Archival Memory Research Articles

Flotation Devices Re-stor(y)ing Haunted South African Ocean Herstories through Mending as a Decolonial Love Language

ABSTRACT This paper engages in a dialogical meaning ∞ making between South African Story-tailor Cleo Droomer and sociologist/artist Dylan McGarry, exploring Droomer's creation of “floatation devices” or “Life(Jackets).” Using a “pedagogy of echolocation” that surfaces the living archival memory of Droomer's artworks, the authors navigate the haunted entanglements implicit with our relationships with the ocean. Their tactile research, rooted in personal and intergenerational trauma, utilizes heirloom fabrics to craft social wearable sculptures. These pieces facilitate a dialogue with his ancestors, from the apartheid-induced removal of his grandparents from the ocean to his enslaved forebears. Droomer's work highlights the ocean's role in the transatlantic and Indian Ocean slave trades, underscoring the need for recognizing it as a site of remembrance and intangible heritage. This contrasts with the acknowledgment of other sites of human suffering, emphasizing the importance of acknowledging the ocean's historical significance. KEY POLICY HIGHLIGHTS Our oceans are haunted in South Africa by complex exclusions, violence’s and sunken histories, and require re-configured “flotation devices” to surface them. The rush for Oil and Gas and other extractive rapid Blue Economy activities are not just violently excluding marginalized communities, they erase the necropolitics of our ocean. Art-making as a form of thinking, theorizing and re-membering/re-configuring our histories can offer ways to surface and work with our ocean heritage with the context of Blue Economy expansion. Global Bodies like the International Sea-bed Authority (ISA) and UNESCO overlook the seabed and ocean as sites of human suffering and cultural history, and should consider Droomer’s sculptural policy briefs, i.e. (Life)Jackets. Social Sculpture and “story-tailoring” offers ongoing living archives or “an-archives” to support meaningful approaches to practicing Ubuntu and re-figuring our relational ontologies with the ocean. Mending both as a practice, and as a figurative theory is an embodied phronesis for decolonial justice, or “love-language.”

Photographs of Solidarity and Archival Memory in the Miners’ Strike 1984–1985

The paper discusses the cultural memory of the Miners’ Strike 1984–1985 and questions the role that photographic documents can play in the process of memorialization of the events. The photographs of solidarity groups composed of women and LGBT people taken by Format agency photographers and currently held in archives have been largely understudied. The paper discusses whether revisiting these neglected photographic documents taken at the time might enable for a reassessment of the cultural memory of the miners’ strike from the perspective of female photographers.

Creating a City for All of Us: The Possible Role of the Fediverse in Archiving Civic Urban Memory

This paper attempts to build a case for adopting the model of the Fediverse to archive digital citizen-generated urban memory. Examining literature from several relevant fields of debate acts as a pragmatic foundation for reasoning to then outline potential core technical functionality for provision of such an archive, using the Mastodon app as an example. This ‘civic urban memory’ archive is considered as open, curated by citizens themselves and owned by them through civic public ownership in a context of technological sovereignty. Reflecting on issues of citizen self curated and moderated memory collection archives, and the potential for opt-in or anonymous archive posting may offer some mechanisms for fair and open curation, moderation and privacy protection in such archives. Conceptual backdrop for a civic urban memory archive is placed in current debates concerning civic technological platforms acting as a digital public good in a context of a techno-social contract for learning, with a co-constructed shared civic urban memory forming part of open incidental lifelong learning in a future learning city.

Documentary as Memory Archive and Feminist Practice

This essay reflects on the significance of documentary filmmaking in the context of Latin American documentaries, in general, and Chilean films, in particular. It also reflects on how Latinas’ diasporic memories of place affect identity and how we think of the past through language and images. Feminist film activism is a way to build an archive of women’s lives and voices revealing how gender shapes them. The short documentary La chispa en la pradera (Spark in the Meadow, 2023) displays feminist activism and feminist memories that cut across different generations of women fighting for equality and justice in contemporary Chile.

Sharing Stories, Food and Passports: Forced Migration, Museum and Memory Activism in Contemporary Germany

ABSTRACT This article uses the online exhibition ‘Arriving: Life after Forced Migration’ by the Marienfelde Refugee Center Museum in Berlin as a case study to investigate how museum activism can contribute to creating and disseminating memories about contemporary forced migration. Employing a close visual and textual analysis of the online exhibition combined with insights from recent discourses on museum activism, migration and memory studies, the article explores which forms of memory the exhibition creates, how these memories emerge and to which end they are used. The analysis firstly illustrates how the exhibition creates a space for communicative memory to surface within the portrayed refugee families through the sharing of stories, objects and food from ‘home’. Secondly, it goes on to argue that the exhibition engages in memory activism by humanizing the portrayed individuals, exposing discriminatory state practices and challenging the audience through provocative questions. Thirdly, the article submits that this online exhibition contributes to a growing transnational archive of forced migration memories. Comprised of a multitude of online platforms dedicated to collecting, preserving and sharing forced migration stories, this archive stimulates multidirectional memory making and allows counter narratives to surface within an increasingly divided Europe.

