Difference between revisions of "Methods & Sources of Historical Research"

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* Institute of Archaeology (UCL)
 
* Institute of Archaeology (UCL)
 
* Library of SOAS
 
* Library of SOAS
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* Warburg
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* Warburg http://warburg.sas.ac.uk/
 
* Heythrop College Library (for religious history)
 
* Heythrop College Library (for religious history)
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* Check out SCONUL (when i'm in school again....)
 
* Check out SCONUL (when i'm in school again....)
  
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=== Also see: warburg ===
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=== Senate House Library ===
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* WARBURG: http://warburg.sas.ac.uk/
 
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== Senate House Library ==
 
  
 
* SEE Special collections - http://www.senatehouselibrary.ac.uk/our-collections/special-collections - access i think is free for non-instituitional researchers
 
* SEE Special collections - http://www.senatehouselibrary.ac.uk/our-collections/special-collections - access i think is free for non-instituitional researchers
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* SUMMER TIME DEAL: http://www.senatehouselibrary.ac.uk/membership/other-categories/summer-membership
 
* SUMMER TIME DEAL: http://www.senatehouselibrary.ac.uk/membership/other-categories/summer-membership
  
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== Visiting Archives ==
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=== Visiting Archives ===
  
 
* BRITAIN vs REST OF WORLD / Interesting locations of Scottish and Irish records - may be scattered due to politics - you are likely to spend time in several places
 
* BRITAIN vs REST OF WORLD / Interesting locations of Scottish and Irish records - may be scattered due to politics - you are likely to spend time in several places
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== Day 2: LMA ==
 
== Day 2: LMA ==
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=== A visit to the London Metropolitan Archive ===
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lma opac
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=== Bishopsgate INstitute ===
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* http://www.bishopsgate.org.uk/
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* Bishopsgate Institute opened 1895.
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* The original aims of the Institute were to provide a public library, public hall and meeting rooms for people living and working in the City of London. The Great Hall in particular was ‘erected for the benefit of the public to promote lectures, exhibitions and otherwise the advancement of literature, science and the fine arts'.
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* improving reading and literacy for the Working class - in the east end.
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* handles on the side of the bookshelves (original) which were used to allow people to climb up and access the higher shelves. however, the women felt the men could see their ankles and up their skirts so asked to ahve a seperate Women's reading room. the main reading room in the library today is the men's reading room.
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*
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* Digression: whilst looking for images of the amazing glass roof i found that they actively do editathons! - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_LGBT_studies/Editathons/Bishopsgate_Library,_London - The Bishopsgate Library is keen to collect more material for the LGBT+ archives, so this could be the chance you have been waiting for to donate Pride march photographs from the 1980s through to original meeting minutes from a gay society. (How amazing!) - Women and African Americans and the LGBT community are using edit-a-thons as a way of bridging the gap in Wikipedia's sexual and racial makeup
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* Digression continues! : [https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Wikipedia_Education_Program_handouts_in_English Wikipedia Education Program handouts in English]
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==== IMPORTANT LINKS ===
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* Finding resources at Bishopsgate: http://www.bishopsgate.org.uk/LibraryCatalogue.aspx
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* Subject Guides: http://www.bishopsgate.org.uk/Library/Library-and-Archive-Collections

Revision as of 18:09, 12 July 2016

Notes from a course on methods and sources of historical research at IHR, 11 July 2016 - 15 July 2016

Interspersed by comments and notes which are mine own (DBBD!) and may or may not be representative of IHR views on the matter....

DAY 1

The Nature of Archives and Primary Source Material

  • Notion of difference between primary and secondary sources... but its quite fuzzy
  • Primary = unmediated access to past (not processed by another mind)
  • Newspapers = a report of what has been told. testimonies are primary but the reporter has chewed thru the material.
  • Historians make statements about things which should be believed - by people who don't have access to primary sources
  • Having looked at the primary sources = is the reason why people listen to historians
  • Does digitization undermine the authority of the historian who derives his/her authority on basis on having the ability to find the primary source material? - should not be - because the historian should define his/her role based on his/her ability to contextualise
  • Primary sources tend to be gathered and held in institutions called archives. historians tend to be interested in written material. others look at other types of materials , objects, material culture, etc.
  • archive - gatekeepers? destroyed by organisations because deemed not of interest?
  • uk? governments destroy 90%? of records - horrifying but also liberating
  • previously history was dead white male europeans, now there is a broadening of history
  • an archive is a set of staff to administer a procedure of cataloguing and ordering
  • the diff between archival and library catalogue is that libraries have certain systems which attempt to divide human knowledge into recognisable chunks
  • archive - institutional procedure orders it rather the dewey
  • archive - not published material
  • library - published
  • brick and mortar reality to an archive (not pure virtual)
  • talking about it in relation to organisation / but also there is question of power of access / gatekeeper
  • point is that we will need to apply a different method of accessing / searching when using archives (compared to libraries) as they are accessed differently
  • surrogacy: what is an original? today we like copies, we think of them as being useful.
  • digitisation processes
  • money, power, etc
  • archives -> state / nation building --> even church was doing this
  • newspapers - pdf ocr - things missed out: compositor (context of what was around this article, what else would be seen by a real reader of newspaper with many articles), marginalia, emphasis, etc
  • Qn to ponder: what is a public record?

