Archives and Absences Author(s): William Uricchio Source: Film History, Vol. 7, No. 3, Film Preservation and Film Scholarship (Autumn, 1995), pp. 256-263 Published by: Indiana University Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3815092 . Accessed: 15/06/2011 09:00

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use.

Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at . http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=iupress. .

Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed page of such transmission.

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

Indiana University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Film History.

http://www.jstor.org FilmHistory, Volume 7, pp. 256-263, 1995. Copyright?John Libbey& Company ISSN:0892-2160. Printedin GreatBritain Archives and absences

WilliamUricchio

R eceived wisdom holds that virtual re- lookingat the situationfrom the archivists'perspec- ality seeks to create an ever more pre- tive - the recurrenthistorical problems of agency cise simulationof the physical world, and narrative play a minor role in acquisition, somethingakin to its exact replication. cataloguing and preservation,but the virtualre- Butthe increasingfeasibility of virtualreality's tech- ality analogy raises intriguingquestions about the nological fulfilmentthreatens an epistemological constructionsof the past that can be extrapolated crisisin whichthe issueof greatestimport becomes from necessarily limitedarchival holdings. In the not sameness or mimesis, but the difference be- pages thatfollow, Iwould liketo reflecton some of tween thevirtual world and the 'real'world. Virtual the archivalexperiences which have informedmy reality,extrapolated to its fullestpoint of develop- research,paying attentionto the shiftingfabric of ment,is far more significantfor what it cannot de- constraintsthat have veiled and shaped access to liver;as a discourseon the limitsof representation the events of the past. Three types of structuring it offers a compellingmeditation on the natureof limitationswill be discussed:overt policies which ontology.And so it is witharchives, at least froma restrictaccess to otherwise available material; structuralperspective. Scholars draw uponvarious overt policies which define and restrictthe very archival holdings to constructrepresentations of collection of material;and, the general historical the past, as telling for theirlimitations as for their filtrationprocesses which, by preservingsome rec- 'completeness'.As withvirtual reality, the effortat ords and ignoring others, shape the archival rec- totalizationteaches us as muchabout the limitsof ord every bit as effectivelyif far less overtly. representationas about the event represented. Thissort of discussion draws obviously upon From controlled access to contemporarydebates in the field of culturalhis- censorship tory, particularlythose regardingthe (contingent) In the course of an extended visit to the Federal natureof representation.Issues ranging fromthe Republicof Germany'sBundesarchiv in Koblenz,I unstablenature of facticity,to the balance between came across several documentsin the UFA-Kultur- determinantstructure and individualagency, to the filmfiles of the mid-i930s whichdiscussed the sale place of the researcher'ssubjectivity in the con- and productionof films for television exhibition. structionof historicalnarratives, have all under- The documentswere intriguingas muchfor what minedtraditional historiographic assumptions and they revealed about UFA'svision of its own future invigoratedthe self-consciousinterrogation of the as for what they suggested about a largely unex- historicalprocess'. The nature,form, and implica- plored period in television history.Although my tionsof the residuesof the past accumulatedin the primary research task during that visit centred historicalrecords that we commonlytake as 'evi- around non-fictionfilm typologies and production dence', while not always centralto these debates, have nevertheless a crucialif role in played implicit William Uricchiois Professorof Filmand Televi- the of historical Of course, deployment arguments. sionat Utrecht University. Contact: Theatre, Film and scholarsemploy archivalrecords for purposesfar TelevisionStudies, UtrechtUniversity, Kromme exceeding 'mere' representation,and - at least Nieuwegracht29, 3512 HDUtrecht, Netherlands. Archives and absencesabsences257 257

