Towards principles for public history using archives and special collections – a discussion draft

The significance of public history to archives and special collectionsThere are many definitions of public history, but at its broadest it refers to the engagement of non-specialist audiences with the past. Given the ways in which the sector is funded, many archives and special collections have an acknowledged need to reach out beyond expert research audiences to increase their value to parent organisations, and to the public. With collections relating entirely to the past, however recent, it is not surprising that archives and special collections undertake a broad range of public history activity.

Survey data in preparing for this guidance showed that most institutions holding historical written collections do some form of public history, whether a twitter feed engaging with popular hashtags such as #throwbackThursday, heritage/alumni/corporate open days, talks and workshops or a full exhibition programme with interpretation undertaken by staff.1 This is seen as a core activity for many, whether because they receive public funding or because the ethos of the parent organisation encourages wide engagement with archives and special collections, rather than a purely research-based view of stakeholders.

All these activities, although primarily focused on collections held by the institution, involve a level of selection and interpretation of the past in their presentation. Despite this, the public presentation of history to engage with broad audiences has rarely been the subject of archives and special collections’ professional discussions, which have focused primarily on the practicalities (which social media channel, how to write exhibition captions). But history is a complex, contested and extensively debated subject. The ways in which it is presented can profoundly affect the ways in which it is received. This is particularly the case when engaging with general audiences, who will bring different levels of interest, knowledge, critical engagement and existing assumptions to the presented history.

1 Survey November-December 2018, ‘Collections and public history: engaging audiences with archives and special collections’, disseminated through archives and special collections networks. 128 responses were received, of which 70% came from public sector archives and/or special collections, and the remainder from a range of private and third sector institutions. Although self-selected for interest in completing a survey on the subject, this is a very substantial proportion of the archives and special collections sector.

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The discipline of public history has developed over decades within academia, and there is value in engaging with that literature. Public history can challenge or bolster cliché and nostalgia, it can illuminate unknown histories or reinforce comforting myths of innate racial and national superiorities. Unconsidered use of history to engage broad audiences can backfire, causing serious offence and alienating communities whose histories are not recognised or respected. There are also ethical considerations about how the history presented through archives and special collections engages with the specific challenges of written heritage, such as contradictory views from different observers, allegations later disproved and the extent to which collections represent the breadth of contemporary experience. The extent to which archives and special collections have embraced online channels for disseminating public history is another important factor to consider, as the online audience experiences content very differently to those engaging in person.

Context and use of the suggested principlesThese suggested principles are derived from research into how academic writing on public history activity can be applied to public engagement activity with historical collections. They are designed specifically in response to the needs of archives and special collections, where this kind of public engagement activity has been less subject to professional discussion than in the museums sector. Here, permanent visitor attractions are often less established and less frequently the responsibility of those with formal training in public engagement. The principles cover some core ethical issues, but are broadened with reference to good practice in engagement, as public history activity in the sector is often seen as part of outreach rather than a discipline in its own right.

The principles are designed as MUST, SHOULD and MAY statements, suggesting a spectrum of validity from essential ethical approaches to good practice intended as a reference point. There are few absolutes, but it is intended that all levels of principle will be useful to services in reviewing their public history offer. The guidance explains each principle and its implications for practice. The principles are applicable across the spectrum of public history engagement, although it is acknowledged that a quick social media post in response to an immediate moment will have involved far less planning than a subject-specific exhibition. The principles should nonetheless be helpful in considering and reviewing public history activity of all types. Some practical support in implementing particular principles is offered in appendices A and B.

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The final principle is used to explore a suggested schematic of understanding generic impacts of public history. This is expanded in Appendix C, which can be used as a standalone for services particularly interested in engaging with impact in their general public history work.

The research basis of these principles is given, with supporting evidence of public history thinking, including some areas of disagreement. Reading cultural heritage and public history writing has been very fruitful for developing the principles. I hope that others will be interested in reading further.

These draft principles will benefit from feedback and testing. Please do get in touch if you would like to discuss this further or to feed back your views on the draft. Comments to melinda.haunton@nationalarchives.gov.uk

AcknowledgementsThese principles were derived through research undertaken for a Research Libraries UK-The National Archives Professional Fellowship 2018-19. They were strengthened through discussion with many people managing archives and special collections, whose contribution is gratefully acknowledged.

Particular thanks are due to Gary Brannan, and to his colleagues at the Borthwick Institute for Archives and University of York Libraries and Archives, who hosted my fellowship placement and answered all manner of questions about how they undertake their work. Professor Geoff Cubitt of the Institute for the Public Understanding of the Past at the University of York very kindly welcomed me into his MA teaching during my placement, enabling me to experience a range of public history ideas. I am grateful for his inspiration for principle 16 in particular, and more broadly to him and the IPUP staff and students who I met with. Attending the 2019 conference of the Association of Independent Museums was an amazing opportunity to hear a range of museum professionals on the subject of being a great venue; the totality of that event is reflected throughout these principles, and I am grateful to the speakers for sharing such a breadth of knowledge and experience.

I would also like to thank the 128 archives and special collections professionals who responded to my scoping survey, and to the many who continued to comment on further iterations and development of this topic.

Melinda Haunton, August 2019

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ContentsThe Principles…………………………………………………………….. 51. Public history using archives and special collections MUST represent the content of collections accurately

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2. Public history using archives and special collections MUST be designed inclusively and to lower barriers to participation

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3. In undertaking public history with archives and special collections, practitioners SHOULD strive to be self-aware, of their own biases and internal assumptions

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4. Public history using archives and special collections MUST avoid voyeuristic focus on sufferings of individuals who are no longer able to give themselves voice

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5. Public history using archives and special collections SHOULD identify when an authentic contemporary account contains demonstrable falsehoods or disproved allegations

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6. Public history using archives and special collections SHOULD make clear whether its primary intention is to give a historical overview or to highlight a particular institution’s collections on a topic

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7. Public history using archives and special collections SHOULD be planned (though agile) and in line with the organisation’s strategic plans

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8. Public history using archives and special collections SHOULD be based on clear success criteria and evaluated against these

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9. Public history using archives and special collections MAY offer multiple voices and conflicting narrative interpretations

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10. Public history using archives and special collections MAY directly challenge accepted historical narratives with reference to evidence from collections

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11. Public history using archives and special collections MAY be designed to be re-purposable and reusable with multiple audiences

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12. Public history using archives and special collections MAY be delivered through partnerships and supplying content to other providers who can reach different audiences or support varied technical environments

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13. Public history using archives and special collections MAY offer opportunities for the public to tell their own stories and express

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resonances of the history in contemporary life14. Public history using archives and special collections SHOULD be designed with an understanding of multiple potential impacts on different audiences, depending on their experiences and backgrounds

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15. Public history using archives and special collections online SHOULD be planned in line with these principles, taking account of the different and more isolated context in which it will be experienced

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16. Public history using archives and special collections MAY be understood schematically through identifying elements which support IDENTITY, ENJOYMENT and/or KNOWLEDGE.

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Appendix A: Using a stepped engagement offer……………………….. 36

Appendix B: Repurposing content…………………………………………….. 39

Appendix C: Using an impact schematic to plan and deliver ……. 44public history

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1 Public history using archives and special collections MUST represent the content of collections items accurately

1.1 Basis and justification: If archives and special collections are seen as repositories of the trustworthy and the authentic, falsifying content in the name of public engagement is clearly unacceptable. Voices from the past must not be misrepresented to a wider public audience.

1.2 Implications: In presenting collections content, archives and special collections may well select excerpts to highlight and promote, for ease of access and practical limits on how much content can readily be presented. Selections should be quoted accurately, and any updating of language should be noted in an appropriate way (from a formal footnote to a casual “today we might say”, according to the medium). References should be given for follow up.

Not all public history is dry and factual. Jokes and spoofs have a role to play – particularly in social media postings, when transposed images, gifs from collections and other tweaks to the original can catch attention. Creative responses to content may include dramatic presentations, visualisations and empathy work. Any of these could be said to falsify collections content for entertainment value, but this principle is not designed against such activities. So long as it is easy for the public to understand what is original content from collections and what is a modern creative response these can be fun to explore. Similarly, highlighting what is not documented in collections by inviting creative responses can play an important role in representing wider truths that cannot simply be quoted.

1.3 References: “To my mind, all historians, whatever their professional status, have ethical obligations, to be humane, accurate, self-aware and judicious for instance, but these are mobilised in the actual practice of history.” L.J. Jordanova, History in Practice (2006), p.165.

“If the past is redesigned as a comfortable refuge, all its negative features must be removed.” J. Tosh, The Pursuit of History (2000), p.18.

