IISG Symposium on Collecting Sources in Social History (Part 2;semi-live blog)
December 14th, 2008 by JimThe afternoon session is devoted to two related topics and led by Jan Lucassen. 
RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN COLLECTIONS AND RESEARCH
He starts by referring back to the position paper and refers to the trias informatica as an analytical tool to see what the shape of the forces are and that this needs to be thought of dynamically. As to Academic and Political Considerations he thinks we’ve gone all over from theoretical to practical. We’ll disaggregate when we have discuss new ideas. Most of the talk was about the relation of institutions like this and the movements whose documents we’d like to collect and make available for study and research.
Struck by the variety of attitude and approaches that the attendees have on this. Our point of departure is a democratic and civil society. Doesn’t know how they could have done differently. Recognizes that this isnt the situation in all of the world. We could makes taxonomies of all the different regions but we didn’t. In honor of Jaap this is the first time that they’ve had a free form discussion on such a high-level topic. Appreciates the day-to-day examples that people are offering as practical versions of the ideal.
[The discussion has people primed to present ‘interventions’ - prepared statements on the topic in order to start off the topic]
Jan quotes from the overview paper:
“Although on principle collection-building institutes may refrain totally from research and just opentheir treasures to outside users, in many cases they also conduct research in the field of social history, most often on the basis of their own collections. Sometimes this results in one-off sometimes in journals or periodicals. A few of the institutions also have full-fledged research departments, like the IISH has had for more than two decades now. This raises questions as to the degree of interdependence of its collection building and research policies. In the history of the Institute varying answers have been formulated, lately the position of semi-independence has been defended: both collections and research have their own history, their own logic and their own specific environment. Yet, the building of the collection in part depends on the input of the researchers, and they make use of the collections. Most of the researchers obviously are from the wider field of social history and not from the IISH itself, and they also make their voices heard. Nevertheless, the degree of interdependence of, and synergy between the research department and the collection building department is something to be discussed, as is the ideal composition of the Institute’s staff.”
Discussion begins:
Concern about oral histories and the fact that in The South these may be the only records. Only an elite minority have written record e.g Bangladesh, etc. How do we approach an oral sources collection? Historians don’t pay attention to these materials. How do we collect, make available and facilitate the use of these important sources?
Someone speaks to the challenges of an oral history project launched by his institution in Turkey - One thousand witnesses to history. Subjects over 70 years old, last reps of specialties like artisans, etc. Modeled on an EU project. Only managed 190 interviews so far. They are now spending a lot of time training and organizing amateur local historians to carry on this work.
Pros and- cons of uniting or separating research from collecting activity within the same institution - research is market-driven within the western academy. We should worry about how this affects collecting. It also infects archival practices and ordering with various biases. That suggests we should invest in helping people to write and order their own stories. Create opportunities where these people can share their own stories with one another - and we record. Let them define and tell us who their knowledge transmitters are.
Example of archival collections, historians, and politics interplay is Musée Social, Paris founded 1899. A scientific and research group that is not part of the academy that has produced a body of research and been the basis for many dissertations. The IALHI network (social history collecting institutions) is mentioned as an organization to which the Musee and the IISG belong; bigger institutions in the group should help the smaller particularly with the challenges of digital production and preservation.
Older people who used to be in a social movement are now returning to use the archives of their movements.
If you train people to tell their own stories and create their own histories at the lowest local level you also have to provide them with backup and support. This is the kind of work that is very fragile. Even when done successfully can disappear very easily as soon as attention or resource levels change. Taking the history of localities also helps to mend the breach between generations and gives the current generation a genuine sense of their own history.
What knowledge producers get privileged? IISG, NYU, etc. support very privileged researchers. Proximity and cost of travel are a big obstacle for others. Giving social history materials safe haven takes them out of the hands of lots of the people who really would like to use them.
From a managerial point of view archives and researchers belong to different tribes. Only thing they have in common is ‘history’ which gives them their reason for being and they have government which tries to strangle them both. Researchers think archivists are technical assistants. Often archivists think researchers are the enemy. Intensive research can kill the material (from a physical standpoint).
The central archive of the Communist Party was never consulted by a member of the Communist Party. (?!)
A number of representatives from different institutions say how this support for collecting and researchers works out in their own organization.
An archive without researchers has a very difficult time in defining its collection policy or to know how it should be described. Collections often get built around particular type of research and that then becomes the collecting policy of the institution i.e. I’m a social historian. I use social history collections.
If collections and research are very tightly connected then the danger is that the researcher interests alone will drive the collecting policy. You then devalue the collection because continuity is lost.
Return to reasons these institutions were created. In some cases it was because researchers interested in social history didn’t have the materials to study contemporary social or labor history. Researchers needed things and created the collecting institutions.