patterns,I collectedwhat televisionmaterial I could Despitethe ready availabilityof recordsoften find and meanwhile checked more obvious unavailableto researchersof othernational broad- sourcesto fill the evident gaps in my knowledge. cast histories,my Germantelevision project faced Thepreliminary research I accomplishedrevealed sometimessevere archivaldifficulties for a number that popular (or even scholarly)memory had ac- of reasons, the first relating to initialacquisition corded very littleacknowledgement to the consid- and cataloguingdecisions. Before 1944, the Ger- erable development that German television man governmentdivided oversight of television underwentbetween 1935 and 1944. The more among three ministries,the postal authoritiesre- closely I looked, the more I became intriguedby sponsiblefor technologicaldevelopments, the pro- the subjectof Germany'stelevision history - a his- paganda authoritiesfor programming,and the air tory marginalizedeven within the massive (and ministryfor potentialmilitary capabilities. Rivalries otherwiseimpressive) television study project cen- withinand among these agencies inflectedthe pro- tredat the Universityof Siegen. Thiscloser investi- ductionand archivingof records, resultingin dis- gation also involveda degree of self-criticism:I, tinctionsbetween form (technology)and content like other scholars, had overlookedpassing refer- (programming)that today seem misguided. ences to the developmentof Germantelevision in Butthe post-wardivision of the Germannation already examined sources such as the trade pa- exacerbated this tripartdivision, posing further pers Lichtbild-Buhneand Der Kinematograph.I problemsfor the researcher.An archival record realized that the aleatory nature of archival re- already affected by war-timeloss and destruction search sometimes gave rise to surprising dis- was splitbetween the east and west, leaving each coveries but perhaps more often concealed yet side with partial but ideologically advantageous moreinteresting ones. Furtherlessons awaited as I documentation.In the west, the Bundesarchiv'scol- pursuedthe topic. lection of propaganda ministryrecords encour- 258 William Uricchio

