Dear Colleagues,
One of the wonderful things about working on the Archival Platform is the opportunity it brings to meet inspiring people and to find out about the work that they are doing to collate, configure and present archives. While our website includes all of the usual items, we’re going to be taking a new approach to the news, interviewing people at work in the sector and reporting back on our discussions. This way, we hope to capture something of the spirit that drives the organisation, not merely the information about what it does and why!
This month we have a variety of posts and opinion pieces on offer. The Archival Platform Editorial, The right to memory, looks at how collective memory is defined, protected and manipulated. Adam Haupt’s post, Musical archives: hip-hop and the commons enclosure
, asks who mediates cultural expression and cultural history and who is entitled to own the knowledge repository of black urban culture. Sandra Daniels’ post, Heritage obscured at the Nelson Mandela Gateway,
examines the impact of 2010 FIFA World Cup™ activity on Robben Island Museum’s facility at the Victorian and Alfred Waterfront. Harriet Deacon’s post, Using new media for heritage management, considers ways in which visitors to museums and similar locations “perform” heritage, using sites such as Flickr, and wonders how this relates to each institution’s intentions.
Mbongiseni Buthelezi, our Ancestral Stories co-ordinator, questions the ways in which a family can be constituted and describes some of the challenges facing those who explore complex family histories. David Slingsby writes about the Cape Town Family History Society and describes some of the routes it takes to track genealogies. Xolelwa Kashe-Katiya
shares her experience of growing up in a family headed by a strong matriarch. Michael Worsnip explains how and why his adopted children have “inherited” his ancestors. Shirley Gunn
of the Human Rights Media Centre shares her experience working with mothers and daughters in an intergenerational life story project.
This month, the Archival Platform interviewed people involved in some inspiring projects. A meeting with Anthony Manion of Gay and Lesbian Memory in Action (GALA) lent insight into the way in which the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex archive works to create visibility and to challenge and change perceptions. Senzeni Marasela of AmaLwandle,
an initiative which aims to develop an archive about South African woman, emphasised the need to draw attention to women who have made a difference – role models for future generations. We came across two extraordinary books at a recent exhibition: Keeping in Touch,
a book in which a group of women each reinterpret a page from an earlier book, but this time in a new format, and Documenting Keeping in Touch, which tracked the process. Jeanette Gilks, who collated the pieces, explains how these books evolved. We joined the Human Rights Media Centre’s 10th anniversary celebrations, a joyful and moving occasion when women who have been part of various life story projects shared their experiences.
The impact of the proposed Protection of Information Bill and the possibility of a media tribunal have continued to keep the issue of media freedom in the headlines and we draw your attention to the Auckland Park Declaration,
a statement issued by the editors of South Africa’s major publications and members of the South African National Editors’ Forum. We’ve also been watching, with interest, the stir caused by the exposure of “secret” documents by WikiLeaks, and take time to consider who, or what, this organisaton is and why the work it is doing is so important. If you’re out and about in Cape Town, don’t miss the Bonani Africa 2010 Festival of Photography,
and if you’re in Johannesburg, or planning to be there in the next couple of months, be sure to see Transformations: Women’s Art from the Late Nineteenth Century to 2010, which offers interesting insights into women’s lives.
The University of Cape Town has introduced a new academic focus, offering opportunities for postgraduate studies in curatorship. There are a few interesting jobs on offer in the new Interpretation Centre in the Mapungubwe National Park, a couple of fellowships and several new conferences on our calendar.
Please let us know what your organisation or institution is doing to celebrate Heritage Month in September.
Best wishes
Jo-Anne Duggan
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