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The Modern Endangered Archives Program is excited to announce its seventh cohort of grantees, awarding 34 projects funding to document and digitize at-risk archival collections from around the world. This is the largest cohort yet, reflecting the global urgency for cultural heritage preservation.
This year’s MEAP grants, amounting to $1.5 million in awards, will support archival work in 26 countries, expanding the reach of MEAP into Angola, Ethiopia, Malawi, and Bulgaria. Projects will collect, organize, and digitize a broad range of archival materials, from photographs depicting life during the fight for Independence in Angola, documents from the peace process in Guatemala, and Buddhist manuscripts in Myanmar and Thailand, to art and museum practices in wartime Bosnia-Herzegovina. Cohort 7 also includes one Regional Grant, “Social Movements and Democratic Resistance in Baixada Fluminense,” which will facilitate digitization of five institutional archives that account for Baixada Fluminense's struggles for better living conditions in 20th Century Brazil.
The program was launched in 2018 with support from Arcadia, a charitable fund of Lisbet Rausing and Peter Baldwin. To date, MEAP has awarded 171 projects in 64 countries.
Urgent Need for Preservation
MEAP received a record 206 applications for funding in Cohort 7 as archives and communities around the world work to safeguard collections from climate-induced disasters and political threats.
This expanded cohort reflects consistent growth over the past seven years, not only in terms of increased applications, but in the connections across the MEAP network. From its first year, MEAP has focused on expanding the culture of open access and fostering opportunities for grantees to share knowledge related to archival practice and digitization. While MEAP has hosted events to bring cultural heritage practitioners together, grantees also work within their own networks, creating training sessions, consulting on archival projects, and contributing expertise to projects and proposals. Of the 34 new projects, 11 grew out of previous MEAP grants and more grew out of local training sessions.
For example, a project team in Angola will begin digitizing photographs from African photographers who were able to capture an intimate visual representation of life during the anti-colonial war and fight for independence. The team will partner with the Photography Legacy Project (PLP) in South Africa for training and ongoing support. PLP was one of MEAP’s first grantees, leading the effort to digitize the Ramakatane Photography Archive in Lesotho. In Myanmar and Thailand, 6 collections of Buddhist manuscripts have been prioritized for digitization after a successful Planning Grant that assessed manuscripts from 74 temples. And in Argentina, the audiovisual archive of photographer Bautista Amé will be digitized following an inventory process that revealed the integration of the Amé photography studio into the small town of Ingeniero Luiggi, La Pampa State, Argentina. Each of these collections, and the dozens of other collections that will be preserved through MEAP grants, offers insight into communities, lived experiences, landscapes, and traditions that allow researchers, students, and others to better understand the complex, but interconnected, world we live in.
The growth of MEAP can also be seen in the UCLA Library Digital Collections, where MEAP funded collections now account for over 100,000 unique digital objects, including photographs, newspapers, audio recordings, news reels, manuscripts and personal correspondence.
New Call for Applications
For those seeking funding to work with endangered collections, the Modern Endangered Archives Program will offer another round of funding with preliminary applications due November 17, 2025. The 2025-26 Call for Applications is now available. For its eighth round of funding, MEAP invites applications that focus on preserving endangered collections from the 20th and 21st Centuries that reflect community voices, cultural expression, and historical experiences that have been left out of national narratives and archives.
Congratulations to all Cohort 7 projects
REGIONAL GRANTS
Social Movements and Democratic Resistance in Baixada Fluminense (Brazil)
Host Institution: Instituto Enraizados (Brazil)
Project Lead(s): Alexandre Fortes, Jean Rodrigues Sales
Related Project: Digitization of the Diocesan Curia of Nova Iguaçu's Archive(opens in a new tab)
PROJECT GRANTS
Sarajevo Under Siege: An Archive of Wartime Culture (Bosnia-Herzegovina)
Host Institution: Historijski Muzej Bosne i Hercegovine
Project Lead(s): Ewa Anna Kumelowski, Elma Hašimbegović, Elma Hodžić
Related Project: Sarajevo Under Siege: A Visual Art Archive(opens in a new tab)
Voices from the margins: oral traditions of communities from Western India (India)
Host Institution: American Institute of Indian Studies
Project Lead(s): Shubha Chaudhuri
Related Project: Recordings of Hereditary Musicians of Western Rajasthan(opens in a new tab)
Records of the Peace Process in Guatemala (Guatemala)
Host Institution: The Human Rights Office of the Archbishopric of Guatemala
Project Lead(s): Mónica Viviana Sigüenza Flores
Related Project: Archives for Justice and Peace: The Project for the Recovery of Historical Memory (REMHI) and the National Reconciliation Commission (CNR)(opens in a new tab)
Angolan Independence: Photographic Archives of War and the Everyday (Angola, South Africa)