aged examinationof theway thatthe Nazi's televi- the Germanarchival holdings are far more useful sion programminghad functionedwithin a top- than those at the BritishPublic RecordsOffice, down political party structuredependent upon where the records which deal with Britishintel- 'injecting'fascist ideology intothose at the bottom, ligence awareness (if any) of German television an interpretationthat contributedto the 'Hitleras remainclassified. Yet even the PublicRecords Of- madman' historiographicalexplanation that ab- fice seems forthcomingby contrastwith the stone- solved the mass of the German people from re- walling treatmentaccorded scholars by the US sponsibility for Nazi outrages. In the east, the companies, IT&Tand RCA,that continuedto co- German Democratic Republic (GDR) State operatewith the Reichin the developmentof televi- Archive, inheritorof the post ministryrecords on sion throughout the war. The trans-national technology,held evidence thatshowed active col- technologicalevolution of the televisionapparatus laborationbetween the German Reichand multi- makesthe roleof US-basedmulti-national corpora- national electronicscorporations, contributing to tions in the developmentof Germantelevision less the 'fascism as capitalism run amok' historio- than surprising,but active collaborationin the de- graphicalexplanation that linked the currentrulers velopment of television-basedguidance systems of West Germanyto the Nazi past2. for rockets,bombs and torpedoes, or in the manu- Archivalaccess problemsadded to those al- factureof such militaryhardware as fighter air- readyarising from document distribution and ideo- craft, seems more transgressive.Fortunately, the logical agendas. Some record collections in the GDR archivists preserved the relevant German west, such as the US-runBerlin Document Centre, holdingson this involvement,but checking that do- were only selectively accessible to east or west cumentationfrom the US perspectivehas been far Germanresearchers; others in the east, suchas the moredifficult. The corporations,with littleto gain StateArchive, proved extremelyreluctant to make fromsuch historicalresearch, have not been eager recordsavailable that hadn't firstbeen screened to open theirarchives. But the ever-vigilanteyes of by local experts. Restrictionsin both cases often the Hoover-FBIprovide at least some sense of the entailed requestsfor specific information,such as USgovernment's level of interestin and awareness the name and birthdateof the sender, the date, of corporate activities. In the case of IT&T,for and the contentsof the documentone wished to example, a secret congressional sub-committee inspect, a procedurethat preventedthe fortuitous authorizeda long termFBI tap on chairmanof the discoveries so crucial to historicalresearch. The board Sosthenes Behn's telephone and do- GermanReich's initial tri-part division of responsi- cumentedthe extent of his corporation'sinvolve- bilityfor the medium,together with the partialna- mentwith the Reich.Yet while evidence had been tureof the east and west's archivalholdings and collected, scholarscould not necessarilyaccess it, the pointedlyideological uses to which these rec- since the strategicvalue of IT&T'sholdings in cen- ords had been put, contributedto the disappear- tralEurope to a cold-warobsessed US government ance of the historyof earlyGerman television from resultedin the suppressionof the materialgathered collectivememory. duringthe finalyears of the war. Freedomof Infor- Despite these and related problems, re- mation Act appeals to the FBInotwithstanding, searchersof the NS period tend to be aware of Behn'stelephone transcriptsremain unavailable, theirprivileged position vis-a-vis colleagues work- and other material regarding the corporation's ing in US, British,or Soviet historyof the same German activities during the war are available period. Germany'sdefeat resultedin de facto de- only in heavily censored form. The National classification,as the victors,together with the new Archives,repository for, among other things, the regimes, seized, copied, preserved and made original congressional investigating committee available, albeit in limitedfashion, the relevantdo- files, was more responsiveto appeals for the de- cuments.But while usingGerman sources to docu- classificationof the relevantrecords, so that in the ment the history of German television proves end, muchof the materialconsidered off-limits by promising,pursuing the search beyond German the FBI(including the transcripts)can be found in archives proves more problematic.For example, anotherfederal agency3. At least in thisinstance of Archives and absences 259 governmentalresponsibility for the archival rec- prioritizefilms for preservationand hence to shape ord, inefficiency and duplication have had a the access of futuregenerations to the cinema past tremendous advantage. The larger point, how- emerge froman historicallyspecific configuration ever, is that archivalpolicy can be responsiveto of the field of filmstudies. the interestsof the state, and thatnational interests Many of the people responsiblefor archival can be mobilized to mask and delimit the re- preservationpolicy, likemany of the readersof this searcher'saccess to the existing historicalrecord. journal,were intellectuallyshaped duringthe for- Hence, the littlethat has been writtento date on mativeyears of cinema studiesas a universitydis- early Germantelevision is shaped by the ideologi- cipline.The institutionalapparatus for 'filmas art', cal contextof the GermanReich, the post-wardivi- so centralto the legitimacysought by proponents sion of the nation,the cold war and multi-national of filmstudies (and theiruniversity administrators) capitalism. includedthe auteurtheory, art museum-sponsored screeningsof experimentalfilms, and the revival and of the art house circuit. Structuralabsences expansion Although specialistsmay well be struckby the field'sremark- Restrictionsand censorshipoffer particularlyvex- able intellectualgrowth, these formativeperspec- ing barriersto archive users, but the presumption tives and assumptionsof some thirtyyears ago that the offending documentsactually exist and remain central to archivists'policies. Distinctin- may some day be considered sufficientlyinno- stitutionalincentives contribute to maintaininga re- cuous to be made available still remains.More- strictiveand outmodedconception of 'filmas art'. over, the ever-presentpossibility that the material Some US filmprogrammes earn theirkeep by pro- censored by one agency (or individual,for in the vidingcourses which fulfilarts requirements, while end appeals are decided by particularagents), several majorfilm archives justify their budgets by may be made available by another encourages strategicalliance withthe traditionalelite arts. But persistence as a particularly useful research the