There are counter-arguments. David Lowenthal notes that “Just as heritage practitioners take pride in creating artifice, the public enjoys consuming it. Departures from history distress only a few highbrows.” Quoted in J. de Groot, Consuming History (2009), p.4. These principles argue that although this is true in areas of public history delivery, such as television, film and fiction, there is a

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different ethical obligation when producing public history based around written collections, where the collections themselves are at the centre of the engagement with the past.

For using content which does not come from collections but which do not create insoluble ethical dilemmas, two very contrasting examples: Jennifer V Evans writes on the fictionalised soundscape played in audioguides Museum of the History of Polish Jews, designed to supplement the material record which has largely been destroyed. ‘Sound, listening and the queer art of history,’ Rethinking History (2018), 22:1, 25-43.

The British Library Manuscripts team chose to celebrate April Fool’s Day 2012 with a blog announcing the discovery of a cookbook with recipes for unicorn, including manuscript illuminations. The context and public comments make clear that this was understood as an engaging spoof, and created no false expectations. British Library Digitised Manuscripts Blog, ‘Unicorn Cookbook Found at the British Library’. Online: https://blogs.bl.uk/digitisedmanuscripts/2012/04/unicorn-cookbook-found-at-the-british-library.html, accessed 16 August 2019.

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2 Public history using archives and special collections MUST be designed inclusively and to lower barriers to participation.

2.1 Basis and justification: If the goal of public history is to draw in a wide public, it is particularly important to understand what barriers may be encountered in accessing content, and to reduce these.

2.2 Implications: Looking to reduce barriers does not necessarily mean a simplification of content, but it does rely on a good understanding of target audiences and their capacity to engage with the service. Barriers may be around location, transport, accessibility, cost or time of events, or it may be around the language, script, social context or other unfamiliar/uncomfortable elements of archives. Good public engagement with archives ensures that barriers are lowered at the outset, and that where they cannot be designed out without losing the essence of engagement (e.g. looking at medieval documents where language, script and materials are all unfamiliar) audiences are encouraged to explore, and given tools to support that exploration. Where terminology in archives is not only unfamiliar but offensive, particular care is needed to support engagement.

Archive services may well choose to use a stepped approach to engagement, where barriers such as higher cost are introduced for more resource-intensive services, or exclusive engagement opportunities are available for key stakeholders (see examples of a stepped approach in Appendix A). But for engagement with a broad public, particularly one which has not previously encountered the organisation, barriers should be as low as possible. Consider going out to locations where the target audience is already found, whether physically or through contributing to online resources.

Using tools to understand audiences can be an important way to identify barriers. Tools such as Visitor Verdict, Audience Finder and Culture Segments can be useful in understanding what drives audiences, how to attract them and what is likely to put them off. Ongoing evaluation and feedback will also be important here. Look out for particular barriers which you can address, including through partnership and collaboration (accessibility audits of venues, event plans and websites including advice for those with autism as well as mobility and sensory needs, sensitivity reviewers for content).

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2.3 References: As David Olusoga says in an Institute of Historical Research podcast, the audience for public history suggests, “There is something that we do… that doesn’t seem that inclusive to a lot of our fellow citizens… There is something wrong in the way we deliver history.” IHR Podcast, ‘Historical Knowledge and Public History.’ Online: https://www.history.ac.uk/podcasts/historical-knowledge-and-public-history accessed 16 August 2019.

An useful commentary on the exclusionary feeling which can be created around heritage tourism: “Touring this heritage will naturally, it is assumed, affect feelings of inspiration, belonging, citizenship and wellbeing… The ‘felt’ responses, those emotional feelings that are stirred when one engages with identity, may not in this case be so universal and positive. This is because the touring ‘ethnic minority’ or ‘working class’ visitor is being asked to orientate their senses and structure their felt responses against a visual impression of Britain that stands as a clear marker – both historically and contemporarily – of exclusion.” R. Staiff, R. Bushell and S. Watson (eds.), Heritage and tourism: place, encounter, engagement (2013).

There is a range of work underway on the use of offensive terminology in recordkeeping and how current practice can mitigate the barriers this creates. An example is summarised in the Intersection GLAM blog entry, ‘Archives and inclusivity: respectful descriptions of marginalised groups’. Online: https://intersectionalglam.home.blog/2018/11/22/archives-and-inclusivity-respectful-descriptions-of-marginalised-groups/. Accessed 16 August 2019.

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3 In undertaking public history work with archives and special collections, practitioners SHOULD strive to be self-aware, of their own biases and internal assumptions.

3.1 Basis and justification: Impartiality has long been recognised to be an unreachable ideal, and may be impossible in some elements of public engagement, where selection of prize holdings or the promotion of messages around social justice may have a core role in activities. However, acknowledging and confronting unconscious biases and assumptions is always worthwhile, and can help to connect with more varied audiences. Part of the lowering of barriers (in Principle 2) involves limiting the sense of exclusion from the past and creating a sense of relevance to modern lives.

3.2 Implications: Connecting the past to the present can be rewarding and effective, but can also embed senses of exclusion. Focusing only on the lives of the privileged can be alienating to those whose personal histories do not connect with elite positions. Equally, drawing exclusively on stories of suffering can risk that prurient approach noted in Principle 4. Some popular labels, such as “hidden histories” may empower audiences to admit to a lack of knowledge and enjoy the process of discovery, but can also frame lived experience from an exclusionary viewpoint.

A key challenge will often be the location of archives and special collections within organisations whose histories they seek to document (local areas, learning institutions, businesses and charities). Although challenging accepted histories and accepting painful pasts can be a highly effective part of public history work (see Principle 10), the underlying tension in criticising the past of the service’s chief funder is likely to play a part and mute some themes. This may be accepted and appropriate in cases where public history is explicitly playing a celebratory role (such as centenaries, or alumni celebrations), but if the overwhelming message of all public history undertaken is simply positive, this may have less impact and be seen more as a marketing exercise and less as authentic history. At the extreme, it can lead to temptation to falsify content (contrary to Principle 1).

3.3 References:

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“The very term implies impartial, disinterested perspectives which we know to be chimeras, simply not attainable…the commitment to weighing up and considering carefully a wide range of evidence is nonetheless a valuable one.” L. Jordanova, History in Practice (2006), p.94. Elsewhere, Jordanova discusses the impact of heritage institutions, specifically museums, in practice being major vectors of transmitting historical information to the public. “It is important to be clear about the consequences of museums being major communicators to the public about the past… They transmit ideas about the past through a variety of lenses of which visitors are unlikely to be fully aware.” (p.145).

Hidden histories is a term which has been embraced by many creating public history experiences. But it also implies assumptions about public memory. “Whose consciousness is being prioritised or taken as normal when a given history is described as hidden or forgotten? Whose needs for social healing or for therapeutic self-analysis are served by the call for that history’s desirable recovery, and by the terms on which that recovery is undertaken? By whom, and according to what criteria, will it be decided that a once hidden or forgotten history has now become sufficiently visible and adequately remembered?” G. Cubitt ‘Bringing it Home: making local meaning in 2007 bicentenary exhibitions’, Slavery and Abolition 30 (2) (2009), p.267. This article also contains reflection on the range of activities undertaken for the 2007 bicentenary of the abolition of the Atlantic slave trade, and the pressures of local context and presentation which resulted.

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4 Public history using archives and special collections MUST avoid voyeuristic focus on sufferings of individuals who are no longer able to give themselves voice

4.1 Basis and justification: If the goal of public history is to bring the past to life for wide audiences, and to represent the complexity of the past to modern times, there will be many occasions when the sufferings of individuals and groups are documented and shared. Archives and special collections contain rich, important sources on the poverty, illness, torture, maiming, abuse, enslavement and death of individuals.

It can be absolutely important to share these; to avoid doing so may appear a betrayal of past suffering and the testimony of those who sought to have their pain to be documented for posterity. However, those working on public history should be aware of the balance of what is presented, and aim to avoid making such suffering into a form of entertainment.

4.2 Implications: Discussing past lives, especially based on documentation not designed for publication, brings with it responsibilities to those whose lives and deaths are documented. There is a particular danger in presenting suffering without context and without the testimony of those affected, transforming them into passive, voiceless victims. This principle is not designed to minimise the documentation of suffering and injustice. But it asks practitioners to consider the effect of what they create on the identity of past humans.

