Digitizing Hidden Collections: Amplifying Unheard Voices
Key Dates
Initial Application
August 12 - October 20, 2026
Advancing Notifications
February 2027
Digitizing Hidden Collections: Amplifying Unheard Voices (DHC:AUV) is a grant competition for digitizing rare and unique content stewarded by organizations in the United States. Grant recipients 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. The program is generously supported by the Mellon Foundation.
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 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 helpful as possible within legal and ethical constraints, centering digital inclusion and respect for materials’ local contexts.