interrogationof canons and taste hierarchies strategy.But in the case of archivalfilm and televi- mountedby proponentsof culturalstudies reveal sion holdings, the budgetary restrictions that that an emphasis upon 'filmas art' may in many necessitatethe selectivepreservation of some texts instancespreclude an emphasis upon 'filmas cul- and the de facto destructionof othershave rather ture', since the texts necessary for the latterap- more permanentand irrevocableconsequences. proach may be excluded by archivalpreservation Althoughthe basic problemsof preservingthe two policies. media are roughlythe same, film is actuallyin a I recentlyasked mystudents which theatrically much better position than television.The relative screened filmin the Netherlandshad the greatest durabilityof celluloid,film's longer institutional his- numberof viewersthis year. Theanswer to thistrick tory (includingits place in museums,archives and question wasn't Schindler'sList or JurassicPark, the academy), and its aestheticstatus, all contrib- butany one of a numberof pre-featurefilm adver- ute to a higher preservationprofile than that ac- tisementsfor Grolsch or Heinekenor Camels,texts corded television.So let's look at the limitsof this seen on average by five or six timesthe numbersof 'best case' preservationscenario. viewers of the biggest drawing features.Many of Inthe case of bothfilm and television,far more these advertisementsare quite engaging, some materialshould be preservedthan can be. Most pushingthe limitsof narrativeor representationbe- filmarchives with active restorationand preserva- yond thatseen in 'typical'feature. As textsin their tionprogrammes have developed a reasonablyar- own right,as culturalobjects, and as centralcom- ticulateset of prioritiesto distinguishbetween the ponentsin constructingthe conditionsof reception films which will surviveand those which will be forthe filmsthat follow, these advertisementshave abandoned, with organizationssuch as FIAFen- tremendousimportance. But they seem to be as couraging open communicationamong different invisible to many archivists, given their tunnel- archivesto minimizedisaster. Yet, at least in the vision of 'filmas art', as they are to my students. case of many film archives, the criteria used to The marginalizationof 'ordinary'industrials, in- 260 William Uricchio structionals,advertising films, and so forth,seems using non-cinematichistorical sources in an effort short-sightedeven withinan aestheticframework. to locate filmand televisionwithin the culturalhis- Ifthe 1 1thcentury's devotional objects are the art toryof our century.The firstproblem is thatof the treasuresof today, who can predictwhether or not historicalfiltration of evidence, a processby which the late 20th century'sadvertising will be the art the archival selection criteria determined by a treasuresof the future? period'sdominant social formationsshape and de- Such marginalizationseems even moreshort- limitour access to the past. Evidence related to sighted from the perspective of culturalhistory. marginalizedsocial formationsis oftensimply mis- Archivalacquisition policies mustbecome respon- sing fromthe historicalrecord since period archi- sive to 'the filmas culture'rather than the 'filmas vists deemed it unworthyof preservation.On the art' paradigm,meaning that archivists must begin other hand, a plethora of readily available evi- to takea longerand broaderview insteadof being dence entails a similarbut related problemcon- attuned to the aesthetic norms of a particular cerning the researcher's historiographic period. But because the expansionist years of assumptions. A fixation with readily available many filmarchives coincided with such factorsas 'facts'can obscurethe complexitiesand contradic- the deploymentof the legitimizingdiscourse of film tions which help to constructa historicalmoment, as art, the institutionalizationof universitycinema privileging'dead certainties'over the ambiguities studies programmes,and the trainingof a new of competingdiscourses. generation of film archivists,the perceived com- In order to develop these points a bit more mon interestsof archivistsand scholarshas grown fully, I would like to discuss two related projects uncommonlyclose. Historicallyspecific notionsof that RobertaPearson and I have worked on: the an academic field ('filmas art'), reinforcedby in- firstconcerns the conditionsof receptionfor par- stitutionalconstraints and the personalinvestments ticularfilms and the second the culturalcontroversy of those involved, has spilled over into archival over cinema theatres in New YorkCity between preservationpolicy. 1907 and 19134. Thefirst project, a book on the Inthis regard, a latenttension underlyingthe VitagraphCompany's literary, historical and bibli- relationship of archivists and academic re- cal 'qualityfilms', looked at the filmindustry's use searchers might help us get beyond the familiar of such culturallyprominent figures as Shakes- debate between preservationvs use. We might peare, Washington, Napoleon and Moses in an productivelyenhance the tensionbetween preserv- effort to attain culturalrespectability. The book, ing materialfor the researchquestions of the future concerned not only with a 'top-down'analysis of vs the researchagenda of the immediatepresent. the film-industry,but with a 'bottom-up'analysis of Such an effort might ironicallycontribute a wel- the probableresponses of workingclass and immi- come dimensionto the traditionalantagonism be- grant viewers, falls broadly withinthe social his- tween the interestsof archivistsand researchers, toryso muchin evidence since the Second World serving the interestsof futuregenerations of re- War. As with many such projects, perhaps the searchers. But while so much of the filmed past greatestresearch difficulty stems from the tendency remainsat risk,we can only hope that the diver- of manyarchives to collect materialrelated to the gent views of researchersand archivistscan be dominantsocial formationswhile ignoring more productivelycultivated and deployed in a com- marginalgroups. And while findingcopies of the bined preservationeffort. Police Gazette, the nineteenthcentury equivalent of The National Enquirer,may be much harder thanfinding copies of the New YorkTimes, obtain- The of historical filtration problems ing evidence perhaps moredirectly related to the While we mightcontest the existing preservation experiences of immigrantand workingpeople of criteriaof filmand televisionarchives, at least the the period poses an even moredifficult challenge. termsare now and have been in the past reason- The collectionsavailable at the New YorkPublic ably clear - generallywe knowwhat to expect. Far Library,the New-YorkHistorical Society, YIVO, more complex archival challenges face scholars and the Libraryof Congress are testamentsto the Archives and absences 261

