Iroko Historical Society · Per Medjat
Iroko Historical Society · Per Medjat
The Iroko Historical Society actively seeks knowledge donations, collection transfers, and storage agreements from practitioners, lineage holders, scholars, and community institutions. We govern what we receive. Access, description, and stewardship decisions belong to the community the materials came from.
I am an experienced elder priest in multiple Afro-Atlantic traditions, with more than three decades of active practice and fieldwork across Cuba, Brazil, and Puerto Rico. I have sat with elders whose knowledge will not appear in any published text. I have received materials that required years of relationship before they could be shared, and I understand that some things are not meant to be shared at all.
I built the Iroko Historical Society because I watched collections disappear. Not through malice. Through time, through illness, through the simple fact that no institution existed with the framework to receive them responsibly. Universities cannot govern what they do not understand. The Iroko Framework was built by someone inside the traditions it describes, which means the governance is not borrowed from outside. It is the same governance the tradition already uses, encoded into the infrastructure.
What was restricted in life remains restricted in the archive. What was earned must continue to be earned. The access tier system was not designed to satisfy an institutional review board. It was designed to honor what the elders already know about who deserves to hold what.
If you are watching a collection and wondering what happens to it, start a conversation. No commitment is implied. Nothing moves without your authorization. The goal is not acquisition. It is continuity.
Every collection that enters IHS follows the same path, whether it is a single libreta or fifty years of field recordings. Nothing moves quickly and nothing moves without your understanding of each step.
The process begins with a conversation, not a form. We want to understand what you have, why it matters to you, and what you need from a stewardship relationship before we discuss anything else. This conversation has no timeline and carries no obligation.
If both parties want to continue, an IHS archivist conducts a preliminary survey of the materials, in person when possible, remotely when necessary. The survey produces a basic inventory and a preliminary access tier recommendation. Nothing is described in detail, nothing is photographed, and nothing leaves your possession at this stage.
IHS does not accept materials without a written agreement that specifies, in plain language, what IHS will do with the collection, what you retain, what access restrictions apply, who can authorize changes to those restrictions, and under what conditions materials may be returned or transferred. Standard deed of gift templates from the Society of American Archivists form the legal backbone of these agreements; IHS modifies them to reflect the access tier governance structure and community authorization requirements that university archives do not accommodate. You review it. You negotiate it. You sign it when it reflects what was agreed.
Materials are described at the level of detail that the access tier structure allows. Public materials receive full bibliographic description. Restricted materials are acknowledged in the finding aid without being disclosed; a researcher can see that a governed record exists and understand the conditions under which access might be granted, but cannot see the record itself. This is not silence. It is structured transparency.
IHS does not acquire collections and disappear. The stewardship relationship is active. You retain the right to update access restrictions, to request copies of your materials, to add to the collection over time, and to designate who holds stewardship authority after you.
Most archives ask you to sign over legal ownership of your materials before they will accept them. IHS begins from a different premise.
You determine who can see what, and under what conditions. The six-tier access system encodes your decisions at the field level; a single collection can be simultaneously public on one property and restricted to initiated practitioners on another. Those decisions are yours to make and yours to revise.
IHS accepts materials under two arrangements: a storage agreement, in which you retain legal ownership while IHS provides physical custody and preservation; and a deed of gift, in which legal ownership transfers to IHS under the terms you negotiate. Both arrangements carry the same access governance protections. Materials held under a storage agreement remain legally yours and may be requested back at any time. For collections transferred under a deed of gift, IHS includes reversion clauses for materials that become subject to repatriation claims or that a successor community authority determines should be returned.
Copyright in original materials belongs to the creator or their heirs, not to IHS. IHS will not reproduce, publish, exhibit, license, or otherwise use your materials without explicit written authorization. Researchers who request access to restricted materials must obtain your authorization, or the authorization of whoever you designate, before IHS will grant it.
You designate who holds stewardship authority after you. That designation is encoded in the collection record and honored in perpetuity. IHS does not assume that authority transfers to a family member, a godchild, or a lineage heir by default. It transfers to whoever you say it transfers to, on the terms you set.
Donations of collections to IHS as a 501(c)(3) organization may qualify for a charitable deduction. IHS cannot provide tax advice or monetary appraisals of donated materials, but can provide documentation of the donation for your tax records. We recommend consulting a tax attorney or accountant familiar with cultural property donations.
IHS will not use your name, your lineage affiliation, your initiatory credentials, or the name of your tradition in any public communication without your consent. A collection may be described publicly as held by IHS without naming you if that is your preference.
If you are watching a collection and wondering what happens to it, the conversation begins here. No forms, no commitments, no pressure. A first conversation is simply a first conversation.
Begin a conversation →