angola, and Seychelles.
Under the theme “Archives, Records and Memory in Digital Spaces and Global Chaos”, the conference will seek to address current issues and look at solutions to deal with disruption and chaos caused by 4IR and AI within the records and archive management environment.
There will also be a handover event of the digitised records of the constitutional development process of South Africa’s Road to Democracy. The project was successfully implemented through a partnership between NARSSA and the Constitution Hill Trust.
Honouring this event will be Justice Albie Sachs, a renowned struggle icon and one of the founding members of the Constitutional Court of South Africa, who will also be the guest speaker at the event and the conference, and the Chairperson of the Constitution Hill Trust, Valli Moosa (former Minister of Constitutional Development in the Cabinet of Nelson Mandela).
The digitised collections include the Convention for a Democratic South Africa (CODESA), Constitutional Assembly (CA), and Multiparty Negotiations (NEG). The digitised records will be made available to the public through the NARSSA website (www.nationalarchives.gov.za), and the Constitution Hill Trust website (www.wethepeoplesa.org). The Ministry of Sport, Arts and Culture will receive the digitised records on 16 August 2023.
Heads of national archives from the region will also have business meetings during this period. This conference promises to be a melting pot of archive and records management experts, administrators and practitioners, and the media is invited to the opening ceremony on 16 August 2023.
Apart from the DSAC Executive, the conference will be graced by:
• UNISA’s Executive Dean of the College of Human Sciences, Professor Zerish Z. Nkosi
• The Gauteng MEC for Sport, Arts, Culture and Recreation – Mr S Mosupyoe
• Ekurhuleni Mayor – Cllr S. Ngodwana
Some of the presentation to look forward to are:
• Memory in a Digitally Chaotic and Disruptive Universe to be presented by Professor Kenosi Lekoko from Zayed University in the United Arab Emirates
• Potential Archives Sources for Climate Change Research in Southern & Eastern Africa and the Indian Ocean region to be presented by the former National Archivist Dr Graham Dominy
• There will be a panel discussion of archive and records management education: “Localisation and Globalisation of Cutting-Edge Content in the Training of Archivists. The discussion will be by Professor Mpho Ngoepe (UNISA), Prof Lorette Jacobs (UNISA), Professor Ngoako Marutha (UNISA) & Dr Makutla Mojapelo (UNISA)