Audiovisual Preservation

16mm color film strip with a hand holding a magnifying loupe

In 2018, UNC University Libraries received a $1.75 million grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the largest ever made to the University Libraries, to allow the Southern Folklife Collection to continue to preserve, digitize and share unique audio and moving image recordings. Collections targeted for preservation and access will come from curatorial departments within Wilson Special Collections Library, as well as partner institutions across the state of North Carolina.

The regional partnerships will be administered through the North Carolina Digital Heritage Center, a statewide digitization and publishing program based at Wilson Library.

To date, the SFC has preserved over 30,000 audiovisual recordings from a variety of audio, video and film formats. Access to these recordings can be found across Wilson Library collection finding aids.