Minutes of the AGM 2025
SCOLMA (UK Libraries and Archives Group on Africa)
ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING 2025
Minutes of the 63rd Annual General Meeting held in person at the Bodleian Libraries, Weston Library
on Monday 30 June 2025 at 12:45 BST
Present: Jenni Skinner (Chair), Sarah Rhodes (Secretary), Lucy McCann (Treasurer), Patricia Hewitt, Terry Barringer, Charles Fonge, Liz Haines, Dawn Wright, Mariam de Haan, and Ben Carson.
Apologies: Marion Wallace and Barbara Spina.
1. Approval of the Minutes of the 62nd AGM (posted on the SCOLMA website https://SCOLMA.org)
The Minutes were approved as a true record, proposed by Charles Fonge and seconded by Terry Barringer. There were no matters arising.
2. Report of the Chair 2024/25 (Jenni Skinner)
Jenni Skinner provided the following report of the past year to the Meeting:
Committee Meetings
Since our last AGM in June 2024, SCOLMA has held three committee meetings: an in-person meeting at SOAS, London in December 2024, followed by online meetings in March and May 2025. The return to in-person meetings has been valuable for strengthening committee collaboration as we prepared for our 2025 conference, and we hope to continue this hybrid approach going forward.
Online Seminar Series
Our online seminar series will return in early 2026, with the Programme Secretary (Elizabeth Haines) exploring themes and potential partners in African institutions once the conference has concluded.
SCOLMA Conference 2025
Following the successful online seminar series in 2024, we are delighted to be returning to our biennial in-person conference format.
This year’s conference explores the vital theme of generational perspectives in African archives and libraries, examining how different generations engage with, preserve, and transmit African knowledge systems. The programme brings together established scholars, early career researchers, and practitioners to address critical questions about intergenerational knowledge transfer and digital preservation.
We are honoured to welcome Dr Buhle Mbambo-Thata, University Librarian at the National University of Lesotho, who will deliver our keynote address on “The youth hold the future of the past: creating an infrastructure for engagement between youth, libraries, archives and museums in the digital preservation of African knowledge.” Dr Mbambo-Thata’s expertise in African librarianship and digital preservation makes her an ideal speaker to open our discussions on generational engagement with African heritage.
The conference features three thematic panels that build upon each other to create a comprehensive exploration of our central theme:
Panel 1: ‘Engaging young people with African history‘ examines innovative approaches to making African collections accessible to younger audiences. Chaired by Sana Ginwalla, this session includes Mariam de Haan and Nicola Pomery’s presentation on the British Library’s ‘Story Explorers’ exhibition designed for children and families. Aishah Olubaji and Naomi Tiley will discuss the Balliol project’s approach to teaching transatlantic slavery, while Abdul Mohamed and Robin Whitburn will present their ‘Justice2History’ overview of changing practices in teaching African history in UK schools.
Panel 2: ‘Digital technology: preservation across the generations‘ focuses on how digital tools can bridge generational divides in archival preservation. Under the chairmanship of Tirivashe Jele, this session features Coherent Digital’s (Gareth Bish) exploration of engaging different generations in African archival preservation and access, Kenneth Atuma’s examination of transforming African knowledge systems from oral tradition to digital preservation, and a collaborative presentation by Misha Maseka and Sana Ginwalla on their ‘Village Girls x Zambia Belonging’ project.
Panel 3: ‘Generations in the archives’ delves into how generational perspectives shape archival research and interpretation. Chaired by Misha Maseka, this session includes Wallace Teska’s research on reconstructing generations of enslaved people through Liberation Registers from colonial Senegal, and Susan Snell and Rob Hammond’s presentation on Africa in the archives of the United Grand Lodge of England.
The conference concludes with a panel discussion bringing together all session chairs to synthesize key themes and identify priorities for generational change in archives and libraries.