“Against Forgetting”

This paper investigates the witnessing and memory-making functions of the poetry of Kashmiri-American poet Agha Shahid Ali. Against the backdrop of prevailing institutionalized constraints on journalism and mass media reportage by a postcolonial nation-state in a conflict-ridden territory, this paper shows how Shahid’s poetry fills the lacuna and serves not only as an archive of collective memories of his people, or witness to their sufferings, but also engages the critical as well as emotional faculties of a wider audience to elicit empathies and garner committed solidarities. It throws light on the complexity of witnessing with respect to the poet’s positionality as he bore witness to the occurrences of his homeland while being physically distant from it and yet offering a substitution to news, especially in the present times when journalism, in Kashmir, has failed in its obligation to represent the experiences of the ordinary people. The study primarily focuses on Shahid’s 1997 collection, The Country Without a Post Office, for its investigation of the witnessing functions of his poetry.

Acque che scorrono, storie che rimangono: il fiume Lambro come archivio della memoria collettiva

Abstract Flowing Waters, Lasting Stories: the Lambro River as an Archive of Collective Memory The Lambro River has profoundly shaped Lombardy’s landscape and local communities throughout history. This paper aims to investigate the connection between the river and the identity of these communities by analyzing how changes in landscape have been reflected in both tangible and intangible cultural expressions. Studying this heritage offers insights into how the Lambro has been perceived and integrated into the local community’s identity over time, becoming a fundamental element of their sense of belonging. To achieve this objective, this research uses art, literature, and music, which not only portray the region but also provide valuable insights in the evolution of collective identities across generations.

A Study on the Impossibility of Representing the Archival Memory and Reconstruction of a Futuristic Fiction: Works by Ayoung Kim and Lindsay Seers

A Study on the Impossibility of Representing the Archival Memory and Reconstruction of a Futuristic Fiction: Works by Ayoung Kim and Lindsay Seers

Archives, Transitional Justice and the Spectre of Politics

Abstract This review essay considers The Prisons Memory Archive. A Case Study in Filmed Memory of Conflict edited by Jolene Mairs Dyer, Conor McCafferty and Cahal McLaughlin (2022) and Archives and Human Rights edited by Jens Boel, Perrine Canavaggio and Antonio González Quintana (2021). Both books are discussed in terms of their key themes, approaches and contributions before discussing their specific contributions to understanding the interaction of transitional, domestic and international politics and archival practice.

Mobile phone activism during Israel’s ‘Operation Guardian of the Wall’ in Gaza

The 11-day war in May 2021 between Israel and Palestine (Gaza) is worth investigating as a phenomenon of recording war testimonies and memories by civilian mobile phone users. This article explores mobile phone usage by Palestinian civilians to record and document everyday war narratives. The users document, archive and disseminate diverse war memories on various social media platforms. Semi-structured (ethnographic) interviews and interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) are included in the methodological design to understand the patterns of mobile phone activism by civilians during Israel’s Operation Guardian of the Wall in Gaza. The authors argue that the physical and digital (phygital) spaces exist simultaneously, forming the socio-psychological presence of the users in the war and making them significant stakeholders of the Israel–Palestine war narrative. The emergence of a phygital presence signifies a comprehensive representation and archive of civilian war testimonies. Users’ mobile phone footage plays a significant role in shaping discourses of dissent and mobile activism, driving and sustaining collective emotions regarding the repercussions of war. These discourses also contribute to the socio-psychological construction of a phygital memory archive, enriching the conflict’s broader narrative.

