Barrett, The Honors College Thesis/Creative Project Collection

Located directly south of Pima County, Arizona, there is a culturally rich community known as Santa Cruz County, Arizona. Santa Cruz County is a smaller community being home to an estimated 47,000 people. Santa Cruz County has a rich history given its proximity to the United States-Mexico border. One example of this rich history can be found at the Tumacacori National Historical Park (NHP) with the attractive and unique ruins. The Tumacacori NHP was once an active Spanish mission that oversaw the religious expansion and communal resources. While the Tumacacori NHP no longer operates in this manner, it does serve an important role in providing visitors with a diverse and immersive look into the history of the region and the Tumacacori mission. While the Tumacacori NHP is meant to be a place for all people to visit, most visitors are not from the local community. The reason for this stems from a lack of educational and engagement opportunities between the Tumacacori NHP and the community youth, mainly due to community members being unaware of the park’s existence or the programs that are offered. This project analyzes and uncovers this disconnect as well as the barriers between the Tumacacori NHP and the Santa Cruz County youth through a research study and the use of children’s literature.

Archiving is the art of memory keeping, but the majority of marginalized communities in Arizona are not familiar with archives or the role they can play in preserving BIPOC and Queer history. In Arizona and across the country, Queer, Black, Indigenous, and People of Color are largely underrepresented in history and in archives. History has primarily been shared through a white-dominated lens, minimizing the impact these communities have had on our culture and our world. According to the 2012 Arizona Archives Matrix Project, Latinos, Blacks, Asian & Pacific Islanders, and the LGBTQ community make up over 42% of Arizona's population but are only represented in 0% to 2% of known archival collections in the state. This is why the podcast series; “Archives Glow” was created. Podcasting is a tool that can preserve the history of these communities and tell their stories in their own voices. Members of these communities refuse to be excluded from archiving and history any longer. That is why I interviewed, Todd Bailey, the special projects coordinator at the Arizona Historical Society, Jessica Salow, the assistant archivist of Black Collections at the Community-Driven Archives at Arizona State University Library, Nancy Godoy, Director of the Community-Driven Archives (CDA) Initiative, Pete Dimas, an archivist and educator, Alex Soto, the director of the Labriola National American Indian Data Center at Arizona State University Bridget Bravo, an educator and community archivist, and Christine Marin, historian, archivist, and founder of the Chicano/a Research Collection at ASU Library, for “Archives Glow.” Each person is an expert in their field of history because they come from Black, Indigenous, Latinx or Queer communities themselves. They have also dedicated their lives to spreading the stories of others in their communities through history exhibits, projects or community outreach events. In the United States 42% of Americans, 12 years of age or older, have listened to a podcast in the last month of 2023. This is a new record according to 2023 Edison Research compared to previous years. Sharing people’s stories through this platform is a useful tool because it encourages listeners to see life from a different perspective and through the lived experiences of someone else. People want to learn, and podcasting is a transformative platform that helps them do that in a fast-paced world. Instead of having to sit down and listen to a traditional lecture people can receive new information in a short amount of time and on the go as people’s attention spans also have become increasingly shorter, as research from the American Psychological Association has shown. With the support and guidance of Regina Revazova, a professor at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University, and Jasmine Torrez, assistant archivist at ASU Library’s Community-Driven Archives (CDA) Initiative, I produced and hosted a five-episode podcast series that tells the stories and history of BIPOC and Queer communities in Arizona to preserve their stories and encourage change in history. This project was intended to spread awareness around story-keeping and memory for BIPOC and Queer Communities.

Out of all fifty states, Arizona boasts the greatest number of sunny days, which comes as no surprise to its residents. According to a CDC data report, Arizona has an average of nearly 286 total days of sun exposure. This sheer amount of sunlight could lead to the assumption that Arizona is also leading the way in harvesting this solar energy, but that isn’t the case. According to the S.E.I.A (Solar Energies Industries Association), Arizona is the fifth largest solar producer, while California comes in first by a significant lead. What happened in the history of California that caused this disparity in solar production that we see today and should Arizona follow in its footsteps? In this video essay, I consider the historical impact that climate change has had on California that directly led them to adopt environmental policies, such as wildfires, droughts, smog, and sea-level rise. These events threaten California specifically, due to its uniquely high population, geography, and climate, and they will continue to get worse as climate change subsists. Due to the persistent threat that they face, California was forced to pass environmental regulations that ultimately ended up developing them into a leader in environmental protectionism. Arizona, while also facing droughts, high heat, and poor air quality, has had its environmental progress greatly hindered by a lack of cohesive action at the State level. Based on information from the U.S Energy Information Agency, over the past 30 years, Arizona has been one of, if not the highest, carbon-dioxide emitters in the West. For a time there was some political response to this fact, but eventually, its momentum was halted in favor of economic challenges and continually stunted by mixed agendas, which polarized Arizona parties even more and left city governments to deal with climate change on their own. With solar being the cheapest means of clean energy production, it seems unavoidable that it will develop eventually. Solar becoming a topic of such polarization in Arizona makes it much more challenging, as it can only progress with bipartisan support, but climate change is inevitable so discourse has to be the first step towards meaningful change.