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On-going projects and research perspectives in the Quito study field

Summary report of the Archival City mission to Quito 25 April -5 May 2023

Georges Lomné, principal investigator of the Quito study field and Carole Lamoureux, general coordinator of the Archival City project, carried out a mission to Quito between 25 April and 5 May. This mission was made possible thanks to the financial and logistic support of the French Embassy in Ecuador and of the Universidad Andina Simón Bolivar (UASB). The mission included personal meetings with Quito partners and French diplomatic staff, personal and collaborative working sessions, visits to repositories and museums, and meetings to discuss new collaborations and prospects.

On 27 April, a meeting was held at the UASB to discuss the general progress of the Archival City project and the ongoing projects carried out at the UASB (data papers, archival descriptions of the Catholic workers centre among others). New project proposals were presented and discussed (processing and digitisation of the personal files of the members of the Centro católico de obreros -catholic workers center-, photographic collections of the Instituto Nacional de Patrimonio Cultural -INPC, national institute of cultural heritage- etc). The perspectives after the end of Archival City were also discussed.

On 3 May a meeting was held at the Archivo Metropolitano Histórico (AMH). It was attended by the archive’s staff, Patricio Guerra (former Cronista de la Ciudad of Quito), Guillermo Bustos (UASB), Santiago Cabrera (UASB) and Natasha Sanmartín (UASB). The main topics discussed were the current situation at the AMH (financial means, vacancy of the post of Cronista de la Ciudad), the report on the minutes of the Centro católico de obreros which were processed by Natasha Sanmartín and Santiago Cabrera, and the AMH digitization system which was reactivated in the framework of the Archival City project.

Figure i – Santiago Cabrera, Georges Lomné, Natasha Sanmartín and Guillermo Bustos testing the digitization system of the AMH (3 May 2023). Photo credits : C. Lamoureux.

 

Figure ii – Georges Lomné, Carole Lamoureux, Patricio Guerra, Sofía Granizo and Sonia Merizalde at the AMH (3 May 2023) Photo credits : AMH

 

Figure iii – Santiago Cabrera, Guillermo Bustos and Natasha Sanmartín at the AMH (3 May 2023), Photo credits: AMH

On 4 May a meeting was held at the French Embassy in Ecuador with Frédéric Desagneaux (Ambassador) and Apolline Blanchard (Technical Cooperation Attaché). The lunch break was an opportunity to discuss with Guillermo Bustos, Santiago Cabrera and Rosemarie Terán (UASB) their work within Archival City, as well as the post-Archival City prospects. In the afternoon, C. Lamoureux and G. Lomné visited the Instituto Nacional de Patrimonio Cultural (INPC) in Guápulo (Casa Guápulo). They attended a presentation of the INPC’s initiatives and archives, including technical archives (archaeological excavation files), map library, library, geomatic service, publishing service, photographic collections and photographic database. After the visit, a meeting was held with Catalina Tello Sarmiento (executive director), Daniel González Guzmán (director of knowledge transfer and technology) and Ana María Toro (coordinator of the project of national photography) on potential collaborations between INPC and Archival City, including: the selection of a corpus of old photographs showing squares in the city of Quito, the signature of an agreement between INPC and Archival City.

 

Figure iv – Rosemarie Terán and Guillermo Bustos looking at an Ecuabel report in the technical archives of the INPC (4 May). Photo credits: G. Lomné

 

Figure v- Ana María Toro presenting the photographic collections of the INPC (4 May 2023). Photo credits : G. Lomné.

On 5 May, G. Lomné et C. Lamoureux visited the Casa del Alabado Museum with Carlos Espinosa (Universidad San Francisco de Quito-USFQ). After a presentation of the museum, they attended a meeting with Lucía Durán (executive director of the museum), Estefanía Carrera (educational coordinator) and Carlos Montalvo (conservation and research officer) on the forthcoming installation of the 3D “Quito 1532” in the museum (20 May) and the improvements that will soon be made by the USFQ team (introduction of scans of archaeological artefacts), including the imminent signature of an agreement between Casa del Alabado, Archival City (Gustave Eiffel University) and USFQ.

