Digitizing Hidden Collections: Amplifying Unheard Voices Program Grant

The Digitizing Hidden Collections: Amplifying Unheard Voices Program, administered by CLIR, aims to digitize rare and unique content from diverse communities in the US. Launched in 2021, this initiative focuses on materials that highlight the histories of underrepresented groups, including people of color and marginalized communities. The program promotes public knowledge, broad representation, authentic partnerships, sustainable infrastructures, and community-centered access, providing funding between $50,000 and $300,000 to eligible organizations.

NOTE: The Initial Application stage is open to all eligible organizations and consists of a series of writing prompts. This is represented by the Pre-Proposal deadline. The Final Application stage will be open to a selection of organizations chosen from the Initial Application pool.
Digitizing Hidden Collections: Amplifying Unheard Voices Program
Digitizing Hidden Special Collections and Archives: Amplifying Unheard Voices is a grant competition administered by the Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR) for digitizing rare and unique content stewarded by collecting organizations in the US and Canada.
Launched in 2021, the program is designed to support efforts to digitize materials that deepen public understanding of the histories of people of color and other communities and populations whose work, experiences, and perspectives have been insufficiently recognized or unattended.
These often “hidden” histories include, but are not limited to, those of Black, Indigenous, Latine, and other People of Color; Women; Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender, Non-binary, and other Genderqueer people and communities; Immigrants; Displaced populations; Blind, Deaf, and Disabled people and communities; and Colonized, Disenfranchised, Enslaved, and Incarcerated people.
Core Values
The program coheres around five Core Values:
Public Knowledge: The program fuels the creation and dissemination of digitized special collections and archives as a public good.Broad Representation: The program supports digitization projects that will thoughtfully capture and share the untapped stories of people, communities, and populations who are underrepresented in digital collections in ways that contribute to a more complete understanding of human history.Authentic Partnerships: The program prioritizes projects that foreground meaningful engagement with the underserved communities whose stories the source materials tell, and that build inclusive teams across institutional and geographic boundaries.Sustainable Infrastructures: The program promotes forward-thinking strategies ensuring the long-term availability, discoverability, and interconnectedness of digitized content.Community-Centered Access: The program advocates for approaches to access, description, and outreach that make digitized content as widely available and useful as possible within legal and ethical constraints, centering digital inclusion and respect for materials’ local contexts.
Funding levels
To receive funding through this program, all grant recipients are required to adhere to the following terms regarding funding amounts and length of projects. Agreement to additional stipulations related to intellectual property and reuse will also be required.
Eligible organizations may request between USD$50,000 and USD$300,000. Currency of award funds will be issued as USD or CAD dependent on the lead applicant organization.
All requests must align with the Allowable Costs as described in the application instructions

Nonprofit collecting organizations located in the United States that hold rare and unique materials.