The Special Collections Research Center engages in the active acquisition of archival and primary source materials to develop and build our collections by soliciting donations of materials that fall within the scope of our particular collecting initiatives.
Through our collecting initiatives, we aim to increase the depth and diversity of materials that document the social, cultural, economic, and political history of the Commonwealth of Kentucky, Appalachia, and the Ohio River Valley Region. Our thoughtful and intentional collecting practices allow us to build upon our strengths while addressing historical imbalances in our existing collections by prioritizing materials created by and documenting the experiences of underrepresented voices and communities.
We pursue many of these collecting initiatives through partnerships with faculty and researchers across the University, enabling us not only to fulfill current research needs, but also to build collections that generate new pathways for research and teaching.
Below, find our ongoing collecting initiatives and learn how you can help us build our collections. Visit our Gifts of Materials page to find information about our broad collecting priorities and guidelines on donating materials.
The therapeutic community model is one of the dominant forms of addiction treatment in the United States. Developed and popularized by Synanon, a controversial California cult, the model has been lauded for its promising results in addiction recovery and criticized for its documented cases of therapeutic abuse. Intersecting with federal anti-drug campaigns, the criminal justice system, religious institutions, and broad cultural currents in the late-20th century United States, therapeutic communities have become a potent political symbol and a subject of societal fascination.
UK Libraries is committed to preserving archival records and oral histories that document the contradictory legacies of the drug-free treatment communities that were directly descended from Synanon. The Therapeutic Communities Collecting Project seeks materials that record the institutional histories, legal battles, and resident experiences of therapeutic communities across the United States from the 1970s to the present.
The collecting project is co-chaired by Doug Boyd, Director of the Louie B. Nunn Center for Oral History; Claire Clark, Associate Professor of Behavioral Science; and Megan Mummey, UK Libraries Director of Manuscript Collections, and is overseen by an advisory group of therapeutic community founders and survivors as well as historians, archivists, and journalists with expertise in the histories of substance use and mental health treatment:
For more information on donating materials for this project, please contact Megan Mummey at megan.mummey@uky.edu. For oral history inquiries, please contact Claire Clark at claire.clark@uky.edu.
