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UvA-DARE (Digital Academic Repository) The most public of all history : family history and heritage albums in the transmission of records Tucker, S.N. Publication date 2009 Document Version Final published version Link to publication Citation for published version (APA): Tucker, S. N. (2009). The most public of all history : family history and heritage albums in the transmission of records. General rights It is not permitted to download or to forward/distribute the text or part of it without the consent of the author(s) and/or copyright holder(s), other than for strictly personal, individual use, unless the work is under an open content license (like Creative Commons). Disclaimer/Complaints regulations If you believe that digital publication of certain material infringes any of your rights or (privacy) interests, please let the Library know, stating your reasons. In case of a legitimate complaint, the Library will make the material inaccessible and/or remove it from the website. Please Ask the Library: https://uba.uva.nl/en/contact, or a letter to: Library of the University of Amsterdam, Secretariat, Singel 425, 1012 WP Amsterdam, The Netherlands. You will be contacted as soon as possible. UvA-DARE is a service provided by the library of the University of Amsterdam (https://dare.uva.nl) Download date:07 Oct 2021 THE MOST PUBLIC OF ALL HISTORY: FAMILY HISTORY AND HERITAGE ALBUMS IN THE TRANSMISSION OF RECORDS ACADEMISCH PROEFSCHRIFT ter verkrijging van de graad van doctor aan de Universiteit van Amsterdam op gezag van de Rector Magnificus prof. dr. D.C. van den Boom ten overstaan van een door het college voor promoties ingestelde commissie, in het openbaar te verdedigen in de Agnietenkapel op donderdag 10 december 2009, te 12:00 uur door Susan Norris Tucker Geboren te Mobile, Alabama, Verenigde Staten van Amerika THE MOST PUBLIC OF ALL HISTORY: FAMILY HISTORY AND HERITAGE ALBUMS IN THE TRANSMISSION OF RECORDS ACADEMISCH PROEFSCHRIFT ter verkrijging van de graad van doctor aan de Universiteit van Amsterdam op gezag van de Rector Magnificus prof. dr. D.C. van den Boom ten overstaan van een door het college voor promoties ingestelde commissie, in het openbaar te verdedigen in de Agnietenkapel op donderdag 10 december 2009, te 12:00 uur door Susan Norris Tucker Mobile, Alabama, Verenigde Staten van Amerika Promotiecommissie Promotor: Prof. dr. F.C.J. Ketelaar Overige leden: Prof. dr. J.F.T.M. van Dijck Prof. dr. S. Leydesdorff Prof. dr. R. Kroes Prof. dr. F Weil Dr. E. Yakel Faculteit der Geesteswetenschappen LIST OF CONTENTS Summary in English vii Summary in Dutch ix Acknowledgements xi Chapters: 1. Introduction 1 Goals and Definitions 2 Memories’ Practices, Memories’ People 6 Women and Men 16 Family History’s Numbers 18 Album Makers’ Numbers 21 Introduction to the Chapters 24 Limits and Contributions of the Study 25 2. Layers of Memories, Practices, and Meanings 27 Layers 29 Literature Review: Family History from the Perspective of Archivists and Librarians 33 Literatures Review: Albums and Private Memory Keeping about Families 37 Transmission 43 Recontextualization 49 Pluralization 51 Influences 54 Technology 55 Levels of Expertise 57 Gender 59 Migration 62 Social Practices in All These Layers 64 3. Historical Overview of the Practices and Forms of Family History 71 i European Ancestors 72 Early Colonial Family History 76 Late Colonial American Genealogy 78 The Early Republic to the 1840s 83 Trends of Mid Nineteenth to Late Nineteenth Century 89 The Late Nineteenth Century to the 1960s 96 A Period of Change: The Late-Twentieth Century to the Present 102 Between Public and Private Records 110 4. Research Design and Methodology 112 Ethnographic Work 113 Early Stages of Work and Ongoing Considerations 115 Finding People to Study 119 Phases of the Study 120 Phase One 120 Textual Analysis 120 Participant Observation 121 Phase Two 122 Phase Three 124 Family Historians 125 Album Makers 127 Analysis 130 Phase Four 131 Phase Five 133 Setting and Methodological Considerations 134 Cognizance of Ethnographic Interfaces 136 5. Family Historians 138 Settings: People in the Houses of Memory 139 First Remembered Records: Obituaries 141 Other Remembered Records and Memory Traces 143 Why Begin Family History? Why Collect Records? 146 To Understand Life-Changing Events 148 To Satisfy Curiosity 149 To Find a Local Past 149 To Find Obscured or Forgotten Identities 149 Processes 151 Research: A Dance between Records and Clues 151 Developing Expertise 153 Learning in Groups 159 Organizing Work 164 Influences: Gender and Migration 165 ii Gender as Perceived by Family Historians 165 Thoughts on Migration 169 Interpreting the Work of Family History 171 Transmission 172 Pluralization 175 Settings in the Network of Memory 176 6. Heritage Album Makers 179 Settings: People in Houses of Memory 180 First Remembered Memory Forms: Families, Stories, and Places 182 Other Remembered Beginnings 184 Why Begin Heritage Albums? Why Collect Records? 