Another aspect to consider is the effect on audiences. Some audiences undoubtedly enjoy gory and horrific tales, especially those comfortably removed from their personal experiences. However, those who have a strong identification with the people or activities depicted may find it re-traumatising to confront detailed and overwhelming testimony on experiences such as slavery, wartime atrocities, rape, suicide, force-feeding and other forms of torture, starvation and domestic violence, to highlight only some of the potential themes. As with other experiences audiences bring to a public history activity, experience of trauma will affect how past suffering is perceived (see Principle 14). Clear warnings before viewing, and in the case of social media ensuring that feeds are clearly marked when they may contain traumatic

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material, both emphasise the service’s awareness of its responsibility, and allow audiences to make informed choices.

4.3 References: “Critics warn of the potential for ‘compassion fatigue’ when viewers are over-exposed to such images, of the scope for voyeurism when the suffering of others becomes an object of prurient fascination, and of the perils of sentimental self-indulgence or self-congratulation that too often haunt the claims of human beings to ‘feel’ or ‘share’ the sufferings of distant others.... A relentless focus on these visual symbols [of violence] can work, in the long run, to aestheticize the suffering that is depicted.” G. Cubitt, ‘Atrocity materials and the representation of Transatlantic Slavery: problems, strategies and reactions’, in L. Smith (ed.), Representing Enslavement and Abolition in Museums: Ambiguous Engagements (2011), p.230.

The issues around presenting unpleasant, dark and abusive histories were considered in 2018 at the Difficult Histories conference (https://difficultheritage2018.wordpress.com/about/). A publication will follow.

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5 Public history using archives and special collections SHOULD identify when an authentic contemporary account contains demonstrable falsehoods or disproved allegations

5.1 Basis and justification: Archives and special collections contain authentic testimony from the past, but that does not mean that all collections content is accurate or was ever intended to be truthful. When the role of those working with archives is simply to document and make accessible their holdings, it is very much up to individual researchers to sift and weigh the evidence, and to draw conclusions. However, when archives and special collections services are presenting history to a general public, they are undertaking interpretation. Many public audiences will assume that history presented by a heritage organisation is ‘true’, and has been carefully researched. Interpretation therefore carries responsibilities, and reputational risks.

5.2 Implications: This principle is not intended to suggest that archives set themselves up as arbiters of contested truths. Although interpretation, especially more detailed presentations such as exhibitions, blogs and talks, should involve an element of research, in many cases, acknowledging that a story is complex, and that views conflict, may be all that can honestly be done. But where a single source is being used to illuminate a subject, it is particularly important to add context and give a sense of whether this is a generally accepted account. Otherwise there is a risk that it becomes seen as the authorised view of the service.

5.3 References: “It is possible to provide a completely one-sided version of the any event, past or present, by simply avoiding certain facts…or to put it another way, by avoiding certain questions.” H. Coxall, ‘Museum text as mediated message,’ in E. Hooper-Greenhill (ed.), The Educational Role of the Museum (1999), p.217.

“To say that the past is public property certainly implies that there will be diverse, competing accounts; hence developing a critical perspective upon them is essential. Yet beyond personal preference it remains unclear how, in the case of public history, competing accounts are to be evaluated.” L. Jordanova, History in Practice (2006), p.163. Jordanova is here discussing competing interpretation by public historians, but the point can easily be expanded to cover competing contemporary narratives.

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6 Public history using archives and special collections SHOULD make clear whether its primary intention is to give a historical overview or to highlight a particular institution’s collections on a topic.

6.1 Basis and justification: Many archives and special collections undertake public history activity primarily to open up their own collections to wider audiences. This may be done through many different media, and may over time produce an effective public portrait of their holdings. Although these activities can broadly be characterised as marketing the collections, or interpreting individual collection items, this is readily understood from context. However, as in principle 5 more careful presentation is needed around activities such as exhibitions, talks and blogs which may appear to have the intention to write history through an overview of multiple sources, providing an authoritative or rounded interpretation of the past.

As principle 5 notes, many public audiences will assume that history presented by a heritage organisation is ‘true’, authoritative and has been carefully researched to present a full overview of a subject or event. This may indeed be the case, but it is often true that many interpretation activities are undertaken to highlight rich or unusual elements of one specific service’s collections, and that this has led the interpretation in a particular direction. Where this is the case, audiences should find it easy to understand this.

6.2 Implications: There are three key benefits here: firstly, the ethical need to clarify the source of the interpretation approach. Secondly, where the intention of public history work is to encourage more people to engage with a service’s collections, making the connection between public history content and the collections unambiguous can underline the message that there is more to be discovered. And lastly, where collections do not fully cover a subject, or present only one side of an event, being explicit about the source of the interpretation makes it easier to invite further comment, to draw out other interpretations, and to recognise that some visitors may find the content alienating. [Appendix C discusses some approaches which may be helpful.]

There are many positive ways to present collections-focused interpretation, and this need not be heavy handed. Clear allusion to “examples from our collections” or “drawing on a range of archives from across the UK” may be all

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that is required, usually with collection references provided. With a major production such as an exhibition, it may be appropriate to include in marketing and introductory materials statements such as “drawing on [service name’s] rich examples of correspondence… You are welcome to visit our reading room to explore further for yourselves.” Equally, audience messages such as, “This is the view of the officers of the English army. How do you think the Scottish troops viewed the battle?” can invite further reflection, while being honest about gaps in the written record in general, or in the views contained in a single organisation’s holdings.

6.3 References: “Should the museum…decide on the themes and stories primarily by using historical accounts and then select objects to illustrate that schema, or should it interrogate the objects and see what themes can be dedicated? To what extent can old collections embodying previous curators’ views of what was ‘important’ or symbolic be re-purposed to address contemporary issues and new lines of historical enquiry?” D. McIntyre, ‘Creating new pasts in museums: planning the Museum of London’s Modern London galleries,’ in P. Ashton and H. Keen (eds.), People and their Pasts: Public History Today (2009), p.143. Although specific to the museum context, this is a useful wider reflection on the role of collections in shaping interpretation.

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7 Public history with archives and special collections SHOULD be planned (though agile), and in line with the organisation’s strategic plans.

7.1 Basis and justification: Public history takes time, resource and care to deliver well. It can help to build new audiences, raise awareness of the service’s value, and have a range of positive impacts for participants. This requires planning, communication and appropriate resource. Simply undertaking a set number of talks, putting out a set number of tweets, or changing a display case three times a year is unlikely to be a transformative process for a service. There is a risk of speaking to those who already know what you will say, of becoming “that week’s turn” on a local speaking circuit, and of presentation getting stale if the same content is constantly repeated (although see Appendix B for ideas on repurposing content).

It is therefore useful to be able to prioritise and deliver activity which helps the organisation to reach its goals, rather than undertaking public history (or any access activities) as an end in itself. Not all activities can be planned well in advance, but a sense of key goals should help to make decisions about what can or should be done.

The service should also have a sense of how it aims to interact with its community. The broad impact categories identified in Principle 16, and expanded in Appendix C, may help to pin this down. These can help to plan the structure and nature of public history work.

7.2 Implications: Services should have a sense of the community they serve, and of key priorities for developing relationships with elements of that community. That may mean supporting internal business use, reaching out to diverse audiences, contributing to education programmes, or simply raising its profile across its potential community.

All of those activities can most effectively be undertaken by understanding the needs of community audiences, how the archive service can address them, and where those audiences can be found. There is little point in building a Facebook following to demonstrate internal value for an organisation where social media is banned at work. Speaking annually to the same local history group near to the service’s location may give handy staff development

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opportunities and a chance to test new material, but if these factors do not apply there may be a limited value in the activity – unlike speaking to a group in a distant location which is a key community underserved by the service in its audience analysis.

This principle does not suggest that archives and special collections must always refuse to respond to ad hoc opportunities (from speaker invitations to social media events). It does suggest that having a sense of how those opportunities can support the service’s wider mission can help to say no to opportunities which do not add value, and to focus the kind of outcome sought where activity is undertaken.

7.3 References: This principle is derived from Archive Service Accreditation (www.nationalarchives.gov.uk), Requirements 3.2.1 and 3.2.2 “The archive service understands the community it is established to serve, and has effective methods in place to gather information on, analyse and evaluate existing and potential stakeholder needs and interests… The archive service has documented plans to continuously improve access and engagement in response to the identified needs and interests of its community.”

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8 Public history with archives and special collections SHOULD be based on clear success criteria and evaluated against these.

8.1 Basis and justification: As at Principle 7, public history takes time, resource and care to deliver well. This is time, resource and care not spent on other activities undertaken by the service. It is important to understand whether activity is having the planned impact, and if/how it could be done better in future. There is little point in repeating an activity and supporting communications that led to little engagement, baffled visitors or exactly the same audience as before, if it was intended to reach beyond existing users.

