Today, the MellonFoundation released “Powerful but Precarious: Mapping the Landscape of Community-Based Archives,” the first national study of its kind. Produced in partnership with research firm Engage R+D, the study draws on a survey of 336 independent, community-led archives, and in-depth interviews with more than 20 practitioners across the country.
Community-based archives are independent organizations that collect and preserve the records, photographs, oral histories, personal papers, and other artifacts of communities many of which have been historically excluded from mainstream institutions. Unlike institutional archives, community-based archives often hold materials that exist nowhere else – collections that, if lost, cannot be recovered.
Additionally, community-based archives often operate outside of the context of universities, libraries, historical societies, or other collecting institutions and in doing so, they serve as civic infrastructure where people can access and learn about their own localized or underexplored histories. While hundreds of these archives exist across the United States, serving communities of every background and geography, they have never been mapped, counted, or examined at this scale—leaving them largely invisible to the funders, policymakers, and organizations best positioned to support them.
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“Community-based archives are the strongholds of our American history, preserving the stories and cultural artifacts most at risk of being erased or distorted by those in power,” said MellonFoundation president Elizabeth Alexander. “This first-of-its-kind study illuminates the breadth and scale of these powerful local histories and the urgent truths they uncover for all Americans. In the face of sustained assaults on core parts of American history and American stories, Mellon is working to protect them from erasure and encouraging others to devote even more resources to this vital sector.”
“Community-based archives do work that few other institutions can make possible—they preserve history on the community’s own terms, and they make it accessible to the people whose history it actually is and to the public at large,” said Patricia Hswe, MellonFoundation Program Director for Public Knowledge. “For too long, this field has operated without the visibility or resources it deserves. This research is a major step toward changing that.”
A Field as Dynamic as the Communities It Serves
The 336 participating archives represent every region of the country. They preserve and share the histories of Black and African American communities (24%), LGBTQIA+ communities (13%), Hispanic and Latino communities (11%), Indigenous and Tribal nations (9%), and Asian communities (8%), as well as immigrant and refugee populations, labor movements, artists and musicians, survivors of violence, and many other communities.
Defining a Field with a Long History
A key finding of the study is that the field has operated without a shared name. In response to a survey question about how these archives refer to themselves, most noted that they don’t use the term “community-based archive.” Many use “memory work,” “cultural preservation,” or “storytelling,” and some have deemed themselves “accidental archives,” having taken on the role in response to an existing need. The absence of a shared name reflects the independence these organizations embody—collecting what mainstream institutions have historically overlooked.
Another defining facet of these archives is the depth of their presence in the U.S. Nearly 75% of survey-participating archives have been in operation for more than five years, and a full third are older than 25 years. At the same time, 26% reported that they were founded since 2020—a signal that communities are actively building new archives to fulfill an ongoing need.
Powerful but Precarious: Mapping the Landscape of Community-Based Archives (Mellon Foundation)
Powerful, But Precarious
Despite this crucial work, the study documents how community-based archives remain significantly under-resourced relative to their impact. More than half of respondents (55%) named lack of sustainable funding as their single greatest challenge, and 85% identified it as one of their top three. Close to half (47%) operate on annual budgets under $100,000; most employ only one or two paid staff members, and 24% rely entirely on volunteers—organizations that, with greater access to resources, could operate far more sustainably and advance their missions more fully.
Beyond funding, the study documents heightened physical and digital safety risks, including temporary closures in response to threats, doxxing or harassment campaigns based on the nature of the material they archive. Technical infrastructure remains a persistent vulnerability as well, with 46% of respondents naming technology gaps as a top three challenge. This under-resourcing is a long-term threat to the survival of the histories these archives preserve.
“Who gets to be remembered in history? Too often, the answer has been people with power and resources. But what about everyone else? That’s where community-based archives come in. These archives emerge from within communities,” said Samip Mallick, the Co-Founder and Executive Director of the South Asian American Digital Archive. “These archives offer something powerful. Proof that every person’s story matters. And that our stories belong in the historical record, too.”
Independence as Infrastructure
Seventy-five percent of community-based archives maintain partnerships with universities, museums, or government agencies. At the same time, the study found that many archives deliberately maintain operational independence, retaining direct control over their collections, exhibit narratives, and public access. For a significant portion of the field, that autonomy is not incidental. It is central to their mission and their ability to serve their constituents without external interference.
Recognizing the Need
Many charitable foundations with grantmaking in storytelling, civic engagement, cultural preservation, and social change share interest in the goals that community-based archives make possible without yet funding community-based archives themselves. The report identifies a clear path forward: more funders should provide multi-year, unrestricted general operating support — a top need named by 78% of community based archives; remove eligibility barriers, including the exclusion of fiscally sponsored organizations, that lock out many of the field’s most active archives; and invest in the peer networks and shared infrastructure that allow under-resourced organizations to learn from and sustain one another.
Community-based archives have been doing this work for decades, largely without recognition and almost always without adequate resources. The report makes clear that the field exists, that it is essential, and that the moment to support it is now.
To see the dynamism of community-based archives in action, visit the MellonFoundation‘s web feature, “Community-Based Archives: History in the Hands of the People.” Through community voices and collection highlights, the feature shares case studies of four community-based archives that demonstrate the wide range of America’s stories —from bilingual community newspapers to Lesbian history, and the records of the formerly enslaved. The histories held by these organizations are as distinct as the communities and geographies they serve. Together they offer a vivid portrait of the range, depth, and irreplaceable value of this work across the country.
