Archival Silences

Douglas Crimp begins his essay by delivering a story about a librarian, Julia Van Haaftan and how she was interested in the photography organization at the Art and Architecture Division of the New York Public Library. In addition, Crimp delivers his most enlightening and meaningful point by explaining how Julia Van Haaftan is also now a “director of the Photographic Collections Documentation Project”. She discovered several lost books and photographs, which she researched, re-categorizing, and placed them under the photography or art category in the photographic collection. I found this section of the essay entertaining because it demonstrates that the history books can get lost

To attain these achievements, the author depends on a wide collection of detailed interviews, personal accounts, critical social theories, and public archives. In chapter one and

The museum believes in a pastiche and populist pathway, in which the history of all people is displayed. Its interactive viewpoint allows this museum to convey history in a way that would be more accessible to its audience. For example, patrons are given the opportunity to record their own history. However, academics, such as Keith Windschuttle, assert that the NMA is a “profound intellectual waste”. He argues that although it displays accurate history, it’s purpose of entertaining its audience detracts from its value, thus creating “waste”. Although Windschuttle’s view may be extreme, it demonstrates the considerable extent to which the tension between academic and popular historians exist.

Feminism is a prominent controversy in present times and is relevant through literary works. In the article, “Throwing like a Girl,” James Fallows analyzes that saying exactly for what it means in our society, and more importantly if there’s any truth to the stereotype. In the article, “Well Behaved Women Seldom Make History,” Laurel Thatcher Ulrich shows how feminist historians, by challenging traditional accounts of both men's and women's histories, have prompted more vibrant accounts of the past. While Fallows analyzes the styles of throwing to identify a possible theory of the stereotypical saying, “throwing like a girl,” Ulrich discusses and encourages women to be strong and accomplish their goals, by using her phrase “well behaved women seldom make history.”

I have to let the readers know how I stumbled upon this topic to introduce where I get my ideas from. It all started in the archive located on the second floor of the library in a dark corner behind a clear glass doors at the Hunter College. I have been attending Hunter College for four years and never have I stumbled on such an amazing place full of live history. I say live history because all the documents and books that are held in the archive are all preserved originals, which fascinated me. Thinking how people who lived more than century ago wrote and read the same things I’m writing and reading about excited me to my very soul. Archive research though fascinating is not an easy task that can be done in within fifteen minutes like how researches are done these days using convenient technologies at hand.

Oral history is described by Cooper, as “personal reminiscence” (Cooper 192) that is gathered by the researcher through an interview format. It can focus on the life; specific events or memories of the person being interviewed or specific moments that the interviewer wants to focus on. Secondly, oral tradition is seen as “stories about the past that local populations produce and reproduce through oral performative transmissions, as a means of preserving their history and consolidating or contesting a sense of belonging and identity” (Cooper 192). Cooper highlights two different critiques of oral traditions, the first one being the structuralist critique. Structuralists argue that oral traditions are more symbolic and universal than historical and literal (Cooper 195). On the other hand, the presentist critique argues that oral traditions only function to reproduce existing structures which only tells us about the present, not the

In 2007, Laurel Ulrich, wrote Well-Behaved Women Seldom Make History, from which there is an essay that speaks on history, and how women have been left out. She wrote this as a result of her newfound fame due to a phrase in her 1976 journal article; this phrase would ultimately give her 2007 article it’s name. In her essay, her goal is to write about the lack of women in history as a whole; she then illustrates the type of women who by a turn of fate make it into history. Her point being that on few occasions women are written in history books, and even when they are, they are not the women who lead ordinary lives; most of the history that include women is tied to some groundbreaking or exotic

An archive is a collection of historical documents or records providing information about a place, institution, or group of people. The current collection consists of assassination records, pictures, artifacts, and sound recordings.

“Working in the Archives: Practical Research Methods for Rhetoric and Composition” is a comprehensive guide for aspiring scholars to navigate research. In chapter --, Lyenee Lewis Gaillet addresses the need to instruct students how to use the research archives and recognize the philosophical assumptions that lie in the worldview of the researcher. Gaillet gives precautions concerning the interpretation of facts, which provoked reflections of my experience processessing artifacts. I took an internship opportunity in a small for-profit museum in Midway, Georgia, a rural town haunted with deep colonial and Civil War history. My primary task was to transcribe unprocessed documents from the museum’s archives.

ORIGINAL DOCUMENTS (excerpts or translations acceptable): Diaries, speeches, manuscripts, letters, interviews, news film footage, autobiographies, official records

The secrets of the past have a way of shaping many lives. Griffin`s essay focuses on the idea of secrets by using various techniques to address this topic. Her essay uses an objective and indirect approach to guide the reader to translate the moments she records. Griffin does this by interviewing people to discover the past, providing descriptive reports of illustrations to promote a visual perspective, and ultimately the paintings are used to make the reader analyze their purpose. These methods are valuable because it promotes critical thinking and different points of views to tell the story.

Representations are not merely objective truth, but encompass conscious selectivity and emphasis which shape and define the meaning we derive from a text. The importance of the Smithsonian's Bearing Witness to History site as both a historical and American representation causes a divergence in its purpose, between its obligation for factual accuracy and intrinsic support of specific cultural values. Deepa Mehta's film Earth (1996) demonstrates the manipulation of texts to shape the meaning we derive from the past, influenced by our memory of the past, distorted by personal context. Despite delving into different historical events, each text demonstrates the complementary relationship of historical truth and memory, a constructed dynamic

When humanity commits atrocious acts, it is the job of the survivors to ensure that these events are remembered and the victims honored. The construction of memory through various methods of remembrance – whether it be memoirs, films or museums – is a delicate art as perceptions can be easily skewed. A biased perspective has the capacity to completely alter the way an event is viewed. The War Remnants Museum in Ho Chi Minh about the Vietnam War for example is more propaganda than history and dishonors the memory of the brutal time. Likewise, when constructing the memory of the Cambodian Genocide, one must strive to portray an honest representation and approach it from many sides. Only by receiving a story from various sources can such an important

Abstract: This essay reflects on the relationship of photographs, history, and memory based on a found and mutilated photo album. Photographs provide opportunities for disrupting and restructuring history with their attraction to memory; they privilege the subjective, creative power of the personal explanation and provide an emotional and even ideological grounding for memory. Photographs as manifestations of memory assist in the process of understanding the present.

Another form of silent censorship occurs when the information professional decides for personal reasons or “perceived community standards” ( Kampen & Spino, 2007, p. 223) to not select an item. Staples (1996) discusses how some books 'disappear' (para. 6) from library shelves, either due to a parent who does not want to go through the process of a challenge, or a librarian who fears for their job. Information professionals have to be ever more selective about what they purchase for their collections due to ever decreasing budgets. Publishers and authors, cognizant of possible issues with certain topics and words, are also much more careful about what they accept for publication and what they write about. (paras.