8.2 Implications: Evaluation needs to fit the aims of public history work, and is therefore closely tied to planning and understanding the intended audience. Capturing evaluation data needs to be a planned process, ensuring that what is needed is collected and analysed (and that data is not collected or retained needlessly). Evaluation is essential to demonstrate value, but also for the individual archive service to understand how to change and grow its public history offer.

It is important to note that there are dangers in too-prescriptive an approach to evaluation, which may lead to undertaking some forms of activity because they are easy to evaluate, whereas other, deeper forms of engagement and impact may be less readily measured. Recognising the value in individual testimony and stories when public history deeply touches identity is particularly important, as is retaining flexibility to recognise and celebrate unexpected successes.

The broad categories identified in Principle 16, and expanded in Appendix C, may help to pin down an evaluation approach suitable for different types of activity.

8.3 References: Margaret Lindauer discusses the complexity of evaluating impact of activities like exhibitions where there may be multiple areas to evaluate, particularly beyond narrow learning objectives. Ideas such as a change in understanding of a key concept, or a map of personal meaning derived from an experience may be more useful in demonstrating impact for larger engagement activities. ‘What to ask and how to answer: a comparative analysis of methodologies and philosophies of summative exhibit evaluation, Museum and Society, 3(3), 2005, 137-152.

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Amy Grack Nelson and Bobby Callahan Schreiber provide a useful worked case study of involving stakeholders in evaluation throughout a major project: ‘Participatory Evaluation: a case study of involving stakeholders in the evaluation process’, Visitor Studies, 12:2 (2009), 199-213.

There is a counterpoint in writing about evaluation in cultural activities, which notes, “it is not possible to develop a rigorous protocol for the assessment of the impacts of the aesthetic experience that can be boiled down to a handful of bullet-points and a user-friendly ‘evaluation toolkit’.” Belfiore and Bennett, quoted in J. Stanziola, ‘Developing a model to articulate the impact of museums and galleries: another dead duck in cultural policy research?’, Cultural Trends, 17(4), 2008, 317-321. Another work by Belfiore and Bennett notes further difficulties with an excessive focus on evaluation. “Public debate about the value of the arts thus comes to be dominated by what might best be termed the cult of the measurable; and, of course, it is those disciplines primarily concerned with measurement, namely, economics and statistics, which are looked upon to find the evidence that will finally prove why the arts are so important to individuals and societies.” E. Belfiore and O. Bennett, ‘Rethinking the social impacts of the arts’, International Journal of Cultural Policy, 2007 13(2), 137.

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9 Public history with archives and special collections MAY offer multiple voices and conflicting narrative interpretations.

9.1 Basis and justification: One of the major contributions archives and special collections can make to public history is to recognise the multiplicity of authentic voices which record a past event or subject. Collections may contain numerous accounts, conflicting or complementary. This richness of source material is one of the strengths of collections institutions, and it allows services to avoid the creation of monolithic histories, which value one lived experience over another.

9.2 Implications: Public history evaluation of nationally-experienced interpretation on many sites, like the 1807 abolition commemorations in 2007 has shown how valuable taking a local perspective can be in cumulatively creating a more nuanced view of a subject than single commemorative action.

There is however a limit to how many multiple viewpoints audiences can absorb, particularly when they are engaging through general interest or enjoyment rather than for specific study purposes. While conflicting viewpoints can be revealing, it may be necessary to point out those which are demonstrably less accurate (see Principle 5) or to present clearly that there are disagreements about the facts. Current audiences may become confused about accuracy and authenticity if there is not a clear narrative of the circumstances in which historical sources were produced, which helps to explain inconsistencies. Services working with multiple voices therefore need to think through their ways of presenting conflict and disagreement, and ideally turn these into a positive element of their approach.

9.3 References: With reference specifically to mythologies of the First World War, Pennell notes the value of multiple voices: “As historians, all of our work is based…on human stories. What are they, how can we bring them to life, and how can we use them to offer more complex and nuanced views?” C.Pennell, ‘Popular history and myth-making: the role and responsibility of First World War historians in the Centenary commemorations 2014-2018,’ Historically Speaking, 13(5), (2012), 14.

Walvin discusses the 2007 abolition commemorations in terms of different heritage institutions finding their own narratives – a heritage version of the multiplicity of voices. “One important decision, taking by a large number of institutions, helped to simplify the problem of how to commemorate 1807. Many agreed not simply to tell the general story - not to recite the history of the abolition movement culminating in the Act of 1807 but to speak to a specific and often a local

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case study… What began as an effort to give 1807 a local context thus evolved into an important statement not merely of regional entanglement with slavery, but also helped to fill in some of the gaps in our broader understanding of Atlantic slavery and of abolition.” J. Walvin, The Slave Trade, Abolition and Public Memory. Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 19, (2009), 142-4.

This sense of plural histories is an exciting element of much public history. “Almost every type of pastness in this book demonstrates a way of experimenting – whether consciously or not – with ‘the representation of historical reality’ and thence an undermining of authoritative, legitimised History in favour of multiple histories.” J. de Groot, Consuming History (2009), p.82.

Jordanova identifies the risks of this approach (albeit in a context discussing modern interpretation rather than historical accounts): “Given that many people do not possess the materials or the tools to evaluate radically different accounts of a morally charged event, they will turn to their emotions for guidance.” L. Jordanova, History in Practice (2006), p.169.

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10 Public history with archives and special collections MAY directly challenge accepted historical narratives with reference to evidence from collections.

10.1 Basis and justification: Just as archives can contain and represent a multiplicity of voices and viewpoints, authentic evidence from the archives can undercut, challenge or directly contradict accepted histories. This is particularly the case where there are popular assumptions about histories which have an ongoing resonance, such as the alleged absence of a Black presence in medieval and early modern England, and the narratives this has driven around more recent immigration and diversity.

10.2 Implications: Challenging accepted histories can be intriguing, exciting and fascinating to audiences. They can support more accessible interpretation of subjects which may in the past have been seen as exclusive or narrow in interest. It can be empowering, and genuinely transformative of understanding. Histories around the First World War commemoration have at times emphasised the strong pacifist campaigns even in August 1914. Over a longer period, there has been a sustained effort particularly in areas such as Bristol to explore and expose the basis of community wealth in slavery.

However, services directly undertaking this kind of public history should be aware that some audiences can find the overturning of received wisdom to be challenging, upsetting or a source of anger. This kind of activity, no matter how clearly based in historical evidence, has the potential to garner critical attention, particularly if it is perceived as aiming to impose modern values on the past, rather than to reveal past truths. This can be countered for well-grounded histories, but there may be implications for the wider organisation, which needs to be prepared to back the service in its approach.

10.3 References: Jorma Kalela makes this point overtly, with regard to popular memory: “Starting from those histories those addressed have created does not mean taking them at face value… An essential part of the trained historian’s job to try to prevent people from using prejudiced, simplistic or outdated interpretations of the past.” ‘Making history: the historian and uses of the past’, in H. Kean and P. Martin (eds.), Public History Reader (2013), p.117.

John Tosh makes the point that there is value in contrasting past attitudes to show evolutions in prejudice and emotional responses, specifically with regard to the 18th century Black populations of

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London in contrast with the ‘aliens’ panics of the late 19th century. J. Tosh, Why History Matters (2008), pp.30-31.

Laurajane Smith’s analysis of contrasting impact of the 1807 commemoration exhibitions gives a valuable case study in risks of a challenging approach. “Attempts at acknowledging dissonant and confronting histories were… too emotionally destabilizing, and visitors turned to an array of strategies to insulate themselves from the emotional content of the exhibition. In doing so, [white British] visitors tended to also distance themselves from any sense of personal or collective responsibility for recognizing the implications of this history, and thus for participating in the public debates looked for by African-Caribbean British visitors.” L. Smith, ‘Navigating emotional responses to dissonant heritages’, in L. Smith (ed.), Representing Enslavement and Abolition in Museums: Ambiguous Engagements (2011), p.263.

This is not however a simple issue, and two contrasting views are included here for context. Christopher Hibbert, on writing history for a wide audience, points out that, “The main aim is to entertain and tell a good, accurate story, without attempting to make historical discoveries or change historical opinion in any way.” Quoted in P. Beck, Presenting History: Past and Present (2012), p.35.

Cristina Lleras, based on case studies in South America which use various strategies for presenting plural histories, has found that “Diversification of heritage by itself does not necessarily solve the problems of representing a diverse and multi-cultural society… On the one hand, it can create master narratives that focus solely on difference… On the other hand it can pose problems by disinheriting a sector of the population that defends traditional understandings of heritage.” ‘National Museums, national narratives and identity politics,’ in J. Gardner and P Hamilton (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Public History (2017), p.361.

