Sharing the ASCL photo collection on Wikimedia Commons: what’s in for whom

The African Studies Centre Leiden (ASCL) is a knowledge institute that undertakes research and is involved in teaching about Africa. It aims to promote the dissemination of knowledge and better understanding of African societies in the wider public sphere. Since 2015 the ASCL library has been uploading copyright cleared Africa photographs of its collection to Wikimedia Commons, Wikimedia’s media repository. It thus makes them usable across all Wiki projects, as well as accessible at no cost to the general public. The ASCL Collection in Wikimedia Commons now contains well over 6,000 images. It comprises, among others, photos captured by Roel Coutinho during his work as a medical doctor in the liberated areas of Guinea-Bissau, in 1973 and 1974 as well as images taken by anthropologist Sjoerd Hofstra among the Poro and Mende in Sierra Leone in 1934 and 1935. The poster sketches the benefits of contributing to Wikimedia Commons for the ASCL library and libraries in general, the Wikimedia community as well as the depicted African societies.