Code of Conduct

The Kentucky Museum & Heritage Alliance (KMHA) is dedicated to providing a
harassment, discrimination, and bullying free environment for everyone regardless
of gender, gender identity/expression, sexual orientation, disability, physical
appearance, body size, age, race, religion, marital status, national origin, or
individual lifestyle. KMHA does not tolerate harassment, discrimination, or
bullying of participants in any form.

Harassment is any verbal, non-verbal, or physical contact that threatens, intimidates, silences, or coerces.

Discrimination is the unjust or prejudicial treatment of others based on human differences.

Bullying is seeking to harm, intimidate, or coerce someone perceived as vulnerable.

These include, but are not limited to:

  • Abusive or derogatory comments, slurs, epithets, and/or discriminatory images
  • Physical contact without consent or after a request to stop and/or unwelcome sexual attention
  • Inappropriate social contact, including sustained one-on-one communication after request to cease
  • Deliberate or repeated acts of misgendering
  • Collection and/or distribution of harassing photography or recordings
  • Intimidation or stalking
  • Threats or acts of violence
  • Sustained disruptions of talks, presentations, or other events
  • Advocating for, or encouraging, any of the above behavior

KMHA reserves the right not to act on complaints regarding:

  • ‘Reverse’ isms, including ‘reverse racism’, ‘reverse sexism’, and ‘cisphobia’
  • Reasonable communication of boundaries, such as “leave me alone”, “go away”, or “I’m not discussing this with you”
  • Communicating in a ‘tone’ you don’t find congenial
  • Criticizing racist, sexist, cissexist, or otherwise oppressive behavior or assumptions

This Code of Conduct applies to all KMHA spaces including the annual conference and the Mentorship Program. All KMHA members, as well as attendees, speakers, presenters, exhibitors, mentors, and mentees agree to acknowledge and abide by the Code of Conduct when they register for an event, the Mentorship Program, and/or when they join or renew their KMHA membership.

Content presented at KMHA conferences, meetings, or online may at times deal with sensitive subject matter ranging from sensitive historical material/topics (for example: historical images related to genocide) to explicit images and language (for example: nude photography, archival letters, film or audio recordings). This policy is not intended to constrain scholarly or professional presentation, discourse, or debate, as long as these exchanges are conducted in a respectful manner.

Reporting

If you or someone else is being harassed, bullied, or discriminated against, please report it to KMHA as soon as possible. Contact a KMHA representative or administrator to report incidents. You may also do so by submitting a detailed account of the incident here: https://kymuseums.org/contact/. To report anonymously, leave the “name” and “email” fields blank. Please know that KMHA cannot follow up on anonymous submissions but will take your report seriously.

KMHA will respect confidentiality requests for the purpose of protecting victims of abuse. KMHA will not name victims without their affirmative consent.

If you are experiencing or witnessing an emergency, dial 911.

Consequences

Participants asked to stop any harassing, discriminatory, or bullying behavior are expected to comply immediately. Anyone who violates this Code of Conduct may be sanctioned or expelled from KMHA and all affiliated spaces with no refund of membership or registration fees at the discretion of the Board of Directors.

Adopted by the KMHA Board of Directors 2.6.24

Download the Code of Conduct as a .pdf below

KMHA Code of Conduct_2.6.24

This policy is based on the example policy from the Geek Feminism wiki; the US OpenGLAM Friendly Space Policy; the Society of American Archivists Code of Conduct; and the American Alliance of Museums AAM 2024 Code of Conduct.