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11 Public history with archives and special collections MAY be designed to be re-purposable and reusable with multiple audiences.

11.1 Basis and justification: The resource implications of public history have been referenced several times in these principles. It is therefore logical to aim to reuse and repurpose content created for one audience or medium to work with others. Simply pasting in content to a new medium, or reading text from an exhibition panel in lieu of writing a talk is unlikely to be successful, but by understanding key principles for switching between medium, audience and context, good public history can be delivered with limited new investment of resource.

11.2 Implications: Repurposing content can be done almost infinitely, although it helps to have a sense of some key factors about each collection/item you want to highlight. Most services have generic text for regular talks into which specific content can be slotted (e.g. introduction to your service, its key collections and how to use them, with space for examples relating to a particular audience). This approach can be usefully reversed to note multiple aspects of a particular collection which can be drawn out for different audiences. To give just one example, a hospital archive can highlight local architecture, medical innovation, individual histories, dietary changes or changes in women’s roles. But much of the work of introducing the collection can be done once and infinitely reused.

Appendix B gives examples of how and when repurposing of content can work for different mediums and audiences. But in practice there are few limits. If a service offers options such as “exclusive” paid viewings or insights for strategic stakeholders, it may be unwise to share these immediately with a wide audience, but in the long term most interpretation content can be reused.

11.3 References: Kalela suggests that, “Ideally historians start creating the parameters of the subject to be studied knowing what in the past is significant for the people they intend to address, and why.” This affects reception as well as presentation. J. Kalela, ‘Making history: the historian and uses of the past’, in H. Kean and P. Martin (eds.), Public History Reader (2013), p.111.

An example of repurposing in practice is the 100 Objects Bradford site created by Special Collections Bradford University. Although primarily a single blog site, this also codifies interesting content across collections and has been a continued reference point for social media and presentations long after the 100 Object blogs themselves were originally posted: https://100objectsbradford.wordpress.com/. Accessed 16 August 2019.

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12 Public history using archives and special collections MAY be delivered through partnerships and supplying content to other providers who can reach different audiences or varied technical environments.

12.1 Basis and justification: The benefit of collections as sources for public history may not be matched by the capacity for archive and special collections services to undertake public history work alongside all their other commitments. Working with partners or through third parties to make content accessible and reach new audiences can greatly broaden engagement opportunities and make it easier to reach communities who have not spontaneously seen archives as an area of interest.

12.2 Implications: When working with partners, services will not be able to control projects, and some find this uncomfortable at times. Factors to negotiate include access to impact data, and clear acknowledgement of the service’s link to the activity, exhibition or other project outputs. It may otherwise be difficult to demonstrate the value of the archive service’s contribution or to use it as a springboard to further engagement.

Asset-based community development can be a factor here, especially where a service has spaces which they can be made available for community activities. While this may not exclusively affect collections or public history, this approach can break down barriers and create opportunities for ongoing relationships.

12.3 ReferencesThis topic was fruitfully discussed at the Archives and Records Association’s 2018 conference panel discussion “Widening the Circle – a discussion about independence and support” between Heather Roberts (HerArchivist), Gail Heath (Pankhurst Centre/Manchester Women’s Aid) and David Smith (University of Huddersfield).

Janelle Warren Findley underlines the value and the challenge to traditional practice: “One of the real dilemmas of public historical work: the need to understand that cultural informants are equal partners in intellectual endeavours because their knowledge and experience, their cultural membership, makes them experts and they must be recognised as such.” She notes that although thinking here has undoubtedly changed, practice has not often followed. ‘Public history, cultural institutions and national identity: dialogues about difference, in J. Gardner and P. Hamilton (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Public History (2017), p.313.

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13 Public history using archives and special collections MAY offer opportunities for the public to tell their own stories and express resonances of the history in contemporary life.

13.1 Basis and justification: As discussed further in principle 16, a major area of impact for public history in archives and special collections is in engagement with individuals’ sense of identity, whether around place, hobby, community, institutional or family history. This means that many examples of public history will encourage responses based on deep personal involvement or resonance with contemporary experiences.

Creating opportunities to participate in the formation of public history and to respond to it empowers audiences and potentially increases their engagement with the history and the service which is promoting it. Their contributions can enrich public history, and bring additional knowledge, expertise and skills into play. Equally, a failure to offer such opportunities may be significantly frustrating and alienating, particularly where the connection to personal identity is deeply felt.

13.2 Implications: The concept of participation as a spectrum, with many heritage sites limited to transmitting knowledge or inviting limited comment only, is well established. Some types of public history clearly lend themselves to or require a participative approach, working closely with a particular community and producing outputs that meet their goals and reflect their experiences.

As with partnership activity, it may be uncomfortable to accept that not all history presented by archives and special collections is complete or even correct, especially for services not accustomed to participatory working. It is useful to gauge from the outset how central this element of contemporary response and participation should be in designing, implementing and evaluating the activity. For fairly brief interactions on social media, with comment functions built in, it may be sufficient to respond to any particularly specific comments (including to acknowledge errors). But for installations, workshops and long-term projects touching on elements of personal or community identity, it is good practice to build this in at the outset.

13.3 References:

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“Museums want visitors to say ‘I know this happened but I didn’t realise what it was actually like.’ Emotional connection, founded on scholarship, is what museums can do best.” D. McIntyre, ‘Creating new pasts in museums: planning the Museum of London’s Modern London galleries,’ in P. Ashton and H. Keen (eds.), People and their Pasts: Public History Today (2009), p.142.

“In community history the shift in the balance of authority from historian to a lay constituency is particularly evident, sometimes leading to the marginalization of the academics. Their expertise may be grudgingly accepted, or disparaged as elitism.” In this quotation, academics are specifically referenced, but this dynamic can exist between community groups and any perceived authoritative organisation, including archives and special collections. J. Tosh, ‘Public history,’ History, 99, pp191-212. doi:10.1111/1468-229X.12053

Jon Newman gives an example of a participatory exhibition practice, when photographs from a studio photographer’s archive were spontaneously re-captioned by visitors from the community represented, recapturing the sense of the photographs as family treasures rather than generic images. “The spontaneous captioning at the Twin Lens Reflex exhibition was a temporary re-appropriation of meaning by the local community that ‘owned’ the collection. The guerrilla captions posted on the images were a refusal to allow the photographs to turn into the merely representational of whatever – ‘black youth’, 1970s fashion, ‘Windrush migrant’, ‘Caribbean nurse’. Instead of the cryogenic after-existence of the archive, they were briefly reacquiring the shared life and meaning that they had once held for the individuals who commissioned and owned them.” in P. Ashton and H. Keen (eds.), People and their Pasts: Public History Today (2009), p.276.

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14 Public history using archives and special collections SHOULD be designed with an understanding of multiple potential impacts on different audiences, depending on their experiences and backgrounds.

14.1 Basis and justification: Public history is not only about the transmission of history – it is also about its reception by the publics who engage with it. In promoting particular strands of history to broad audiences, archives and special collections should be aware that public responses are likely to be varied. These are significantly based in the experiences and backgrounds individuals are bringing to the history portrayed. To take an obvious example: people who have personally experienced warfare and displacement from their homes in conflict are likely to find exhibitions based on wartime bombing and evacuation a very different prospect from those whose experience of warfare is largely from fictionalised film portrayal. This response may be particularly acute if they are not expecting to confront such reminders of their own past, or if they are in an unfamiliar setting.

14.2 Implications: As experiences vary by individual, it is difficult for archives and special collections to anticipate and understand the full range of possible impacts. But it is always worth being aware of the community served, and particularly of the profile and experiences of any engagement-target groups which have not previously engaged with the service and whose first engagement this may be.

The impact schematic suggested in principle 16 may be helpful in considering likely different impacts: the conflict between those affected by enjoyment and identity impacts, for example, may be acute. The reference case of different responses to a slavery exhibition shows colliding identity impacts: of strongly-held pride in a local place which profited from slavery versus family histories deeply affected by the experience of being enslaved. Public history which challenges accepted assumptions or confronts difficult pasts is particularly likely to evoke this kind of fragmented response, and this needs to be considered from the outset.

