Tag: British Records Association

CFP: Curtain Up! The Practice of Archiving Performance

Call for Papers

  • Date:  Tuesday 29 October 2024
  • Location:  The Gallery, 77 Cowcross Street, London, EC1M 6EJ
  • Abstracts submission deadline: 5pm on 3rd May 2024

This year the British Records Association (BRA) annual conference will be held in partnership with the Association of Performing Arts Collections (APAC), which is a network for all museums, libraries and archives holding performance arts materials in the UK and Ireland. This is an opportunity to share the work of the performing arts archive world with the wider sector and consider the transferability of particular methods and experiences of performing arts information professionals.

The theme of this year’s conference will be active archiving, with, through, and for practitioners. We aim to explore how archives can be developed in collaboration with the record creators, the practitioners themselves, to create more representative collections of performance for use by practitioners, academics, the general public, and beyond. Mirroring this collaboration is the use of these collections by practitioners to advocate for the archives, create new work, or share the collections with new audiences.

This can cover many areas of work:

  • collaborations with practitioners in creating and cataloguing collections
  • challenges and opportunities of practitioners being involved in the archiving of their work
  • how participatory archiving has been used with the performing arts
  • practitioners engaging with and interpreting performing arts archives to widen audience engagement
  • practitioners creating their own archives

Abstracts of papers (20 minutes) or lightning talks as part of a panel (5 minutes) should be a maximum of 200 words and should be accompanied by a biography of all participants of up to 150 words. These should be submitted as Word files to the BRA Hon Secretary, Amanda Engineer.

Enquiries regarding the call for papers should be addressed to APAC

The British Records Association is a charity which aims to promote the preservation, understanding, accessibility and study of our recorded heritage for the public benefit. It is open to anyone interested in records and archives whether local historians, academics, professional archivists, or custodians and owners of collections, or simply those who are curious about the record of our past.

APAC is the membership organisation for professionals, specialists, and other individuals working with or interested in performing arts heritage in the United Kingdom and Ireland. Our activity programme for members and non-members aims to inspire the widest possible participation in the enrichment of the UK’s performing arts heritage.

Winners of the 2023 Janette Harley Prize announced

Written by Amanda Engineer, BRA Secretary

The British Records Association is delighted to announce the winners of the 2023 Janette Harley Prize. The Prize is shared between two entries as follows:

Dr Ian Forrest and Christopher Whittick (translators and editors), for The Visitation of Hereford Diocese in 1397 (Canterbury & York Society, vol. CXI, 2021)

Dr Imogen Peck (Birmingham University), for “‘Of no sort of use’?: Manuscripts, Memory, and the Family Archive in Eighteenth Century England” (Cultural and Social History, vol. 20:2 for 2023, pp.183-204), and the accompanying blog series and online resources, part of the ‘Family Archives in Early Modern England’ research project supported by the Leverhulme Trust.

These contrasting prize-winners show the breadth and value of archival records, and the different ways in which they can be studied and made more accessible.

Forrest and Whittick: Bishops learn about their dioceses through visitations. Surviving medieval visitation records are rare and of great value to historians. Bishop John Trefnant’s visitation of his diocese of Hereford in 1397 is contained in Hereford Cathedral Archives (HCA) 1779. The visitation offers unparalleled insight into social life, sexual behaviour, religious belief and practice, and gender relations during a period of religious and political turmoil, revealing how the clergy were disciplined, how English- and Welsh-speakers interacted, and how the congregation experienced worship. It is also a treasure trove of information about the fabric of local churches and the administration of parishes before the Reformation. The document is a major early source for Welsh naming practices – indeed Bishop Trefnant himself came from a Welsh area, had a Welsh name, and employed Welsh-speaking scribes in his household.

This edition is designed for the non-professional reader, being the first of the Canterbury and York Society’s 111 volumes to be published in the original Latin with a facing English translation. Conscious attempts have been made to preserve the word-order of the original as far as is consistent with fluency of translation, and to avoid technical vocabulary. The edition has greatly increased the accessibility of the manuscript, which now is consulted as a matter of course by the Diocesan Advisory Committee on questions of church fabric.

Imogen Peck: Dr Peck’s work explores the role of family archives during Britain’s long eighteenth century, especially in the formation of memory and identity. This was a period of growing archival consciousness, yet the archives curated by families have hitherto been almost entirely overlooked. This research establishes their significance. It also challenges the tendency to value the institutional and formal (and often patriarchal) over the informal and domestic.

Tracing the curation of three family collections across several generations, the article in Cultural and Social History shows how the creation and transmission of family archives played a significant role in the memory and identity of relatively modest families. The article is supported by blog posts by the author and by undergraduate and A-level students which highlight other family archives held in record offices across the country. The author has also established a ‘Family Archives’ network where historians, archivists, and members of the public working on family collections can share their work. The recordings from the network’s online workshops are available on the project website.

Highly Commended

Prof. Steven King (Nottingham Trent University) and Paul Carter (TNA), and others, In Their Own Write: Contesting the New Poor Law, 1834–1900 (McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2022).

The prize was established in memory of Janette Harley, a member of the British Records Association, who died in 2015. It is intended to raise awareness of research and achievements in the world of archives, and is awarded for the best or most original piece of published work which reflects the aims of the Association: to promote the preservation, understanding, accessibility and study of our recorded heritage for the public benefit.

A call for entries to the 2024 Janette Harley Prize will be made in April.