Course Length: 30 hours
Course Week: 20–25 July 2025
Format: in person, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Fee: $1,495

Media archives present a unique and invaluable world of historical and cultural content captured on an array of aging and obsolete audio, video, and film formats that present unique preservation challenges. Unlike paper, audiovisual media has a very limited lifespan and requires specialized knowledge to safely and accurately evaluate, describe, conserve, replay, and reformat it for preservation and access.

This class will be particularly helpful for collectors, students, librarians, and archivists who plan to or are currently working with media in their collections, but who are stymied by the lack of opportunities to gain the education and experience required to facilitate a coordinated or comprehensive response to unlock their collections’ content and ensure its longevity.

Through selected readings, lectures, class discussions, special guests, and demonstrations of AV formats, mold cleaning, film inspection, and tours of preservation studios, students will:

• gain an understanding of the history of sound, television, and film technologies and how they work.
• learn how to identify media types found in archival collections, including wax cylinders, discs (instantaneous, radio transcription, 78rpm, 45rpm and LPs), magnetic tape (open-reel, cassette, DAT, videotape), and optical discs (CD, CD-R, DVD, DVD-R, BluRay), as well as 8mm, Super 8, and 16mm (nitrate, acetate, and polyester-based) motion-picture film.
• understand the risks inherent in each type, such as technological obsolescence and physical decomposition due to aging and environment, and learn how to identify and treat common problems like delamination, sticky-shed syndrome, mold, vinegar syndrome, and disc rot.
• learn what methods of cleaning are recommended for each media type.
• learn how to conduct a preservation survey.
• learn how to plan and manage a preservation project. Accomplishing this objective will include evaluating what solution is best for their collection, learning how to select and work with a preservation vendor, discerning standards for physical and digital storage to ensure the content’s long-term viability, seeking grant funding, and managing a preservation and access project.
• attain an understanding of copyright laws that apply to the preservation and access of audiovisual recordings.

In their personal statements, applicants are encouraged to share information about their experience working with audiovisual materials and specific audiovisual collection challenges they are currently facing within their collections. Applicants should also include a description of their professional education and work experience.