Memory Preservation in Cambodian Graphic Narratives

Since the Cambodian genocide (1975-79), first-and-second generation survivors have developed new ways of processing personal and national trauma, including through the mode of graphic arts. This paper first extrapolates how graphic narratives differ from comics and cartoons. Then the graphic narrative’s role in assisting genocide survivors will be examined. In this section, the works of graphic artists, Ing Phoussera, Aki Rai, and Vath Nath, will be specifically looked at in relation to Franz Stanzel’s idea of ‘reflector narratives’ and Mieke Bal’s definition of ‘focalization.’ The paper will also focus on how graphic narratives have become a mode for second-generation survivors to engage with the past through Bui Long’s ‘refugee repertoire’ and Marianne Hirsch’s concept of ‘postmemory.’ Within this section, Tian Veasna’s Year of the Rabbit’s will be analyzed. Aspects considered include illustration, dialogue, and layered content. Finally, this paper will look at how graphic narratives contribute to the concept of the memory archive and “memory citizenship” within Cambodia. Specific questions that prompt my research include: What is a graphic narrative? Can graphic narratives be sources of memoir and postmemory? How do graphic narratives function as a tool for remembering and working through trauma for artists and readers?

‘Prendemos uma das peças fundamentais da subversão do país’: A construção da figura do inimigo nos memorandos policiais de 1975 após a prisão de Marcos Osatinsky

Abstract In the following article, I investigate the modes of construction of a specific subjectivity in the 1970s in Argentina: the figure of the enemy at the onset of the last civic-military dictatorship in the country. To achieve this, I focus on the arrest of Marcos Osatinsky, head of the Montoneros organisation, in Córdoba in August 1975. I analyse the how his arrest was handled by the security forces, based on police memoranda that refer to this event, available for consultation in the Archivo Provincial de la Memoria [Provincial Memory Archive]. I inquire how the Córdoba police functioned in the 1970s, and how what happened to Osatinsky was reflected in the writing practices of the police through police memos, in order to understand how the figure of the subversive was constructed in this handling of the facts.

Travelogs of Journeys to Lithuania in Early 15th–19th Century: The Problem of Egodocumentality and Typology

The article discusses the egodocumentary travel writing of trips to/inside Lithuania, which is characterised by an autobiographical first-person narration, and examines its origins, development, and dissemination. Based on the methodological paradigms of research into the cultural heritage of a manuscript and printed book, the concepts of memory archive, book communication cycle, and the social life of books, an attempt is made to draw the boundaries among the types of this writing (typology), and the intentions of the writing and publishing process are revealed. The case study is based on manuscript and published travel descriptions by both Lithuanian and foreign authors for the routes in the territory of Lithuania or on the Lithuanian border. It was found that first-person narration and an author’s ‘participation’ are present not only in manuscript travel accounts that are personal and those belonging to one’s relatives (family, clan, descendants), but also in texts that engage a wider audience and are published and distributed through various media. The attempt at a typology of travel egodocumentation revealed a gap between a genetic taxonomy based on the notion of the personal archive as a treasure trove of memory and a literary classification based on contemporary genres of travel writing. Travel accounts were created on the basis of the worldview prevailing in the society of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, which formed a canon different from the European one. Noteworthy are the hitherto understudied egodocumentary marginalia, diaries in calendars that reflect the culture of travel in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.

Annotations as Knowledge Practices in Image Archives: Application of Linked Open Usable Data and Machine Learning

We reflect on some of the preliminary findings of the Participatory Knowledge Practices in Analogue and Digital Image Archives (PIA) research project around annotations of photographic archives from the Swiss Society for Folklore Studies (SSFS) as knowledge practices, the underlying technological decisions, and their impact. The aim is not only to seek more information but to find new approaches of understanding the way in which people’s memory relate to the collective, public form of archival memory and ultimately how users figure in and shape the digital archive. We provide a proof-of-concept workflow based on automatically generated annotations comprising 53,481 photos that were subjected to object detection using Faster R-CNN Inception ResNet V2. Of the detected objects, 184,609 have a detection score greater than 0.5, 123,529 have a score greater than 0.75, and 88,442 have a score greater than 0.9. A threshold of 0.75 was set for the dissemination of our annotations, compatible with the W3C Web Annotation Data Model (WADM) and embedded in our IIIF Manifests. In the near future, the workflow will be upgraded to allow for the co-existence of various, and occasionally conflicting, assertions made by both human and machine users. We believe that Linked Open Usable Data (LOUD) standards should be used to improve the sustainability of such an ecosystem and to foster collaboration between actors in cultural heritage.