14.3 References: Sherry Turkle identifies a range of general emotional and evocative experiences from engaging with objects from the past. Themes such as “transition and passage”, making life stages and geographical mobility are likely to evoke different responses and strength of response depending on the

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experience of the viewer. ‘Evocative Objects: the things that matter’, in H. Kean and P. Martin (eds.), Public History Reader (2013)

Geoff Cubitt explores the question of local history in the context of the 1807 commemoration activities in 2007, and the challenge of the popular idea of history inspiring sense of place due to population shifts during the intervening centuries. “Relevance to place and relevance to community no longer, in such circumstances, coincide neatly: identities are shaped as much by displacement and dislocation (cultural as well as physical) as by social and cultural and residential continuity… Alongside these groups of African or African-Caribbean descent, and alongside the white British members of local society (whose own connections to the particular locality may often themselves be of recent date) exist other groupings – Asian or Eastern European, for example – whose members’ sense of being implicated in either a local or a national connection to the transatlantic slaving past may be variable, unpredictable or non-existent.” G. Cubitt, ‘Bringing it Home: Making Local Meaning in 2007 Bicentenary Exhibitions’, Slavery and Abolition 30 (2), (2009), 269-70.

In a similar context, Laurajane Smith explores unanticipated emotional impacts around the 1807 commemorations and the experience of visitors with different. “Feelings of guilt and shame emerge as significant issues for many of those interviewed, particularly those who identified as white British. None of the museum exhibitions referred to or aimed to generate feelings of guilt, although many used a range of devices to illicit empathy, and to encourage reflection on the legacies of the history of enslavement… The white British response was dominated by attempts to negotiate these feelings, negotiations that met with varying degrees of success or failure. Indeed, most white British respondents tended to insulate or disengage themselves from the exhibitions, and more particularly from negative feelings that undermined their sense of national identity and sense of self.” (‘Navigating emotional responses to dissonant heritages’, in L. Smith (ed.), Representing Enslavement and Abolition in Museums: Ambiguous Engagements (2011), p.263.) Conversely, Smith notes direct visitor feedback from a Black visitor: “I mean you have to remember the context we’re in walking round the space, everyone’s looking at the black person to see how they react, that’s how I feel.” ‘Man's inhumanity to man' and other platitudes of avoidance and misrecognition: an analysis of visitor responses to exhibitions marking the 1807 bicentenary’, Museum and Society, 8(3) pp. 193-214.

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15 Public history using archives and special collections online SHOULD be planned in line with these principles, taking account of the different and often more isolated context in which it will be experienced.

15.1 Basis and justification: All the principles outlined here should be useful for online activities, but there are particular considerations when presenting public history in this environment. Online engagement is a great opportunity to reach out beyond those with the time, money and coincidence of location who can reach in-person activities. But it also changes the context in which public history is understood. It increases the likelihood of content being seen in isolation, without context, interpretation or support. This should be considered and designed into online engagement. Distressing content and material which promotes what are now offensive views need particularly careful management.

15.2 Implications: Two areas which need particular consideration here are the sensitivity of material and ensuring it has context. Highly distressing material should be used online with great care, and within a clear context which avoids that excessive focus on individual suffering (Principle 4) and gives adequate warning of the content. Providing information on sources of support for those affected by distressing content is good practice. Where historical material which contains what is now offensive content is included in online activities, it is again vital to contextualise and give warnings. This is essential to avoid alienating public audiences who come upon this content; it also importantly acts to distance the collections organisation from endorsing such views.

15.3 References: On general experiences of heritage through online access: “Digital media… puts much of the authority – and responsibility – for constructing the narrative in the hands of the viewer… The narrative may become temporally as well as spatially confused…the overall understanding gained from a chaotic visit may be jumbled, contributing little to the communication of cultural heritage” Y Kalay, ‘Introduction: preserving cultural heritage through digital media’, in Y. Kalay et al. (eds.), New Heritage (2007).

Jerome de Groot likewise highlights the disorientating effect of encountering history online. “Users need not have connections either conceptual or physical, to the information they download…on this model, ‘history’, or rather the sets of information relating to the past – document, artefact, image, database – become another group of strands in cyberspace, accessible and usable to just about anyone who has access to the internet.” Consuming History (2009), p.91. To archives and special

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collections undertaking digitisation programmes this will be seen in many ways as a positive, but it is nonetheless a quite different experiential context.

The impact of encountering disturbing content through online catalogue searches was productively discussed at an Archives and Records Association Northern region 2013 conference ‘Filth’, on dealing with contested and disturbing records. The use of offensive terminology in finding aids and professional discussions on addressing this is noted at (Principle 2) above.

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16 The impact of public history using archives and special collections MAY be understood schematically through identifying elements which support IDENTITY, ENJOYMENT and/or KNOWLEDGE.

16.1 Basis and justification: The potential impacts of archives and special collections are extensive, particularly in the context of research activity which spans sciences, environmental data, social policy, creative endeavours, language, landscape and language change, and thousands of other potential impacts. Individual public history activities may well have targeted impacts and range widely across a spectrum of ways in which they can positively affect their communities.

However, it may be useful for day to day purposes to break down the most frequently-observed types of impact from public history with collections into three categories. These are found both in archives and special collections’ understanding of their impact and public history writing’s conceptualisation of the impact of public history, particularly engagements with collections.

IDENTITY comprises: sense of place, sense of belonging to an organisation, self-understanding through personal, family and local history connections and/or community identities including age, race, gender and sexuality, cherished hobbies and interests, affective responses relating to personal experience and emotions, a sense of their identity’s representation and valued inclusion within histories. A challenge to accepted histories may affect a person’s sense of identity if they are closely connected to the previous narrative or to the new interpretation and understanding. There may be satisfaction in being represented and understood in a new version, or a sense of alienation from a disruption to previously accepted narratives.

ENJOYMENT comprises: fun, storytelling, satisfying curiosity, a ‘good day out’, positive health and wellbeing experiences, a variety of creative responses, affective responses relating to positive external experiences. A challenge to accepted histories may affect a person’s sense of enjoyment through the pleasure of hearing a new voice or story.

KNOWLEDGE comprises: learning outcomes, skills development, inspiring exploration and discovery, a sense of understanding or encountering new facts and truths. A challenge to accepted histories may affect a person’s sense of

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knowledge through the excitement of new discoveries; however it may also provoke a negative response if a person feels that the challenge undermines their previously acquired knowledge and is therefore untrue or biased.

16.2 Implications: These are very broad categories and there is potential for overlap between them (many people enjoy acquiring knowledge, knowledge is a powerful element of identity, a positive sense of personal identity connects into enjoyment and wellbeing etc). However, this schematic approach can be used in planning and evaluation of overall public history activities, as outlined in Appendix C, and its simplicity allows briefer, less planned activities to come within a framework of understanding impact. This can work alongside audience data to understand and explore how the archives and special collections are affecting their communities.

This schematic understanding of impact is particularly helpful in understanding likely responses to public history. It also deliberately promotes and values the sense of enjoyment from engagement with public history which is often underplayed within analyses of the public value of archives and special collections. Different archives and special collections services will value different elements of this impact trio in different ways; different audiences will respond to some elements more strongly than others. This is certainly not intended to confine the ambition of archives and special collections to have a broad range of impacts, but to simplify what can be a challenging area for day to day practice.

16.3 References: This idea for a schematic understanding of the impact of archives and special collections arose out of discussion with Geoff Cubitt and the students of the MA in Public History, Institute for the Public Understanding of the Past, University of York. I am very grateful for their stimulating conversation. However, a range of readings contributed to refining the definitions and are given here.

Bernard Eric Jensen gives a valuable insight into the thought processes identified here as ‘identity’ elements of public history, and why they may provoke strong responses. “Humans do not have one kind of memory…the kind of memory that appears to be most relevant…is termed autobiographical memory. Autobiographical memory…is the decisive one when seeking to understand human action; that is, the ongoing making of history… The memory work undertaken by human beings is not merely retrospective in character. It also has a prognostic or prophetic function, focused upon the future…”’Usable pasts: comparing approaches to popular and public history’, in P. Ashton and H. Keen (eds.), People and their Pasts: Public History Today (2009), p.54.

Similarly, Raphael Samuel understood the identity elements in what he identified as public history: history practiced outside the academy. “The past that inspires genealogists, local historians and collectors is not random,” but inspired by elements close to their self-identification. Quoted in J.

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Kalela, ‘Making history: the historian and uses of the past’, in H. Kean and P. Martin (eds.), Public History Reader (2013), p.112.

“History and the archive …are engaged with in a variety of ways…and for a number of reasons: understanding, revelation, personal storytelling.” J. de Groot, Consuming History (2009), p.82.

“Accounts of genealogical research stress its importance for self-making, self- exploration and self-understanding.”…“Genealogy is a resource through which connections through blood are made, and re-made, meaningful... Genealogy is also described as a way to ‘bring back’ the dead, both those known and unknown in a person’s lifetime.” A.-M. Kramer, ‘Kinship, affinity and connectedness: exploring the role of genealogy in personal lives’, Sociology, 45 (3), (2011), 380, 385.

