MAKING A SKELETON DANCE.

by CAROLINE BROWN, PROGRAMME LEADER ARCHIVES AND 
FAMILY HISTORY, CAIS, UNIVERSITY OF DUNDEE.

Introduction

The principles of family history research remain pretty much unaltered, but the manner in which this research is conducted has changed enormously since I embarked on my ancestral journey over thirty years ago.  I well remember my first visit to an archive office, back in the days when Northumberland’s county records were housed in Gosforth, and computers, although they existed were not commonly used for this type of research.  The experience is one that I will never forget, the thrill of being able to handle documents from a bygone era, whether relevant to my search or not, made a lasting impression.

These days more and more research is being carried out online, and it can take no time at all to achieve a page full of names.  But that is all they are – names.  The connection to our ancestors is largely being lost, replaced by formated text and digital images.  Even the simplest record such as a burial has a certain tangibility when seen handwritten in its original ledger, which cannot be achieved from viewing a typed transcription, in isolation, on a computer screen.

This week’s feature comes from Caroline Brown, Programme Leader, Archives and Family History, CAIS, University of Dundee.  I hope it will inspire you to re-engage with the fabulous original records that are held in Archives throughout the world.  

If you are interested in learning more, Caroline will be live on-line on the 16th July from 12.30 pm -1.30 pm to answer your questions regarding the comprehensive selection of courses offered by the University to help you achieve a greater understanding of these records, the historical context in which they were written and make your research more successful and rewarding.

Making a Skeleton Dance

In all of us there is a hunger, marrow deep, to know our heritage - to know who we are and where we came from. Without this enriching knowledge, there is a hollow yearning. No matter what our attainments in life, there is still a vacuum, an emptiness, and the most disquieting loneliness. -- Alex Haley, Roots

For many of us Haley’s quotation rings true. Whether we are dipping our toes in the field of family history or are seasoned genealogists we are driven by a desire ‘to know who we are and where we came from’. But what drives us to investigate the past, and what awaits us when we try, is more complex than this.

As an archivist I am interested in the role that records and archives play in the lives of individuals, and in organisations and society. Knowledge might not lead automatically to power, but you cannot have power without access to information. Often power leads to control of knowledge, as we have seen on many occasions: through state control of access to information, through governments using information to control individuals (such as by secret police), or through the destruction of heritage and information during wars and invasions, as is happening in some countries now. 

Records and archives can be used for positive purposes: to hold organisations to account, to protect the rights of citizens and to ensure that people’s rights to access to information are upheld. Records and archives are evidence, and as such they are a powerful tool in modern society. They have legal, judicial, and administrative significance. However more than this, and this may be the area with which you are most familiar, they have a cultural importance binding societies, families and individuals together. This cultural impact goes beyond the information that archives can provide about the past, and touches on who we are and how we remember. 

The field of memory and identity studies is a complex one involving many disciplines but archives play a central role. You might collect records (whether these are photographs, letters, diaries, films, or ephemera) from activities and events with which you have been involved. These records will be a way of remembering what happened, every time you look at them they will prompt you to remember the event. It may be that handling or even smelling something is just as important in triggering your memories as the visual prompts. But every time you look at a photograph or touch a letter you will be further removed from the event, you will essentially be remembering not only the event itself but also your previous memories. Moreover if the things that you decided to keep trigger memories, what aren’t you remembering? What else could you have kept which might have triggered or preserved other memories?

You will not be the only person with memories of that event, and your shared memories will link you together. These links may be particularly strong, such as those between families or communities, and these memories and links are part of what contributes to your (or your family’s) sense of identity. It may even be that the act of creating and bringing together archives and artefacts of your life, and of your ancestors, instigates or reinforces that identity.  Without this comes the yearning and emptiness that Haley speaks of. 

Most family historians may not articulate their interest in these terms. For them what is interesting is searching for information, playing the detective, collating evidence, piecing clues together and tracking down answers. But for this to be rewarding it is worth thinking about what records and archives are. For example we saw above that:

• Archives are evidence. Do you know whether what you are looking at is reliable? Is it authentic? What has happened to it since it was created.
• It is important to remember that everyone brings different memories, backgrounds, experiences and expectations to archives, and may go away with very different interpretations.
• Archives are not the past. It is as important to remember what hasn’t survived or what wasn’t created as it is to understand what does exist.
• Digital records might be great, but nothing beats handling (or even smelling!) originals. 

The point of these, I hope not too rambling, observations, is that genealogy and family and local history involves more that just putting names on a tree. The internet and companies such as Ancestry and Find My Past have made this much more straightforward (although not without difficulties) but what has always fascinated people is that old phrase ‘putting flesh on the bones’. To do this you have to find and engage with records and archives. 

Discovering and understanding this evidence of the past requires an understanding of the context in which the records were created. This means not just studying history but looking at the social systems, legislation and institutions which led to the creation of the archives, understanding what was recorded and what was not, and why, and having an awareness of where this information is now and how it can be accessed.

Waiting in libraries, archives and museums are miles and miles of un-digitised records relating to the church and military, to education and health systems, to land ownership and courts, all waiting for people to access, use and interpret them. It’s not easy to find out what is out there. It can be difficult to interpret it without skills such as palaeography or even Latin. It can be dangerous to try to make assumptions about your findings without an understanding of the context in which the records were created. 

Finally I think every family historian and genealogist is missing the most rewarding aspect of using archives if they don’t consider, at least now and again, the power of the records they are using. These sources will once have protected people’s rights or held organisations to account, they are now contributing to preserving memories (of those in the past and present) and creating identities for the future. As a genealogist it is worthwhile considering your role in this process and the power you also hold. 

George Bernard Shaw said ‘If you can’t get rid of the family skeleton you may as well make it dance’.  First you have to find your skeleton, but once you have you will struggle to make it move at all without knowing something about its life, which you can only do with a full understanding of records and archives. 

Links

To find out more about the range of Family and Local History courses available from the University of Dundee visit:
http://www.dundee.ac.uk/cais/programmes/discoverexploreyourfamilyandlocalhistory/

To put your questions to Programme Leader, Caroline Brown in our live online Questions & Answers 16th July from 12.30pm - 1.30pm, and to be eligible for the generous discounts on offer through #AncestryHour you, will need to register.  Please do so by following the link below:
http://www.ancestryhour.co.uk/register-for-live-qa-with-university-of-dundee-cais-16th-july.html