Writing the history of minorities and diasporic populations is a tricky business. Sources that could be used for this purpose are never where we think they are, most are not even in “memory institutions” (such as museums, archives and libraries), and what is accessible might not even be reliable, authentic, or evidential.
People live history. Historians write about it. Archivists/curators/librarians preserve it. And all distill it through personal experiences, value systems, world views, knowledge, availability of sources, socio-economical backgrounds, political affiliations, cultural influences and so on….
When it comes to the history of minority populations, can any of us really say we can know it and represent it decently? Gone are the days when the Historian wrote “definitive” and “authoritative” works by actually using a mere fraction of what was out there due to various constraints (difficult or primitive technology and transportation, geographical constraints, accessibility etc.).
Now that technology has solved or made easier most of the above, we need ways that will let people, historians, archivists and any interested party add their knowledge and make sense out of history. We need technologies that will permit and enable a seamless, dialectic communication among data and people. We need the possibility for user-generated material to be incorporated in the historical record. Many new technologies (such as linked data) could offer solutions for seamless applications, but we have still a long way to go.
So I guess the reason I am here, at THATCamp is to hear, listen, and learn of what is out there, what can be done, and what can be envisioned for sense-making in history.
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