Public Records

  • WHY ARE MOST BOAT RECORDS AT Greenwich , National Maritime Museum? - cos boat stuff seems more suitable there
  • WHY IS INDIA OFFICE RECORDS IN BL: Kew rationale that anything outside of English, Latin, French - they have no specialisation, so they gave it to British Library.


National Archives Research Guides

GUIDES! we have to think of it in terms of records being scattered to the wind and for various reasons being held at different places and we have to find out where these archives might be kept. Never give up hope!


TNA: Searching Example

What if i want to find something about Boots the chemist? What would be the thought process of how to start searching?...

  • would they be historically minded and keep their own archive?
  • would it be at wellcome collection cos its medical/pharma?
  • is there a chemist trade union and do they have a collection?
  • business archives council for business archives?

National Register of Archives

National Register of Archives (NRA) - a list of where to find records

Discovery at TNA is a combination of:

  • NRA, the National Register of Archives
  • ARCHON, directory of archives
  • A2A, Access to Archives
  • MDR, Manorial documents register

But how do we access this underlying database that is NRA?

Do note to use the Creator option.

Bootsplc.png Bootsplc2.png

Introduction to the Institute of Historical Research

Victoria County History

Bigredbook.png

Also see: COPAC

Interesting libraries in the area

  • Institute of Archaeology (UCL)
  • Library of SOAS
  • Warburg http://warburg.sas.ac.uk/
  • Heythrop College Library (for religious history)
  • Check out SCONUL (when i'm in school again....)

Senate House Library

  • SEE Special collections - http://www.senatehouselibrary.ac.uk/our-collections/special-collections - access i think is free for non-instituitional researchers
  • The Institute of Commonwealth Studies, founded in 1949, is the only postgraduate academic institution in the United Kingdom devoted to the study of the Commonwealth.
  • Senate House Library contact: jordan.landes@london.ac.uk

Visiting Archives

  • BRITAIN vs REST OF WORLD / Interesting locations of Scottish and Irish records - may be scattered due to politics - you are likely to spend time in several places
  • Going into british imperial holdings - the decolonisation moment. in most cases there was a transfer of records or archival system. but

"There is currently no single, unified online catalogue for searching across all archive collections in the UK..." :'-(

  • MAJOR TIP: GET A WELLCOME LIBRARY CARD - great online resources
  • France - Biblotheque Nationale
  • Germany - many records lost due to berlin bombing, decentralised records due to federal govt system
  • CONCLUSION: IT VARIES ACROSS THE WORLD
  • papers vs material culture collections such as the ones at LAARC: material not usable by nonspecialist.
  • http://archive.museumoflondon.org.uk/laarc/catalogue/
  • for that reason they tend not to have public facing catalogues as their material would anyway require specialists to handle or contextualise them
  • for maps, plans, ordnance survey - check BL first

Day 1 - Random thoughts

  • DEBBIE'S NOTES: copies of letters, drafted until perfect.... the originals i was so excited about are they original?
  • D.J. Cohen et al., ‘Interchange: The Promise of Digital History’, The Journal of American History, 95/2 (Sep., 2008), pp. 452-491
  • L. Putnam, ‘The Transnational and the Text-Searchable: Digitized Sources and the Shadows They Cast’, American Historical Review, (April 2016), pp. 376-402.

Thinking about the origins of Singapore's National Archives

  • how similar is it to british system?
  • From NAS website http://www.nas.gov.sg/nas/AboutUs/History.aspx: While the establishment of the National Archives of Singapore (NAS) has a relatively short history, it can trace its roots back to the creation of the post of Archivist within the Raffles Museum and Library in 1938. Then, Tan Soo Chye was appointed to trace, record, organise and preserve the historical colonial records and to perform research and administrative work spanning both the library and museum. In 1967, the National Archives and Records Centre Act was passed, and NAS was established the following year in 1968. In 1993, NAS together with the National Museum came under the management of the National Heritage Board. Due to a reorganisation of government ministries and portfolios, the NAS has since been transferred to become an institution under the National Library Board on 28 March 2013.


Day 2: LMA

A visit to the London Metropolitan Archive

lma opac

Bishopsgate INstitute

  • http://www.bishopsgate.org.uk/
  • Bishopsgate Institute opened 1895.
  • The original aims of the Institute were to provide a public library, public hall and meeting rooms for people living and working in the City of London. The Great Hall in particular was ‘erected for the benefit of the public to promote lectures, exhibitions and otherwise the advancement of literature, science and the fine arts'.
  • improving reading and literacy for the Working class - in the east end.
  • handles on the side of the bookshelves (original) which were used to allow people to climb up and access the higher shelves. however, the women felt the men could see their ankles and up their skirts so asked to ahve a seperate Women's reading room. the main reading room in the library today is the men's reading room.

= IMPORTANT LINKS

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