Archivists obsessed with the most accurate and complete description are in conflict with researchers desire to get at the materials as quickly as possible.
Research themes are more important to have than the collections. You should acquire collections in support of research themes. Feels strongly that this is the theme. Discussion about whether collecting institutions can actually set the research theme. Most think the institutions are much too small; others imagine it is their obligation.
IISG Afternoon session two
If the observation about researchers and archivists are in different tribes is true, how long will it be true? As archives collect data on which researchers have been working i.e. as the data by-products of research become collected and offered for use by other researchers, then the relation between the two professions will change. Example: collecting the data that corrects official statistics on strikes and offering it to others for use in their analyses. Not something an archivist could collect until the researchers produce it with the archivists’ help.
Research and collections have their own logics and momentum. Research agenda setting has its own autonomy and its own forces. These two cannot exist without the other.
INTERNATIONAL CONSIDERATIONS
Jan quotes from the position paper:
“We live in a world of national states and cultural heritage is often, and increasingly, conceived and defined in a strictly national way. That, after all, is why Greece wants back its Elgin marbles. Institutes with international collections therefore have something to explain. The ambitions of the IISH are truly international, both in the sphere of research and in the sphere of collecting, but that in itself leads to a paradox. On the one hand, its traditions imply that it engages itself to support efforts to salvage the historical legacy of social movements worldwide, which in many cases implies bringing over materials that are sensitive (both in a political and in a material sense) to Amsterdam. On the other hand, the traditions of internationalist solidarity of the institute also mean that, where possible, efforts should be made to make the materials available to those who need them most – the researchers in the different areas of the world in which the IISH is active. Building strong regional networks with IISH representation and “preferred partners” that are supported in their local role may be part of the answer, just as further strong investments in digitalization of the materials in the collections will allow the IISH to make them available to the users in the country of origin, in a sense “giving them back to the world.” It should also be noted that institutes like the IISH, with a predilection for oppositional, and often radical, movements can act as safe havens for the legacy of those movements, precisely by removing them from their country of origin. To take one example from the Institute’s collections: the papers pertaining to the German Rote Armee Fraktion have not been deposited in Germany for obvious reasons. However, in taking this stance, the Institute has questions to answer from authorities and a general public concerned with national safety.”
As soon as you talk about heritage the national scope becomes a difficult factor.
[The various ‘interventions’ begin]
Trying to protect materials that are in danger can look a lot like the colonial plunder of heritage that so many of the people here abhor. Some institutions have the policy that they will return materials to the country of origin as soon as their are institutions there which can take proper care of them not just physical care but care to provide them to researchers in an appropriate way.
Transfering the materials from other countries with oppressive or difficult regimes is a big challenge. Having regional offices in country is one important way to make identification and transfer easier.
Basis presumption is that if there is a local solution you do not take the materials out of the country. If there is nowhere then is it still working material for the group? If it is then you provide them a copy immediately and transfer the originals. Even if there is a local solution they might prefer to have their materials at the IISG (alongside the Marx archives with which they identify, etc.) Even if the physical solution is present the political situation might be such that the material cannot be returned because of the potential for state and police use of the producers or those mentioned in the materials.
At one end the simple solution might be found locally and at the other might be a very clear need to remove the materials from the country. Lots of situations in between these two poles.
Often western democracies pass laws that allow unpleasant governments elsewhere to bring legal suits that would let them get access to very sensitive materials e.g. Iran could start a lawsuit around documents they call ‘cultural heritage’ because the law leaves it to the two countries to define what constitutes ‘cultural heritage’.
There is a great difficulty in determining when there is a moral basis for ‘rescuing’ documentation from inside another country. This maps to some of the issues that have long been faced by museums. My rescue is your plunder.
What’s the difference between an archival collection and an artifact? If we claim that the information content is the important thing rather than the container it suggests that the material is an archival collection even if having a copy would be regarded as inadequate.
Basic policy at IISG is to discuss with the depositors what kind of access policy they desire. In no case will the IISG on its decide whether an archive should be open. Sometimes the IISG has to tell people they recommnd that an archive be closed because of the dangers the information would pose to them if they were to be used by the wrong people.
The time dimension is important. Difficulties that justified rescue or closing an archive can disappear over time. What’s the obligation then?
An unprincipled government could want to kill the people named in an archive but still declare that the papers in the archive are their national heritage.
Soviet Union never thought that immigration was their national heritage now they consider it a vital piece of their heritage.
The historical record is getting bent because of various legal rights now being attached to data gathering e.g. can’t take an oral history without going through a human subject review board. So you don’t do it and it’s lost.
Final exchanges consist of various examples of legal and ethical issues in collection building particularly ones that change the relation between researchers and those they are researching.
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