Several working sessions were held during the mission with Gabriela Arguello, Jeroen Derkinderen, Sophia Checa (PhD students at the UASB) and Erika Bedón (independent researcher) on their data set, archival descriptions and related data papers. On 2 May a working session was organised with Natasha Sanmartín et Santiago Cabrera to discuss the integrations of the archival descriptions of the minutes of the Centro católico de obreros into AtoM.  On the last day of the mission (5 May), C. Lamoureux and G. Lomné met with Tamara Estupiñan (independent researcher) and discussed about the imminent delivery of her INH database and original documentation, and the delivery of the corresponding data paper.

Carole Lamoureux et Annalaura Turiano

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Research workshop in Bologna- 12-13 May 2023

The Archival City-Bologna team is organising a research workshop on 12 and 13 May in partnership with the Archivio di Stato of Bologna.

The first day will be dedicated to the Archival City project and the findings and results of the Bologna research team. A round table and a final discussion will close the day.

The second day will be devoted to the diversity of research on medieval history and sources carried out at the Archvio di Stato Bologna. The presentations will be held in Italian and French.

Click here for the detailed programme.

The Centro Católico de Obreros of Quito- a source for research on the social history of the city and part of the urban heritage

On April 5,  a conference on the archives of the Centro Católico de Obreros (CCO) was held at the Universidad Andina Simón Bolívar-Ecuador,  in partnership with the university Gustave Eiffel and the Archivo metropolitano de Historia de Quito. Speakers (including Patricio Guerra, Santiago Cabrera and Natasha Sanmartín, members of the Archival City Project) debated about the importance of the Center as a source for research into Quito’s urban social history and as part of the city’s heritage. The process of conservation and cataloguing of the CCO’s historical archive, resulting from the collaboration between the Universidad Andina Simón Bolívar and the Archivo metropolitano de Historia was presented.

First slide of the poster presented by Santiago Cabrera and Natasha Sanmartín

Courtesy of Santiago Cabrera

The CCOQ is one of the oldest workers’ organisations in Quito. It was founded in 1906 by a group of conservative intellectuals under the principles promoted by the Encyclical Rerum Novarum (1891) issued by the Pope Leo XIII. Catholic intellectuals looked for alternatives to the leftist trade union organizations and were inspired by the work of French Catholic centres aimed at developing edifying links between workers.

The CCOQ archive hols a documentary collection of great relevance for the study of the social memory of both Quito and Ecuador. Speakers in the conference underlined the importance of the centre as part of the urban heritage of the city as shown by its geographical position. Indeed, it is located in a highly symbolic position, in the street 24 de mayo, which represents an imaginary border between the heritage space of the city as it is conceived for touristic purposes and the quarters of the historical centre of Quito considered as being popular.

Concerning the documentary collections, the CCOQ minutes (from 1906 until now) are the most important body of documents preserved. The center keeps other relevant sources for the history of workers’ sociability (membership registers, accountancy books, magazines, documents on mutual and cultural activities, posters, etc.). In order to prevent this documentary collection from damage and risks of natural catastrophes, a preservation project has been conceived. It entailed the transfer of 11 linear metres of documentation to the Quito Metropolitan Historical Archive for technical processing.

Digitalisation process at the  Quito Metropolitan Historical Archive

Photo credit: Archivo metropolitano de Historia de Quito

This was possible thanks to the commitment of the City Chronicler, Patricio Guerra, Georges Lomné (Principal investigator of Archival City Ecuador), Guillermo Bustos (coordinator Archival City UASB-E) and Santiago Cabrera Hanna (coordinator of the intervention project Actas de Sesiones del CCOQ). The project consisted of three main phases: the description of the documentary collection, the preventive conservation process, and the digitalisation  which are detailed in a forthcoming data paper co-authored by Santiago Cabrera Hanna and Natasha Sanmartín Monteros  who was responsible for the technical treatment.

The recovery of the CCO-Q minutes represents an important step in safeguarding  Quito’s working class cultural heritage and facilitating academic research. One of the challenges is the recognition of the CCO-Q archives as an integral part of the documentary heritage and social history of the city of Quito.  The work done makes this documentary heritage more accessible to national and international researchers and users.

 

Meeting on the archives of the Centro Católico de Obreros, Quito

5th April 2023, Universidad Andina Simón Bolívar

On Wednesday 5 April at 5pm, a meeting will be held at the Universidad Andina Simón Bolívar (Área de Historia) in Quito on the archives of the Centro Católico de Obreros in partnership with Archival City and the Archivo metropolitano de Historia de Quito. The CCOQ was founded on March 18, 1906 by a group of conservative intellectuals from the city of Quito who looked for alternatives to the leftist trade union organizations. It was inspired by the work of French Catholic centers and  aimed at developing edifying links between workers. 