“A strong sense emerges from the interviews overall that people came to the museums with their own knowledge and values, and looked for, and often found, what they needed to reinforce those values, whether progressive, conservative, reactionary or overtly racist. This is not to say that exhibitions cannot change or modify people’s views, but that some people do not use museums as places of learning, and that the lengths to which people go to seek affirmation of their knowledge, views and identities is, as yet, not well understood.” L. Smith, ‘Navigating emotional responses to dissonant heritages’, in L. Smith (ed.), Representing Enslavement and Abolition in Museums: Ambiguous Engagements (2011), p.300.

A suggested schematic for cultural impact is provided by M. Ridge et al, A framework for evaluating cultural policy investment (non-technical summary) (2007). Online: http://dimetic.dime-eu.org/dimetic_files/RidgeEtAl2007.pdf. Accessed 16 August 2019. This includes familiar elements of archives impact such as research, but also consumption (largely leisure use) and regeneration/strengthening communities.

The appearance of a TV special on Danny Dyer’s royal ancestry demonstrated the ways in which public history pitched as entertainment can attract negative responses (the “dumbing down” accusation will be familiar to many). But it also attracted staunch defence, as both an enjoyable and a successful learning experience. See E.Evans, ‘Danny Dyer is “making people think again” about history, say historians’, History Extra, January 2019. Online: https://www.historyextra.com/period/medieval/danny-dyer-bbc-history-programme-historians-reaction/. Accessed 16 August 2019.

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Appendix A: Stepped engagement offerA stepped engagement offer is a means of understanding, identifying and managing barriers to engaging with archives and special collections, while maintaining a realistic resource base to allow the service to function across its remit. The general goal is to attract new audiences and those who may be uncertain of the value of archives and special collections to them through a low-barrier approach with some public history engagement tasters, while progressing some audiences to an in-depth, high-commitment role which may require significant contributions from both sides. It is essential to note that there will be some specific priority audiences which do not fit this pattern: the service may be seeking a long term or in-depth role with these audiences, but consistently aim to keep barriers low and to actively facilitate their engagement.

Example audiences and activities:

Starters: non-users within the parent organisation (local people, students, employees), people with a general interest in the subject/area/organisation who have not used the archives and special collections. Engage through activities such as social media hashtags, open afternoons, heading out into the community (festivals, alumni events) rather than expecting them to visit the service. Any charge for participation should be within their existing experience/expectations: eg local history group events programme where all events have a low cost.

Interested audiences: those who have become aware of the archives and special collections but have not become regular users. Engage through targeted attractions (specific project, online and onsite exhibitions, talks, events). Some of these activities may have a charge to cover costs and many will have some barrier such as distance travelled or needing to get noticed on social media, but these should be minimised as this is not a committed audience. Talks may be in multiple locations, for example, and online content promoted through multiple platforms including traditional media. Interested online audiences may find options like webinars attractive: additional content but not a long term commitment.

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Starters

Low barrier

Low/no cost

Introductory/no commitment

Short

Awareness raising

Interested

Engaging

Longer term

Actively using the service

Chargeable (cost recovery)

In depth

Intensive

Longer term

Setting expectations of them

Will expect more in return

Cost recovery (or more)

Specific priority

Audiences you want/need to attract

May be starting from low awareness of

you

Minimal barriers: facilitate and look

for ways in

In-depth audiences: those who value the organisation and have a sense of trust/commitment which prepares them for a more intensive engagement. They may be prepared to commit to longer term activities which make demands on their time or money (eg volunteering, joining paid-for courses lasting several weeks, being regulars at series of talks), but they will expect more in return. In-depth audiences often have a long history with the service; this type of offer may not reach out to new groups.

Specific priority audiences: services may well identify top priority groups for engagement, whether connected to their funder or elements of their community who are underrepresented in service audiences. These groups sit outside a stepped offer, as it needs to be as easy as possible for them to engage. Costs for engagement with these groups will need to be borne by the service, its parent organisation or by external funding (eg seminars for students, free schools workshops for priority schools, staff/alumni events, community projects).

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Appendix B: Repurposing contentKey content about important collections, typical record types among your holdings or iconic items can be repurposed many times. This appendix aims to help to guide you through factors which can help to re-use existing activity and content for new audiences. Many of these factors are self-explanatory, but some notes may help to clarify:

a) AudienceThis is really key to deciding on your engagement approach. Generating content without knowing the audience can make it particularly difficult to come up with a hook (under c) or to promote it in relevant places. Although if you have a really strong idea it may catch attention anyway, if you are repurposing content that you have already used with a more obvious audience, it is essential to think about what the characteristics of your new audience are, how they differ and what their needs are. The most immediate division may seem to be whether they are with you in person or online/remote users. But equally your approach needs to be different between an organised group which has set aside time for you and a general public audience whose attention you need to attract.

b) TimeType of audience is key to understanding how much time they are likely to have. A browsing social media audience typically moves on in seconds, though they may be prepared to give you some brief minutes to watch a short clip. If you want online audiences to give you more time, you need to give them notice to set aside time (eg by scheduling a webinar) or let them schedule their own time (eg by offering a recording). Similarly, organised in-person events differ between those which are ticketed (perhaps paid for) and time therefore set aside, against trying to catch attention among other attractions (eg at a fair or local open day, or individual labels in a large exhibition). If you are trying to catch a browsing audience, and engage them for a long period, you need to be really sure they have time to spend with you. It may be best to offer them opportunities to follow up after their immediate, fleeting interest.

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What will reach even wider audiences?Podcasting a talk Recording a webinar Cross-linking through social media Issuing a press release

What do you already have/planned?Existing general content Subject-specialist collections content Major outreach activity Invitations to participate

What tone will work?Chatty Authoritative Inviting participation

What is your intended impact area?Enjoyment Knowledge Identity

How can you catch their attention?Links to a place Interest in a subject/person Catching or creating a theme Insight into activities

How much time do they have?Five seconds scrolling Five minutes reading At least ten minutes to engage

Who is your audience?A defined group A broad public onsite A broad public online

c) Catching attention and connectingWhen you have a defined audience like a talk to a specific group, it should be relatively straightforward to identify a hook to get their attention. Very often this will be records associated with a place or subject which connects the group, or a person or family with a strong story which links to the group in some other way. These hooks can work for broader audiences, but are likely to chime with a smaller proportion of those who first view them, so your key messages may not land so well.

With general audiences, it may be better to look at storytelling or packaging content, to give them a sense of coherence of approach. The simplest tactic here is to identify content as part of something bigger (“This week we are sharing our Top Ten Archives”; “As it is 150 years since….”; or use social media hashtags as part of a campaign or in response to trending topics). This won’t guarantee an audience follows all your posts, but it gives a coherence to outreach presentations that might otherwise seem random. Top ten-type presentations are also useful as they give you a core group of content which you know are high priority and may be readily reused, for staff development and short-notice engagement opportunities.

Storytelling is a technique which can work well on social media to catch attention. This requires threaded posts or other techniques to draw in audiences from a simple hook (“Today, we’re finding out what’s in this box”, “A reader ordered this book today, and we wanted to share it with you”, “Have you ever wondered how to clean old documents?”) through a series of steps which unfold content and/or process. Don’t discount the value of giving insights into how collections are managed and processed: introducing staff members and their work can be a humanising factor that suits the intimate feeling of social media and its one-to-one reception. Note that as an in-person technique storytelling tends to be time-consuming and needs to factor in the points in b above. A planned event such as a trail or with live storytelling can be very rewarding – but you need to have captured your audience already.

d) Intended impact area

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The schematic of impact “identity, knowledge and enjoyment” will help to understand what your audience may gain from interaction, particularly if you are dealing with a set group about which you have plenty of data. If you are engaging with more general, independent audiences, it is useful to ask yourself what you intend the impact to be, and whether there is likely crossover of different impact areas. Conflicts and convergences are discussed in Appendix C in more detail.

e) ToneThis is to some extent linked to intended impact, but also to medium, and is one key reason why different media require rewriting content rather than simply cutting/pasting across different platforms. Social media tone is important to establish, and may be consistent as a voice for the service over time; alternatively, individual staff members’ voices may be distinct, to increase perception that the social media channel is not just an authorised institutional voice. But tone for individual displays, exhibitions, talks, workshops and activities will also need to vary. Tone can affect perceptions of how much the service seeks participation and feedback. Some services have kept to an authoritative, relatively formal tone for outreach, and there will be times when this has a role to play. However, a consistently formal tone may increase perceived barriers and negative responses. If you are seeking to encourage the idea that the service supports enjoyment and participation, aiming for an informal and personal tone can help.

f) What you already haveIt is worth looking at what you already have prepared as engagement opportunities and planning how they can be re-skinned for other uses. A talk on a local hospital for a local history group could become a blog about health records focusing on key series from the hospital, celebrating an NHS anniversary. A top ten set of collections tweets can quickly suggest an alumni display or a document ‘speed dating’ event. Major activities such as funded projects will provide opportunities to reuse content across multiple platforms, giving workshop outputs as web pages, providing inspiration for talks programmes, and using social media to shape displays. These can remain relevant long after the project concludes, and it is useful to revising older engagement material to identify its wider potential.

