Purposes almost infinitely varying: archives as sources for labour biography

Abstract

Sir Hilary Jenkinson, sometime Deputy Keeper of the United Kingdom Public Record Office, wrote in his Manual of Archive Administration about the two common features of archives ‘of extraordinary value and importance’: Impartiality and Authenticity. He referred to the purposes for creating archives and the purposes to which they are put: Drawn up for purposes almost infinitely varying – the administrative or executive control of every species of human undertaking – [archives] are potentially useful … for the information they can give on a range of subjects totally different and equally wide … the only safe prediction concerning the Research ends which Archives may be made to serve is that … these will not be the purposes which were contemplated by the people by whom the Archives were drawn up and preserved.1 That is, archives created for one purpose will invariably end up being used for another purpose entirely. This is challenging for archivists tasked to decide what it is we keep and what we let go: the fact that we need to predict future research use when not even those creating the records know to what uses they will be put. Show more