ASU student-produced podcast focuses on community history, memory, healing

Looking for a new podcast to listen to this summer? The Community-Driven Archives Initiative at the ASU Library recently launched a new podcast series titled "Archives Glow" about community history, memory and healing.

Episodes highlight the importance of BIPOCBlack, Indigenous and people of color experiences and storytelling, center the lived experiences and knowledge of community members, and share the untold stories and history of marginalized communities.

"We want this podcast to be a healing project that creates safe spaces for BIPOC and LGBTQ+ community members to acknowledge past traumas, and empowers people to become memory keepers in their own communities," said Jasmine Torrez, assistant archivist with the Community-Driven Archives Initiative, who manages the podcast. “The episodes in this first season elevate Black, Indigenous, LGBTQ+ and Chicano/a voices and history.” 

The first season is now available on Spotify and Acast.

The Community-Driven Archives Initiative works to build strong relationships with historically marginalized communities by preserving untold stories and history. Last year, the initiative was recognized with an Archival Innovator Award. 

“The ‘Archives Glow’ is a name given to a warm feeling that one has when working in the archives,” Torrez said. “The ability to see yourself in history and the stories of your ancestors is so powerful. This podcast is another way to find a place of belonging, to see oneself represented in the archives.” 

The podcast includes five episodes featuring host and producer Adriana Gonzalez-Chavez.

Gonzalez-Chavez is an ASU student who graduated in May from the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication and Barrett, The Honors College. She is now pursuing her master's degree in broadcast journalism at the Cronkite School.

“Spreading awareness and bringing recognition to diverse communities through storytelling can change the way an entire nation views itself and its past, also the people that make up the population,” Gonzalez-Chavez said. “History and storytelling impact policy and the way someone may view themselves as an individual, a community and a society at large.”

Gonzalez-Chavez got involved with the project after hearing Nancy Godoy, director of the Community-Driven Archives Initiative, and Torrez present in the Humanities Lab Avanzando Education Pathways course. She reached out to partner with the initiative and ASU Library, and the project became her creative honors thesis project.

“A podcast is a modern and accessible method to do this work,” Gonzalez-Chavez said. “That is why I have partnered with Nancy Godoy, Jasmine Torrez and Regina Revazova. With the guidance and support of these amazing women with unique and diverse experiences of their own, I have been able to create a podcast to tell the stories of diverse people.”

Adriana Gonzalez-Chavez

Hearing the voices of leaders from libraries, archives and the community was an impactful experience for Gonzalez-Chavez. Her thesis became not only a professional project, but also a personal one. 

“Through this project, I have been able to find myself,” Gonzalez-Chavez said. “The stories and histories that have been told in the episodes reflect my culture and people. As a Latina, I have felt out of place just like Nancy Godoy expressed in the "Trauma and Healing" episode. My ancestors and history have not been reflected in the archives or in the media. I don’t hear the stories of LatinxA gender-neutral term for Latino. members on the news or mainstream media often, nor do I hear anything about their contributions to society. Listening to someone else share the same experiences as me has helped me heal. I feel less alone or unnoticed in the spaces I take up.”

These diverse stories and experiences offer possibilities for future episode topics and support efforts for lifelong learning. 

“We’re excited to have this first season of ‘Archives Glow’ out in the world for people to listen to,” Torrez said. “As we work to create season two, we’re looking for more community stories, collaborators and partners who want to get involved. We hope to continue making this podcast as a safe space for people to listen to community voices."