The CCOQ archive has a documentary collection of great relevance for the study of the social memory of both Quito and Ecuador. The department of History of the Universidad Andina Simón Bolívar and the Archivo metropolitano de Historia have been collaborating on the conservation of theses archives, in partnership with Archival city. The intervention process includes registration, conservation, and inventory.

Storage & labeling

Conservation status record

Photos by Santiago Cabrera Hanna & Natasha Sanmartín Monteros

The event on the 5th April proposes a dialogue on the importance of  the Centro Católico de Obreros (CCO) as a source for research into Quito’s urban social history and as part of the city’s heritage. The results of the process of conservation and cataloguing of the CCO’s historical archive will be presented. Speakers will include Patricio Guerra, Santiago Cabrera and Natasha Sanmartín, members of the Archival City Projet Quito.

The meeting will be broadcasted on the facebook page of the Universidad Andina Simón Bolívar and that of the Archivo Histórico de la Ciudad. It will also be recorded.

More information on the event can be found here.

 

Conference in Quito 15-16 march 2023

On March 15 and 16, 2023 will be held at the University of San Francisco de Quito a two days conference devoted to the Inca Quito and organized by Carlos Ramiro Espinosa Fernandez de Cordova professor at USFQ and member of the Quito Archival City’s Team.

The first day will be devoted to the presentation of the 3D modelling of Quito 1532. On the second day, the presentations will revolve around the documentation and data covering 100 years of history of the city, a transition period characterized by the Inca occupation and the Spanish conquest.

Programme of the first day

Programme of the second day

Seminar Documenting the Ordinary Cities in Southeast Asia. Chiang Mai and Bangkok 19-24 February 2023

The Archival City Chiang Mai Team organises a week-long seminar entitled “Documenting the ordinary cities in Southeast Asia”, in partnership with several local and international institutions. The seminar will take place in Chiang Mai and Bangkok from February 19 to 25.

Through presentations, panel discussions, and visits to specific neighborhoods and archival repositories, the seminar will focus on the sources,  methods, and digital tools for documenting the ordinary city and its heritage.

ProgramSeminarCM-BGK_19-22February

Archival City Research Workshop March- September 2023

The Archival City research workshop is aimed at Master’s students (M1 and M2) who wish to reflect on the history, nature and stakes of urban sources, data or archives.

The main objective of the workshop is to give students an overview of the methodological and conceptual achievements of the international Archival City programme, as a complement and support to their research.

The workshop sessions will aim both to support students in the production and description of their research corpus and to provide them with bibliographic, conceptual and methodological tools on the world of urban archives in the digital age.

A final workshop will be held in autumn 2023.
It will be public, and will be part of the activities of the Urban Futures Labex.

Presentation

Symposium: Ghost Archives and Shadow Records

PDF (in English) Presentation in French

Summary Programme (in French)

Detailed Programme (in French)

Archival City is a Tremplin project selected by the I-site Future of Gustave Eiffel University and funded over the period 2019-2023. Its aims are to propose new modes of intelligibility, visualization and use of urban archives, from six experimental and non-exclusive fields: Algiers, Paris, Jerusalem, Bologna, Quito and Chiang Mai. More information on Archival-City here: https://archivalcity.hypotheses.org

Archival City is organizing its fall 2022 symposium on the theme “Ghost Archives and Shadow Records”. It will be held at the Archives nationales (Pierrefite-sur-Seine site, metro line 13 Saint-Denis Université – auditorium and “salles de commission 1 et 2”) on November 17 and 18, 2022.

Continuer la lecture de Symposium: Ghost Archives and Shadow Records

Call for paper. Ghost Archives and shadow records

Archival City is a Tremplin project selected by the I-site Future of Gustave Eiffel University and funded over the period 2019-2023. Its aims are to propose new modes of intelligibility, visualization and use of urban archives, from six experimental and non-exclusive fields: Algiers, Paris, Jerusalem, Bologna, Quito and Chiang Mai. More information on Archival-City here: https://archivalcity.hypotheses.org

Archival City is organizing its fall 2022 symposium on the theme “Ghost Archives and Shadow Records”. It will be held at the National Archives (Pierrefite-sur-Seine site, metro line 13 Saint-Denis Université) on November 17 and 18, 2022.