Host Institution: North Carolina State University
Project Lead(s): Claudia Gastrow, Paula Agostinho
Archivo Amé (Argentina)
Host Institution: Fundación exACTa
Project Lead(s): Carolina Cappa, Julieta Sepich
Related Project: Archivo Amé (Planning Grant)(opens in a new tab)
Andean Oral History Workshop (Bolivia)
Host Institution: Taller de Historia Oral Andina
Project Lead(s): Sarah Hines, Oscar Chambi, Oswaldo Calatayud
National Cinematheque of Ukraine Film Archive Digitisation (Ukraine)
Host Institution: National Cinematheque of Ukraine
Project Lead(s): Taras Bosak
Digital Archives of the National Union of African Teachers (Burkina Faso)
Host Institution: Austral University of Chile
Project Lead(s): Missa Millogo, Siaka Traoré
Related Project: Archives of the Union of Teachers of Burkina Faso(opens in a new tab)
Digitising Rare Language Materials from Oceania: The David Walsh Collection (Australia)
Host Institution: The Australian National University
Project Lead(s): Julia Colleen Miller, Nick Thieberger
Minnette De Silva: Legacy Project (Sri Lanka)
Host Institution: World Monuments Fund Britain
Project Lead(s): Charlotte Masters, Sharmini Pereira
Photo Archive of Andre Yacoubian in Syria between 1974 & 2024 (Syria)
Host Institution: Friends of the Old City of Aleppo Association
Project Lead(s): Dima Dayoub, Andre Yacoubian, Alaa Haddad
Seeds of Hope: Digitizing an Ethiopian Film on Resilience against Drought (Ethiopia)
Host Institution: National Archives and Libraries Service of Ethiopia
Project Lead(s): Haleta Yirga, Solomon Tena, Mahlet Fantahun
Monastic Manuscript Collections across the Greater Shan Country (Myanmar, Thailand)
Host Institution: Inya Institute
Project Lead(s): Francois Tainturier, Jotika Khur-Yearn
Related Project: Documenting Colonial Era Monastic Collections in Former Principalities of the Shan State(opens in a new tab)
Archiving Childhood: Assamese Periodicals for Children (1980- 2020) (India)
Host Institution: Tezpur University
Project Lead(s): Pallavi Jha, Subhadeepta Ray, Abhijit Bhattacharya
Digitizing the Maharani Binodini Archive of Manipur (India)
Host Institution: Indiana University
Project Lead(s): Shobhana L. Chelliah
Digitizing criminal Court records during Autoritarian regimes in Amazonia (Brazil)
Host Institution: Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD)
Project Lead(s): Jessica Cazares
Related Project: Brazilian Court Records Under Authoritarian Regimes(opens in a new tab)
Nubian Land and Property Records (Egypt)
Host Institution: Institute for Field Research
Project Lead(s): Willeke Wendrich, Mazen Alaa, Khaled Maher, Fatma Emam
PLANNING GRANTS
(Dis)appearing Images: Archiving the Peruvian Internal Armed Conflict (Peru)
Host Institution: University of California, Berkeley
Project Lead(s): Emily Thompson, Olinda Quispe
Digitizing Archives of Architecture in Ghana (Ghana)
Host Institution: Regents of the University of Michigan
Project Lead(s): Kuukuwa Manful
Cinemateca Universitaria "Enrique Torres" - Guatemala (Guatemala)
Host Institution: Canyon Cinema
Project Lead(s): Alex Feliciano Mejía, Javier Corleto
Social Movements in Hyderabad Deccan: B Shyam Sundar and the Depressed class movements of India (1940-1990) (India)
Host Institution: Aruvu Collaboratory
Project Lead(s): Shreyas Srivatsa, Harshawardhan Rathod, Abhishek Patil, Vinay Kumar Malge
Carahuasi School Archive. Indigenous Highlands of Jujuy, Argentina, 1908-23 (Argentina)
Host Institution: Reserva Patrimonial y Archivo del Museo de Antropología-IDACOR CONICET, Universidad Nacional de Córdoba
Project Lead(s): Guillermina Espósito
Social justice archives of Medellín, Colombia (Colombia)
Host Institution: The Regents of the University of California, Santa Barbara
Project Lead(s): Juan Cobo Betancourt, Santiago Muñoz Arbeláez
Rescuing Peace and Justice in Guatemala (Guatemala)
Host Institution: Fundación Grupo de Apoyo Mutuo (GAM)
Project Lead(s): Carlos Juarez, Mario Polanco
Acervo Bajubá/HIV and AIDS collections (Brazil)
Host Institution: Acervo Bajubá
Project Lead(s): Yuri Fraccaroli, Marcos Tolentino, Angel Natan
Echoes from the Land: Family Archives of Memory and Human Rights in Paine (Chile)
Host Institution: Corporación Memorial Paine
Project Lead(s): Constanza Dalla Porta
Lluvia comunicación (Ecuador)
Host Institution: "SER" Asociación para el Desarollo Humano
Project Lead(s): Tania Laurini
Popular Portraits and Art by Angolan Photographer Paulino Damião (1980-2010 (Angola)
Host Institution: Universidade Lusíada de Angola
Project Lead(s): Lino Damião, Ines Ponte
Preserving records of the Federation of Afrikaner Cultural Associations (South Africa)
Host Institution: The Heritage Foundation (Die Erfenisstigting)
Project Lead(s): Lizette Jansen, Petra Luus
The South African Transition: Documentary and Cultural Archives from KwaZul (South Africa)
Host Institution: University of Cape Town
Project Lead(s): Ruchi Chaturvedi, Ingrid Bamberg
Conserving Voices of the ‘Non-Existent’: Macedonian Minority in Bulgaria (Bulgaria)
Host Institution: Peoples University Library (Goce Delcev)- Stip
Project Lead(s): Stoyko Stoykov, Iva Divkovic
Preserving İskenderun’s Arab Orthodox History through İskenderun Daily (Turkey)
Host Institution: Nehna
Project Lead(s): Evlin Huseyinoglu, Can Terbiyeli, Emre Can Daglioglu
Malawi's Audiovisual Heritage at Risk: Preservation and Access Initiative (Malawi)
Host Institution: National Records and Archives Services
Project Lead(s): Innocent Mankhwala