The year 2027 will mark the 10th anniversary of the Manitos Community Memory Project digital archive, one of the flagship digital humanities projects supported over the years by the New Mexico Humanities Council. It will also usher in a new chapter in its history, in partnership with the New Mexico State University Library. The Manitos Digital Archive is a centralized online resource built by and for Manitos, the Indo-Hispano people native to northern New Mexico and southern Colorado, one of the oldest Indigenous land-based cultures in the United States. Once at risk of being lost, the archive preserves and offers access to this rich trove of history, traditions, and wisdom for generations to come. 

The MCM Project began as an initiative of the Department of Media Arts & Technology/Center for Cultural Technology at New Mexico Highlands University. In 2015 NMHU Media Arts submitted a proposal for a planning grant to the Mellon Foundation for the development of a Manitos digital archive spearheaded by a network of ten original rural libraries and nonprofit organizations working with NMHU Media Arts faculty, staff and students. The outcome of the proposal was multi-year support for a collaborative project that included funding to create the archive and for student internships, equipment purchase, training, community-based memory gathering activities, and a variety of demonstration projects. The MCM Project became the first rural community-directed archive funded by the Mellon Foundation, which has since become the major funder of the community-based archiving movement nationwide. 

The path has been challenging. After years weathering the global COVID pandemic that began in 2020, the 2022 wildfire season that ravaged the region, and transitions in leadership, NMHU was unable to continue supporting the MCM Project, and the NMHC stepped up to the plate, providing fiscal sponsorship and support in a variety of ways including the production and distribution of student intern illustrated and designed cuadernos and organizing community events celebrating northern New Mexico musical and dance traditions which were documented in a series of videos.  Then in 2025, significant changes to state humanities councils’ federal funding meant the search was on once again for a new administrative hub.  

Throughout all of the ups and downs, one persistent problem had bedeviled the project from the beginning–the need for affordable and secure long-term data preservation and storage. Then in the summer of 2024, the MCM Project received an invitation from our longtime partners at the national nonprofit Shift Collective, creators of Historypin, a community-driven online platform where people share photographs, sound, and video to tell stories of people and places that matter to them. Ten Manito libraries and community nonprofits were invited to participate along with nine other community-based archives across the nation in a grant-funded research project on a novel approach to cultural data storage that would address this exact issue. The NMSU Library joined us as the university partner. 

The outcome of that experience was a new partnership between the MCM Project and the NMSU Library. Under the agreement, the MCM digital archive will become a project of Digital Commons @ NMSU. Digital Commons is the online repository and publishing platform used by the NMSU Library among hundreds of other academic institutions, public libraries, and research centers to showcase their special collections and scholarly output. The platform allows for the efficient storage, management, preservation and publication of data and ensures that it is secure and accessible for discovery and collaboration. The Exhibits Module facilitates the creation of multimedia virtual exhibits and digital storytelling. 

As the archive continues to grow, Manito community archivists will maintain editorial control over their individual digital collections and have access to technical assistance and training from the NMSU Library’s staff. The collections will be searchable online, with access in perpetuity for members of the community, classroom educators and students, academic researchers, and for all those interested in learning more about Manito history and cultural heritage and in documenting and preserving traditional lifeways. The archive also serves as inspiration for new forms of creative expression and cultural production and as a resource for activists, providing historical and cultural context for their work in defending communal land and water rights and the environment from threats that range from the erasure from historical accounts and encroachment of developers and gentrification to the impacts of climate change. 

Under their Digital Commons @ NMSU licensure, the NMSU Library will host the MCM Project website and provide long-term secure data storage at no cost, thus creating a new model for fulfilling the university’s mission as a Hispanic-Serving Institution, to serve the diverse needs of the state through education, research, outreach, and public service by engaging university faculty, staff and students in the important work of cultural heritage preservation and commitment to community. 

https://newmexicohumanities.org/stories-programs/manitos-community-memory