Fig.2. ThePrincess Theatre, angling for an upscaleaudience by programmingGrenadier Roland and TheFall of Troy(191 1). [Courtesyof Q. DavidBowers.]

'bestand brightest'of the period,but for the experi- search approach) by a creative use of non-cine- ences of 'ordinary'people, one mustlook eitherto matic sources at certain archival collections. De- social surveystudies or to more recentlyobtained ciding thatwidely circulatingdepictions of figures oral histories.In either case, the materialobtained such as Washington or Moses, or greatly simpli- mustbe verycarefully considered, for it is far more fied versionsof Shakespeare'sJuliusCaesar or Na- mediated(either by a social science paradigmor poleon's career all helped to establish the by the ravages of time)than the sorts of material intertextual frame to which many 'ordinary' availablewhen consideringthe conditionsof cine- viewers would have been exposed, we found maticrepresentation for representativesof the 'bet- treasuretroves of popularimagery in sucharchives ter'classes. as the ArentsTobacco collectionat the New York The difficultiesof historicalfiltration can to Public Library(with cigarette cards and cigar some extent be offset (depending upon one's re- labels) or the BurdickCollection at the Metropoli- 262 William Uricchio

tan Museumof Art (withadvertising and packa- tionsof the new movingpicture medium proves far ging materials),or the Bella C. LandauerCollec- more profitable than searching for definitive tion at the New-York Historical Society (with 'facts'.I would argue thatthe portrayalsof moving writingtablets and calendars). Thisextrapolated pictureexhibition originating from the press and intertextualframe, reinforcedby such sources as pulpithad far greater importthan the numbersor school text books and classroom chromolitho- even locationsof the actualtheatres. Indeed, if one graphs, churchsermons, public statuary,parade wishes to understandthe mobilizationof public floats, and public lectures, led to historically- sentiment,the passing of legislation,and the film groundedspeculations about the probable condi- industry'sresponses, the period's own depictions tions of reception for Vitagraph's films among tell us morethan a futileattempt to reconstructan working class and immigrantaudiences which historical'reality'. Of course, some sense of 'em- contrastedsharply both with our presentistexpec- pirical reality' provides a necessary reference tationsand withdominant period sources. In inter- pointby whichwe can appraise pressreports and rogatingcontemporary conditions of receptionwe othersuch data, butdocumenting perceptions gets had in some respectsto 'create'our own evidence, us far closer to understandingthe implementation butwith the New YorkCity nickelodeon project we of culturalpolicy. We shouldcarefully interrogate faced a potentiallyoverwhelming array of 'facts'. competingdiscourses, retaininga high tolerance Intentupon understandingthe social/culturalposi- for ambiguity, ratherthan search for more and tion of New York'snickelodeons, we attempted, more 'facts' that mightresult in a monolithicinter- like several previous scholars, to determinethe pretation. numberand locations of moving picture shows. Locating previously untapped material in New Conclusion YorkCity's Municipal Archives, we foundthat offi- cial city sourcesvaried dramatically in theircounts Thedemands of the new culturalhistory encourage of the city's movingpicture shows. New Yorkhad a farmore creative use of archivalsources than has up to seven departmentsinvolved in some aspect of hithertobeen the case. Whether reading docu- exhibitionregulation, yet in 1908, the Department ments against the grain, or finding alternative of Policecounted 239 nickelodeons,the Bureauof sourcesof documentation,or of 'reading'the very Licences,550, and the Departmentof Buildings, process of archiving (a la Foucault6),strategies 800. Recourseto otherarchives, such as the paper- exist to circumventthe originating 'intention'of s of the civic reformorganization, the People's In- previousgenerations of archivists.But in conclud- stitute,located at the New YorkPublic Library, led ing I wish to returnto my most importantpoint. I to still more 'facts', such as those of a People's take the inevitablecurse of 'presentism'far more Institute report on 'cheap amusements' that seriouslyin the case of filmarchives, where it has countedover 400 nickelodeons.Clearly, city offi- an irrevocablecharacter, than in the case of other cials and reformershad politicalagendas which archives, where it serves as a stimulantto more inflectedtheir 'facts', butthe extentof the discrep- creative researchstrategies. The difficultiesto re- ancy