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g) What will reach even wider audiencesOne re-purposing can lead to more opportunities, and it’s useful to consider this in advance. Typically, on-site and in-person opportunities reach more restricted audiences and are less flexible in reuse, so podcasting, livestreaming and creating recorded webinars are all opportunities to keep longer term value from short-term activity. Turning workshops into online resources may also work, although simply posting workshop materials online may not translate well. Re-purposing is likely to involve additional resource, though more in framing the content well than in identifying potential content from scratch.

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Appendix C: Using enjoyment/identity/knowledge schematic to understand impact The schematic of three types of regularly-found impact can be used in a number of ways, when planning, delivering and evaluating public history activities.

Identity Enjoyment KnowledgePlanning Question whether the main

aim of this activity touches on questions of identity. If so, consider:

seeking gatekeeper partners or ensuring recruitment of individuals to help with development and identify sensitivities

publicising through organisations associated with that identity (interest/community/ locality)

whether the issues are ones which may raise criticism of your organisation or interpretation

Question whether the main aim of this activity is for participants to have fun. If so, consider:

How to raise the profile of your service as a leisure provider, online or offline. This is a competitive market; what is your USP?

How to meet audiences at times and places which work for them – unless your enjoyment offer is outstanding, they may not come looking for you

How to lower barriers to first engagement, for audiences who may be new to you

How to reinforce the sense that this is a fun, inclusive

Question whether the main aim of this activity touches on questions of acquiring knowledge, skills and learning. If so, consider:

How to engage with formal education where appropriate (eg schools offers, reaching teachers)

How to ensure balanced interpretation of contested histories

What the key learning points are for any activity or section of activity (feed these into evaluation)

What the balance is with other elements of the schematic, as this will influence presentation

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approaches (seek colleague support)

whether the issues are ones which may create strong responses in audiences (consider offering contacts for further discussion and emotional support)

How the engagement approach can lower barriers and proactively invite participation by those whose identity is closely involved – not doing this can be perceived as active exclusion

opportunity and to reduce any sense of exclusion to those who aren’t already engaged

How to retain a sense of wonder/discovery/curiosity in activities

Whether a stepped engagement offer is appropriate – in a competitive leisure market, keen followers/attendees may be happy to pay for more exclusive or extensive leisure offers

How to manage responses from existing users if this is a new direction – ‘dumbing down’ is a classic accusation

Whether there is an impact on local/comparable attractions and how to work collaboratively rather than in competition – joint offers, trails and links between

design Whether the issues/learning

includes challenges to accepted histories and whether this is likely to create strong responses/criticism of your organisation (ensure there is awareness and backup)

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related attractions/sites

Designing Effective engagement approaches may include:

Collaborative or community curation: ceding power and recognising that experience among people with this shared identity has value

Challenging accepted histories by offering varied voices and different perspectives

In less participatory or extensive activity designs, openly using consultative, questioning methods and acknowledging gaps in collections or representation

Warmly inviting commentary and

Effective engagement approaches may include:

Short, funny, eye-catching content via social media or traditional publishing: images, fun facts and quick quotes

Top tens/prime items and stories around them

Participating in wider activities (festivals, fairs, open days) to connect in spaces where people are already, with minimal promotion

Offering creative activities to respond to collections and showing creative responses including commissioned artworks, writers in residence etc

Ensuring there are leisure-supporting options in place

Effective engagement approaches may include:

Social media stories and press releases which explain context, process and activity (eg tweet threads about how an item was acquired, blogs about less obvious collection items)

Stories which explain unexpected elements of the past through a worked example

Linking content to key hashtags and ‘did you know’ approaches

Workshops and courses which lead to proof of achievement

Opportunities to reinforce learning through activities/feedback/ reflection during less formal

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testimony from those with relevant experience, memories and stories

Sustained engagement and events around a theme, encouraging repeated encounters

Themes on family, locality, emotional histories, histories connected to the organisation/place/particular communities engaged with the service, difficult or contested histories

Seek: relevance to lives as now lived

for on-site engagement (eg refreshments, seating, toilets)

Positive invitations to find out more

One-off and low-impact events contributing to general positive feelings rather than deep engagement

Opportunities to feel special: late events, one-to-one consultation (at a cost), games, trails and quizzes

Themes around star items, familiar topics (food, family, gardens, travel), better known histories and broad periodisation (Vikings, Tudors, Victorian life)

Telling stories focused on key individuals and events which bring them to life

Seek: human stories, which capture imagination

activities Many types of engagement

will work for this, including talks, exhibitions (on site or online), quizzes, trails, workshops and training packages

Themes may be very varied and focus on specific insight from collections, unexpected content, new light on familiar historical tropics, contested histories and divergent narratives

Seek: authenticity, the

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Delivering Issues to look out for: Strong personal

responses requiring support

Clashes of identity creating tension between participants

Issues to look out for: Practical glitches which

appear unprofessional and reduce a sense of enjoyment

Glutted markets or too much similarity in offer to an established provider

Getting stuck, being perceived as providing reliable content for leisure users without being able to progress to greater engagement/new audiences, if this does not fit your strategy

Issues to look out for: Content that has been

pitched at the wrong level and needs further interpretation/additional information

Whether key learning points are being absorbed or whether revisions are required

Which elements are particularly successful and others need review

Evaluating Key questions:Does the story here represent your understanding of the event/community/etc?What have we missed – can you help us to be more representative in future?

Key questions:Would you attend more activities like this?Would you like us to post more content like this?What did you enjoy most about today?

Key questions:What was new to you today?What will you remember from [this activity]? What surprised you about the [activity]?

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Key metrics: Generic social outcomes**Participation in feedback activities including levels of engagement and contribution of ideas – qualitative responses may have great value hereNumerical participation from the community/ies in question if targeted activity

Key metrics:Generic wellbeing measures**Likes/Retweets/follower countsAttendance numbers over time/series of eventsSatisfaction ratings/star ratings

Key metrics:Generic learning outcomes**Self-assessed confidence/competence at start and end of activityCompletion levels for structured activitiesFeedback mentioning key learning points

Impact questions: Archives Revealed Wellbeing Toolkit*

Material held in the archive represents the stories of the people or places you are interested in. (0-10)How do you feel your involvement with the archive will make a difference to you/to others?When volunteering at the archive, do you feel useful? (0-10)

I feel comfortable when visiting the archive (0-10)I enjoy the process of archival research (0-10)Volunteering at the archive has allowed me to make new friends and connect with others (0-10)

I trust the information available at the archive (0-10)Using the archive makes me keen to learn more (0-10)When volunteering at the archive would you say you learn new things? (0-10)

Potential positive outcomes

Sense of participation and being valuedCloser connections with the

Positive initial impression of the service prompting further engagement/word of mouth

New skills, knowledge and understandingConfidence in working with

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serviceContributing knowledge, life experience and personal links to the activity and the service’s understanding

supportWillingness to participate in a stepped engagement offer, including payment for more intensive/exclusive events

particular sources/types of records

*The toolkit suggests a range of structured options for evaluating impact over short and long term archive engagement. Some key examples are used here to illustrate the schematic, but for a rounded picture of impact, the full toolkit should be used. They can be repurposed for special collections use.

** Generic Outcomes are useful indicators across many types of activity. Find out more at:Generic Social Outcomes, Arts Council England: https://www.artscouncil.org.uk/measuring-outcomes/generic-social-outcomes. Generic Learning Outcomes, Arts Council England: https://www.artscouncil.org.uk/measuring-outcomes/generic-learning-outcomes. Generic Wellbeing measures are less widely used, but there are a number of resources including activity-based measures developed by UCL: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/culture/sites/culture/files/ucl_museum_wellbeing_measures_toolkit_sept2013.pdf, and the first four questions used to generate the ONS Wellbeing Dashboard https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/wellbeing/articles/measuresofnationalwellbeingdashboard/2018-04-25.

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