The conference has strong financial backing with approximately £4,300 pledged in sponsorship. We are grateful to our sponsors: Adam Matthew, Coherent Digital, Cambridge Centre of African Studies, Taylor & Francis, IAI, and the ASAUK, as well as Terry Barringer’s kind donation of the Conover-Porter prize winnings as support. This solid financial foundation has enabled us to secure our keynote speaker’s travel and accommodation arrangements, as well as offer financial support to four early career researchers/professionals.
We are pleased to confirm that all presentations will be recorded, transcribed, and made available on SCOLMA’s YouTube channel, ensuring wider accessibility of conference content. Audio-visual support is being coordinated through the Bodleian Library.
Early Career Researchers have been selected as session chairs, reflecting SCOLMA’s commitment to supporting the next generation of African Studies scholars. Sana Ginwalla, Tirivashe Jele, and Misha Maseka bring fresh perspectives to their roles while also contributing as presenters. A comprehensive support plan includes pre-conference preparation guidance for these emerging academics.
Africa Bibliography, Research and Documentation (ABRD)
We are absolutely delighted to announce that Africa Bibliography, Research & Documentation (edited by Terry Barringer) has been awarded the African Studies Association’s 2024 Conover-Porter Award for Africana Bibliography or Reference Work. We are thankful to Carli Coetzee (former President of ASAUK), Peter Limb (MSU Libraries) and Livingstone Muchefa (National Gallery of Zimbabwe) for their generous endorsements. This prestigious recognition represents a tremendous achievement for SCOLMA, IAI and CUP.
The Award was presented at the 67th Annual Meeting of the African Studies Association in Chicago, Illinois in December 2024, with Stephanie Kitchen kindly accepting it on our behalf.
CUP provided a comprehensive usage report in June 2025. This included a breakdown of the Top 10 most downloaded ABRD articles on the Cambridge Core platform:
Top 10 downloaded articles on Cambridge Core (year to May 2025)
To celebrate the conference, CUP have made the current issue (volume 4, issue 1) available as Open Access through to the end of August and continue to promote via their relevant social media channels.
The pipeline for the second volume of 2025 remains strong, with a strategic focus on conference papers for 2026 publication ensuring continued academic relevance and timeliness. Exhibition reviews continue to develop as a popular feature, with committee members actively identifying opportunities for coverage (photography, art, museum exhibitions).
Congratulations to the entire Editorial Team for their excellent work and contributions to the journal: Terry Barringer (Editor), Stephanie Kitchen (Managing Editor), Barbara Spina, and Richard Bartholomew. We also extend our gratitude to IAI and Cambridge University Press for their continued support.
Advocacy
Our institutional members continue to demonstrate remarkable activity and innovation reflecting the breadth of SCOLMA member activities, from mission archive acquisitions, academic project partnership and engagement, and international conference participation. The collective work of our members demonstrates SCOLMA’s vital role in supporting the broader African Studies research network and our perfect placement to perform advocacy work.
SCOLMA’s second, revised request (with thanks to the sub-group addressing these requests) was sent to TNA on 25th September 2024 regarding the Rhodesian Army (Association) archives with the following revisions:
“Please can you provide any documented advice, decisions, directions or guidance issued by the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office to TNA regarding the Rhodesian Army (Association) archives in the period 2017 to the present (inclusive).”
A final response was received on 22 November. This resulted in approximately 6 pages of emails covering the dates 13/03/2017 – 14/12/2020, and a ‘Rhodesian Army Archive background note, dated May 2023’.? Much of the correspondence originating from the FCO and from the then Director of the National Archives of Zimbabwe has been either partially or fully redacted.
SCOLMA is in touch with contacts who are the current custodians of the archives and represent both the Rhodesian Army Association & Museum Trust as well as the British South Africa Police Regimental Association, UK Branch.? Both representatives remain keen to move discussions forward regarding the safety and preservation of the collections although it has been confirmed that the archives are currently held in professional level archival storage.? The archives can be consulted on request by individuals.
We will continue to revisit this issue with sensitivity and patience to ensure a successful outcome.