is striking.The situation is furthercompli- searchers,present and future,posed by the aesthe- cated, since many of the moretransient, tenement tically oriented preservationcriteria of most film district nickelodeons were not recorded in the archivesfacing archivalcollections of filmsare far more official sources such as Trow'sBusiness Di- less negotiable than those posed by problemsof rectorybut ratheronly fortuitouslyentered the his- historicalfiltration. Those films lost because they torical record through newspaper reports of don't conformto presentistaesthetic criteriawill nickelodeondisasters or police shut-downsof mov- constitutea significantabsence for the future.And ing pictureshows. althoughfuture researchers may well have an easy The 'incompleteness' of this particularevi- time appraising our archivalvalues and assump- dence base need not necessarilyrestrict historical tions,they will have an extraordinarilydifficult time interpretation,since considering discursive evi- conjuringup films that no longer exist. Despite dence concerningthe period's dominantpercep- some strategicadvantages in maintaininga level Archivesand absences 263 of tension between archivists and researchers on systematicepisodes of documentloss when search- for IT&T-relatedrecords in the State the needs of the future vs the needs of the present, ing Depart- mentsarchives. In these the record there be a term to closer cases, entrylog may longer advantage indicates the existence of documentswhich the cooperation at least with regard to the questions archivistshave been unableto locate, and in the raised by new developments in cultural history. case of the ITTrelated records I sought,over 70 per One can easily criticize any selection process with centof the entereddocuments were missing. such irrevocable and here consequences, my point 4. Thefirst part of this research,which considers the is not to single out archival policy-makers as some- conditionsof productionand receptionfor particu- how conspiring to impose a particular form on film larfilms, appears as ReframingCulture: The case of the Films history, but perhaps thinking more about the pro- VitagraphQuality (PrincetonUniversity Press,1993): the second part,which considers the cess and implications of constructing history, and debateover motionpicture exhibition in New York less about a notion of 'aes- defending presentist City, is forthcomingas The NickelMadness: The thetics,' will encourage more far-sighted archival Struggleto ControlNew YorkCity's Nickelodeons policies. in 1907-1913 (SmithsonianInstitution Press). 5. Researchersfrom Russell Merritt and RobertAllen Notes (who challengedthe then dominantview that nic- kelodeonaudiences were primarilyworking class 1. Recentexpressions of these issuesmay be foundin and immigrant)to BenSinger (who has embarked thework of HaydenWhite and DominickLa Capra, on an ambitiouslocation analysis of NY nickelo- or in collectionsof essays such as AramVeeser's deons) have contributedto this quest. See Russell The New Historicismand LynnHunt's The New Merritt,'Nickelodeon Theaters, 1905-1914: Build- CulturalHistory (Berkeley: University of California ingan Audiencefor the Movies', in Tino Balio, (ed.), Press, 1989). TheAmerican Film Industry, University of Wisconsin Press, Madison, Wisconsin, 1976, pp. 831102; 2. Fora lookat the researchspawned by thesediffer- RobertAllen, 'Motion Picture Exhibition in Manhat- ent archivalsources see WilliamUricchio, Die An- tan, 1906-1912: Beyondthe Nickelodeon'in John fange des Deutschen Fernsehens: Kritische Fell,(ed.), FilmBefore Griffith, University of Califor- Annaherungenan die Entwicklungbis 1945 (Tub- nia Press, Berkeley,California, 1983, pp. 162- ingen:Niemeyer Verlag, 1991 ). Foran overviewof 175; and Ben Singer, 'ManhattanNickelodeons: the researchand itsideological implications, see my New Data on Audiencesand Exhibitors',Cinema 'Televisionas History:Representations of German Journal (forthcoming).For a sense of ourapproach TelevisionBroadcasting, 1935-1944', pp. 167- to the issue, see WilliamUricchio and RobertaE. 196 in Framingthe Past:The Historiographyof Pearson,'Constructing the Audience:Competing GermanCinema and Television,edited by Bruce Discoursesof Moralityand Rationalizationin the Murrayand ChristopherWickham (Carbondale: NickelodeonPeriod', Iris 17, 1994, 43-54 . SouthernIllinois University Press, 1992). 6. MichelFoucault, The Archaeology of Knowledge 3. Thisis not to implythat all of my declassification and the Discourseon Language,(New York:Pan- requestsat the NationalArchives have metwith the theon, 1972). samesuccess. Moreover, certain collections seem to have been purged,or at least I have encountered