Every record, file or archive is the ghost of something. Archives are related to institutions, events and people that can only be grasped through documents. This international symposium aims to explore every possible meaning of such paradoxical but fertile terms that express the relationships between documentary disappearance and conservation, and the lacuna and completeness of historical sources, as they perpetually interact with rationales for forgetting and strategies of memorialization. The present call for papers invites authors to reflect on “ghost archives” and “shadow records”, using three different meanings of these expressions, from the strictest to the widest sense.

In French, the expression “archive ghosts” (fantômes d’archives) is the technical term for the dummies, the cards which are put in the place of original documents or files that are currently being consulted by researchers. In a metaphoric sense, records which existed once and then disappeared can be called “ghost archives”. This term applies to an extremely wide group of records that are rarely studied as a whole: it includes both documentary collections which have been the object of a selection (as part of a controlled archival destruction operation or of a “wild” elimination), and those lost or struck by involuntary selections (natural or human). However, these lost, dispersed or missing archives leave traces and imprints, more or less visible: dummies lingering on the shelves, destruction registers, lists and inventories, summary descriptions, collections of copies or extracts, or catalogue records. Archivists and historians are finding it increasingly necessary to establish a method of investigation and critical analysis for use of these traces, in order to reconstitute or even to restitute these mutilated or destroyed archives. Historians are now more concerned about the heuristic challenges      related to the creation and conservation of documents, and to the role of archival institutions in these processes.

From a historiographical or epistemological point of view, shadow records are existing documentary sets which have not been the object of an archiving procedure. Indeed, they are not considered historical records and are not preserved as such. In some cases, these records are not considered to be of interest, but they survive for a number of reasons, and thus may become archives at a later stage. In other cases, the interest of these documents is recognized by their creators who choose not to transfer them to the service responsible for their archives, but instead choose to keep or even destroy them. In still other cases, operational, financial or technical reasons delay archiving, or even prevent it permanently. Finally, this concept of shadow records  intersects with a key contemporary challenge affecting archivists and historians who work on the documentation of the last thirty years, marked by the transformational adoption of computer technology. Indeed, the digital transformation has led to new archiving issues: in this case, digital sets which have been “saved” thanks to the inertia of digital data, but which have not been the object of an archiving procedure, can be considered “shadow records.”

Finally, from a historical and critical point of view, some documentary collections are actually archived but have become difficult to find or invisible over time because they have escaped the notice of researchers or because of the power relations within the field of intellectual knowledge. A lack of interest in some subjects can delay or prevent the creation of finding aids, which makes it more difficult to study or even to preserve these documents. In recent decades, numerous movements (postcolonial studies, gender studies) have tried to react to this “invisibilization” and have found the archival field to be in need of examination. The recognition of this “archival turn” has had the merit of reminding us that any constitution of archives meets a political logic of power relations. More recently, researchers have tried to qualify this approach in order to account for a more complex and varied archival landscape. Indeed, documentary sets are created, transformed, and used by a multitude of actors (political personnel, civil servants, intermediaries, historians, researchers, scholars, and professional archivists) guided by different logics. These interactions must be reconstituted in a precise and delicate manner that acknowledges different contexts.

Distinguishing all these “ghosts” or “shadows” from proper “archives” (i.e. sets of documents arranged in such a way as to be retrievable by a reader or user, and preserved for a long period of time), is a research challenge      gaining recognition today. Indeed, historians are showing a new willingness to make global comparisons. They also have new means at their disposal to do so. Studying the different forms of conservation and use of documents mobilized by different communities, societies and eras is thus an emerging research      objective.

Cities are a particularly fertile ground for this research. Since their beginning, cities have      been sites where varied and often competing powers converge and clash. Each city is an archive in itself (of buildings, streets, toponyms…). Within cities, archival memory is more frequent, dense, and more intense, so it is always dispersed in multiple spaces and sites     . This situation creates ghost archives in the narrower sense (inventories, copies for multiple recipients). Sometimes, in the same city and at the same time, some institutions aim to preserve documentation while others set up counter-archival practices of oblivion that can have paradoxical effects (this is the well-known case of the Geniza in Cairo). More often, the coexistence and stratification of different institutions in a city generate document sets which are marked by different degrees of archival organization. More globally, the richness of urban archival material gives the opportunity to accurately trace the phenomena of documentary dispersion, disappearance, reconstitution and restitution, all of which this symposium will seek to make clear through the comparison of different cases and examples                

This focus on the urban context will finally also be positioned as an alternative to the traditional vision of archives as a mirror of the modern European state. It thus gives the opportunity to study ghost archives and shadow records over a long period of time and in different configurations, especially in local contexts.