185 Reasons for Continuing on with Heritage Albums 189 To Have Some Creative Outlet 189 To Make a Lasting Book 190 To Know the Past 192 To Connect To Others 194 Processes 195 Finding the Perfect Album 195 Designing the Heritage Album 196 Using Technology 197 Influences: Gender and Migration 198 Gender 199 Migration 202 Interpreting the Work of Album Makers 204 Transmission 204 Pluralization 209 The Middle Point 211 7. The Transmission and Pluralization of Family Memories 215 Movement and Layering 216 A Succession of Knowing 219 Marie Rosalie’s Story and Records about Her 221 Linking the Family to Collective Memory 229 Always Remembered 234 Dedicated Memory 236 Dynamic Memory 248 The Hospitality of Memory, Ideas, and Nations 250 8. Conclusion 255 iii Settings 256 Differences Between Family Historians and Album Makers 259 Almost Finite versus Infinite Work 259 Identity/Evidence Split 260 Commonalities Between Family Historians and Album Makers 261 The Bigger Picture: The Collective Nature of Family History 262 Technology 263 Archival Roles in Shaping Collective Memories 265 Changes to Archival Education 265 Enhanced Archival Programs 267 Changing Professional Roles 271 Future Study 273 Concluding Remarks 274 Appendix 277 Questions for Family Historians 277 Background of the Participant 277 General Questions about Work with Family History 277 Processes and Practices 278 Purpose and Vocabulary 279 Questions for Heritage Album Makers 279 Background of the Participant 279 General Questions about Work with Albums 280 Processes and Practices 280 Purpose and Vocabulary 281 List of Sources 283 Index 322 iv LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Figure 1 Marie Rosalie Préjean Pécot (1714–1813) 234 Figure 2 The Miho Baccich Archives 239 Figure 3 Miho Baccich Private Records and Public Records 242 v vi THE MOST PUBLIC OF ALL HISTORY: FAMILY HISTORY AND HERITAGE ALBUMS IN THE TRANSMISSION OF RECORDS Summary Family History remains one of the most enduring cultural forms of recordkeeping. Its rich history has been shaped by education, religion, materials, technologies, gender, class, race, migration, and, fundamentally, access to records. Family history practitioners also hold a majority among all researchers in public repositories, making up from forty- five to ninety percent of all users who cross the literal or virtual portals of libraries and archives. Yet, archival science has devoted little attention to understanding the tasks and functions involved in documenting ancestors. This dissertation seeks to correct that imbalance by exploring and interpreting influences and processes among people who practice genealogy (family historians who use primarily public records) and people who make scrapbooks (heritage album makers who use primarily oral accounts, private records, and family heirlooms). The two groups were specifically chosen in order that obvious ways of knowing the past—through written records accessible in repositories—and less obvious ways—through orally transmitted and privately held memory texts of various sorts—could be compared. The two groups were also chosen so that changing technologies could be studied as part of both a lived and an archival path to memories about families. To learn the context of such pursuits, an ethnographic approach was undertaken. Fifty-two people were interviewed and time was spent with family historians and album makers, primarily in Alabama and Louisiana. Among these people, the migrations of Acadians and Cajuns, African Americans, Sicilians, Croatians, and other ethnic backgrounds were also explored as motivations for studying family history. In addition, an historical perspective on gender and family-history keeping was interwoven in the study, and the opinions of family historians and album makers were sought in an exploration of the propensity of women to dominate the work of family recordkeeping. Commonplace processes, theories on memory, and the mediation of memory in sundry individual and communal problems all were shown to be involved in family history. In the give-and-take among themselves, their legacies, and their movement between private and public sources, family historians and album makers were shown to demonstrate ways that public records are used and private records are created. This focus on records also illuminated conceptualizations of archives in general, and the means by which records are transmitted, especially as more and more people develop personal archives. The study then was cognizant of the transformations of environments where access to records and communication about records