Understanding memory transmission in disaster risk reduction practices: A case study from Japan

“Disasters strike when they have faded from memory”, is a powerful quote from the Japanese geophysicist Terada Torahiko (1878–1935). This sentence, often used when addressing the need to improve disaster resilience, is a powerful reminder of the role that local memories of past disasters play in ensuring the safety of communities exposed to hazards. Twelve years from the Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami (GEJET) that hit Japan Tohoku's East Coast, this article aims at understanding how the transmission of local knowledge and experiences of past disasters contributes to increasing community resilience to tsunami risks. Based on field research along the coast of the Japanese prefectures of Iwate, Miyagi and Fukushima, this study analyses 11 semi-structured in-depth interviews, to investigate the role of memory transmission in preparing for tsunami risks such as the GEJET. The data was analysed following a narrative approach and through thematic coding with the use of NVivo. Coding structures led to the identification of disaster memory transmission practices in the case study areas and allowed the testing of the relevance of the theoretical framework to community disaster resilience studies. Results are aligned with the theoretical framework and show that disaster memorials are more likely to influence community resilience if passed down using a combination of oral transmission and interpretation together with the use of backup memory archives and physical objects. Such practices are recommended as they allow both the communicability and durability of lessons-learned. Transmitting and maintaining a constant interaction between these two forms of memory is the responsibility of those institutions that oversee the keeping alive of memories, by continuously repurposing and renewing them while engaging with exposed communities.

In the gutters of grief and shame: drawing displacement in Kim Suk Gendry-Kim’s Grass

ABSTRACT This essay explores the haunting shadows of coloniality through the lens of shame and grief. Highlighting the graphic novel Grass by Keum Suk Gendry-Kim, I trace the diasporic linkages between gendered violence, colonial amnesia, and the patriarchal silencing of the stories of ‘comfort women.’ I argue that the search for legibility and homecoming trouble shame, grief, and memory. Shame and the female body play a central role in the narrative and visual framework of Gendry-Kim’s graphic novel. It challenges us to reconsider our understanding of history by engaging with shame that disrupts history. Such alternative archives of memory are important in that they articulate exclusions that frame history, documenting stories about home, diaspora, displacement, and their aftereffects from the vantage point of women who are relegated to the haunting shadows left by the legacies of war.

The transnational archival memory of European integration

The European Coal and Steel Community established in 1951, the European Atomic Energy Community, and the European Economic Community, both established in 1957, built the roots of the European single market and are direct forerunners of today’s European Union. The vision of a united post-War (Western) Europe went far beyond economic considerations, as can be seen in the preamble of the Rome Treaties with its concept of “ever closer union”. It made the European Union a unique transnational political and cultural phenomenon based on common values and supranational decision-making processes. Archives hold the memory of the multi-levelled European integration process. European integration produced a new model of transnational archives with specific privileges, immunities and working methods. These archives preserve the legal acts, negotiations, correspondence, and documents produced by intergovernmental or nongovernmental European institutions and organisations and make them available to the public. The Historical Archives of the European Union play a central role in transmitting the memory, informing the public and fostering research on these diverse types of archives.

Book review: The Prisons Memory Archive: A Case Study in Filmed Memory of Conflict

Book review: The Prisons Memory Archive: A Case Study in Filmed Memory of Conflict

Pelopidarum secunda: a ‘site of memory’ in the history of Elizabethan revenge tragedy

AbstractPelopidarum secunda is an understudied anonymous English adaptation of Seneca's Agamemnon and Sophocles' Electra. The play is preserved only in manuscript and was probably performed at Winchester College around 1590. Through a combination of Marvin Carlson's notions of ‘ghosting’ and of the ‘site of memory’ with a neo‐historicist approach, the article offers a close analysis of this neglected school play from an intertextual, performative, and extratextual perspective. The analysis shows that the play is haunted by memories of its classical sources and of other performance contexts, including the church, and contains potential allusions to contemporary royal figures. In so doing, I argue that Pelopidarum secunda showcases the role of classical models in the history of Elizabethan revenge tragedy. By conjuring up memorable sources—Sophocles and Seneca—and events—past performances and executions—the unknown playwright(s) had the ambition to make Pelopidarum secunda equally memorable. Although this attempt has evidently failed given the obscurity into which the play has fallen so far, Pelopidarum secunda deserves a place in the archival memory of classical reception as well as further scholarly attention within early modern English drama studies.

A surviving camera: reorganized choreographies for the long mode of change

ABSTRACT This article examines the choreographic sphere through the perspectives of cine-digitalities, archival memories, and camera mediations. I argue that our pandemic and post-pandemic Zoomscapes introduced a new cine-material plane that reorganized the choreographic process, as well as its presence and remoteness. I investigate how the web camera's distinct repository of temporality propels the dance archive forward, its complexity heightened by the pandemic. In all instances, rather than describing works of dance, I focus on how they emerge in this particular digital constellation, while delineating how they occur as complex events: as kinetic objects, kinetic surfaces, and kinetic proceedings, conjoined and choreographically labored by the camera.