Website and Digital Presence
With our many thanks to Charles Fonge (Web Manager) and Ben Carson (Committee Member) for their continued technical and marketing expertise managing our growing online presence.
SCOLMA’s digital engagement continues to evolve with the changing social media landscape, demonstrating both challenges and significant successes across multiple platforms.
Our Twitter/X audience has experienced a decline in line with the wider exodus from the platform, with followers dropping by 5% to 667 (-35 followers). LinkedIn, which we joined in March 2024, is working exceptionally well in bringing professional networks and new audiences to SCOLMA, with 81 followers and 32 posts demonstrating consistent engagement.
We have recently joined BlueSky (June 2025), recognizing the platform’s growing appeal to academic communities. As BlueSky operates without an algorithm, this will require more emphasis on posting and reposting for visibility, but we anticipate good engagement as more academic libraries migrate to the platform.
Our YouTube channel represents one of our greatest digital success stories, with 1,209 views (+717% increase) and 11,500 impressions during 2024/25. We uploaded 8 new videos this year, bringing our total to 10 videos. The channel has gained 14 new subscribers, making a total of 23 subscribers.
Top 5 viewed videos:
“Material Heritage, Data and the Environment” (2023 Conference Panel 2): 374 views
“Digital Resources for African Studies: Teaching & Research” (2024 Seminar 2): 252 views
“Digital Re-Curation & Creative Research with African Archives” (2024 Seminar 1): 156 views
“Environmental Histories, Archives and Mining” (2023 Conference Panel 1): 118 views
“Publishing, Platforms, & African Literature in the Digital Age” (2024 Seminar 4): 99 views
Eventbrite continues to prove worth the fee, providing more seamless event administration, enabling donations, and building a following of 92 followers who are automatically notified of new events. The conference has been our only event this year (bringing our total to 12). We will be closely monitoring charges for registrations to ensure good value for money, and where necessary explore other registration sites in time for the online seminar series next year.
Our LIS-SCOLMA listserv remains active with 121 subscribers and 46 messages, maintaining its role as an important communication channel for our community.
There is important work to be done in translating our strong digital awareness and event attendance into SCOLMA membership. The invaluable contributions from our speakers and chairs have been successful not only in delivering excellent events but also in adding impact, outputs, and awareness via video content and subsequent ABRD articles.
ELIAS
ELIAS (European Librarians in African Studies) The 18th ELIAS Annual Meeting will AGbe held in person at the Naprstek Museum, Prague on 24 June 2025, centred on the theme “African collections – from collecting to sharing and repatriating”. The programme includes 8 presentations from speakers representing institutions in Czech Republic, Cameroon, Netherlands, Portugal and the UK. The Annual Meeting concludes with a tour of the exhibition “Emil Holub”
While our ELIAS representative Dawn Wright is unable to attend this year, she will provide SCOLMA news for presentation at the meeting and has circulated the programme to members for information. SCOLMA continues to maintain strong connections with our European colleagues through ELIAS, ensuring our activities and developments reach the broader European African Studies library and archives community.
African Studies Association (UK)
Our relationship with ASAUK remains strong, with Marion Wallace attending the in-person AGM at Oxford Brookes University in August, and myself attending the Council meetings in December, March, and May. Again we would like to thank ASAUK for their generous pledge of sponsorship to our SCOLMA 2025 conference, via their small conference grants scheme.
The 2026 ASAUK conference will be held in Durham, with potential for a SCOLMA panel at the conference under consideration. We continue to benefit from ASAUK’s support and collaborative approach to African Studies and are looking to find ways to more actively collaborate with this large association moving forwards.
As always, we thank Stephanie Kitchen for continuing as ASAUK representative at our committee meetings.
Thank You and Committee
SCOLMA’s success continues to depend on the dedication and expertise of our committee members and institutional representatives. I extend my sincere thanks to all officers and representatives for their continued hard work over this last year:
Lucy McCann (Treasurer),
Sarah Rhodes (Secretary),
Marion Wallace (Development Officer),
Terry Barringer (ABRD Editor),
Liz Haines (Programme Secretary),
Charles Fonge (Web Manager),
Dawn Wright (ELIAS representative), and
Stephanie Kitchen (ASAUK representative).