Historians, archivists, historians of architecture, urbanism or cities, are invited to propose papers across these themes of “ghost archives” and “shadow records” in the urban context, paying special attention to its epistemological and comparative potential, and addressing topics such as:

– The (re)discovery of disappeared, relocated and dispersed urban archives.

– The “visibilization” of urban archives which have been overshadowed for various reasons (linguistic, political, archival, technological)

– The study of the loss or “invisibilization” of urban archives

– The reconstitution of these archives by their “ghosts” or “shadows”, or by other preserved traces

– Issues related to the integration of “ghost archives” or “shadow records” within a corpus of sources of a current or past research project.

To propose a paper, send:

– Statement of interest and summary proposal (maximum 3000 characters), before June 15.

– For selected papers, a draft must be sent before November 1st.

to paul.lecat@univ-eiffel.fr ; carole.lamoureux@univ-eiffel.fr 

The symposium will lead to a publication of its proceedings or of a dedicated issue in a journal.

Scientific Committee: Valérie Gouet-Brunet, Thierry Guillopé, Anne Lacourt, Carole Lamoureux, Nathalie Lancret, Paul Lecat, Vincent Lemire, Georges Lomné, Giuliano Milani, Frédéric Moret, Yann Potin, Pijika Pumketkao, Loïc Vadelorge

CoreTeam Workshop in Jerusalem (24-28 March 2022)

From March 24 to 28, the Archival City CoreTeam met in CRFJ – Jerusalem (www.crfj.org) to review the progress of the fields, to work on the future of the project and to meet with many local partners.

  • On Thursday 24th, a conference was held at the Ecole Biblique around Open Jerusalem and the publications “Au pied du Mur. Vie et mort du quartier maghrébin de Jérusalem (1187-1967)”, “Le moine sur le toit” and “A Liminal Church”. Stéphane Ancel, Vincent Lemire and Maria-Chiara Rioli presented their work. The video recording of the conference is fully accessible here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xXS2udUa5Bg
  • Friday 25th was devoted to discussions and presentations at CRFJ, on the fields of Jerusalem, Chiang Mai, Quito and Algiers, as well as discussions on the technical convergence of Open Jerusalem and Archival City, and the cross-cutting use of the 3D modeling tool on many terrains.
  • On the morning of Saturday 26th, the CoreTeam had the opportunity to visit privately the Holy Sepulchre, as well as the future Custody Museum still under construction. We also had the opportunity to be invited by Mr. Khader Salameh to visit the archives of the Khalidiyya Library. The Khalidiyya contains the largest private collection of Arabic manuscripts in Palestine
  • Saturday 26th in the afternoon, the progress of the Bologna and Greater Paris projects was discussed at CRFJ, as well as a presentation of the results of the Allegoria partner project.
  • On the morning of Sunday 27th, the Archival City CoreTeam enjoyed a private visit of the ongoing archaeological excavations under the Western Wall Plaza ; then another private visit of the Haram al-Sharif, the Dome of the Rock, the El Aqsa Mosque and the Islamic Museum. Finally, the Archival City CoreTeam had the exceptional opportunity to visit the restoration center of ancient manuscripts.
  • Sunday 27th in the afternoon, the Coreteam worked at CRFJ on the finalization of the call for papers for the future symposium “Ghost archives, shadow records” that will be organized by the Archival City Project in the fall 2022. To be continued !

CoreTeam Meeting 28/01/2022

Archival City holds its first CoreTeam meeting of the year 2022. With a year and a half to go before the end of the project, this meeting is crucial for setting the main directions.
Organised on the Descartes campus of Gustave Eiffel University, in person and with the presence of Vincent Lemire, director of Archival City, the CoreTeam meeting will be held on Friday 28 January 2022, in room C006 of the Bois-de-l’etang building between 10am and 4pm. The following topics will be discussed

  • Organisation of the upcoming international conference
  • Budgetary orientation for the next two years
  • Choice of technical solutions.
  • Organisation of future trips
  • Progress of the various study areas