Thanks also to our elected and co-opted members for their ongoing contributions to SCOLMA’s mission of promoting and supporting African-related collections and scholarship.
Patricia Hewitt (Robert Sainsbury Library, University of East Anglia) – elected 2023
Alison Metcalfe (The National Library of Scotland) – elected 2023
Barbara Spina – (Individual member) – elected 2023
Ben Carson – (University of East London) – elected 2024
Co-opted:
Mariam de Haan (British Library)
Katie Sambrook (Kings College London)
While personal membership numbers remain modest, our revised biennial model and expanded digital presence continue to extend SCOLMA’s reach and engagement within the African Studies community. As we are in the midst of our 2025 conference and continue developing our biennial model alternating between conferences and seminar series, SCOLMA remains committed to supporting African Studies collections, research, and scholarship. The strong financial position of this year’s conference, coupled with the continued success of ABRD and active institutional membership, positions us well for continued growth and impact.
Jenni Skinner, SCOLMA Chair, 30th June 2025
3. Financial Statement and approval of the audited accounts (Lucy McCann)
Lucy McCann, SCOLMA Treasurer, spoke to her report and commented on the audited accounts for 2024 (circulated at the meeting).
Income:
Membership has recently increased to 19 paying members (7 honorary members) but it should be noted that costs are incurred by SCOLMA to CUP for each member receiving ABRD online access and/or print copies. Royalties continued to be received from EBSCO.
Expenditure:
Apart from our regular expenditure on maintaining the website and our audit fee, the main expenditure in 2024 was paying honoraria to a number of the speakers who contributed to the ‘African Studies in the Digital Age’ online seminar series in the first half of the year. The honoraria were paid out of the generous sponsorship received for the 2023 conference. Even taking account of this however our expenditure exceeded our income by a small sum.
Our payment to Cambridge University Press for membership access to ABRD in 2024 was only requested in January this year and therefore will appear in next year’s audited accounts.
Update:
SCOLMA’s finances were relatively straightforward in 2024 as it was not a conference year. A relatively new cost is that we incur Eventbrite charges when we use Eventbrite to manage and ticket our events. The charges were lower last year for the free seminar series but will be higher for this year’s conference when attendees have paid conference fees.
Peter Westley produced the audited accounts for 2024 and has agreed to audit the accounts for next year’s AGM subject to approval at this AGM.
Appointment of auditor
The proposal to reappoint Peter Westley as auditor and approve the accounts, was proposed by Sarah Rhodes and seconded by Terry Barringer. All were in favour.
4. Appointment of Officers and Committee
The following nominations were received:
• Chair – Jenni Skinner (Centre of African Studies Library, University of Cambridge)
• Secretary – Sarah Rhodes (Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford)
• Treasurer – Lucy McCann (Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford)
• Editor – Terry Barringer (Individual member)
• Web Manager – Charles Fonge (Borthwick Institute for Archives, University of York)
• Programme Secretary – Liz Haines (The National Archives)
• Development Officer – Marion Wallace (Individual member)
Elected:
• Patricia Hewitt (Robert Sainsbury Library, University of East Anglia) – elected 2023
• Alison Metcalfe (The National Library of Scotland) – elected 2023
• Barbara Spina – (Individual member) – elected 2023
• Ben Carson – (University of East London) – elected 2024
• Dawn Wright – (SOAS Library, University of London) – proposed for election
Co-opted:
• Mariam de Haan (British Library)
• Katie Sambrook (Kings College London)
• ASAUK representative: Stephanie Kitchen – (International African Institute)
Proposed by Lucy McCann and seconded by Liz Haines, committee officers and members were elected nem con.
5. Any Other Business
There was no other business recorded.
The AGM was closed at 13.15 BST
Sarah Rhodes, SCOLMA Secretary – 27/10/25
