Interpreters of the past and of the present: the art of historians of education and archivists

Abstract

Interpreting former times is not the sole province of historians. It is a constitutive act of the arts performed by writers, exhibition curators, docufilm directors, film writers and scenographers, re-enactors. But not only, it is also an element of the practice of historians of education and archivists, of people who throughout their lives collect records, of the exercise of patrimonial education on the part of teachers and of the organizers of school museums. Framing the discussion on the craft of historians of education and archivists, we structured the article into two parts. The first part focuses on the historiographical narrative in education, taking an example from the Brazilian history of education. The second part deals with some of the dimensions present in the acts of archiving, focusing on particularly the materiality of the documents.

Revisiting the life of Lucy Garvin, first principal of Sydney Girls High School: expanded biography and use of digital sources

“…There are other aspects of a source that is digitised that alter the research experience. The digitised historical document has no discernible “dust”: it is less visceral or “cooler”, less given to provoke the interpretive and emotional responses through the force of its materiality (Vidal, Silva 2020, pp. 6 and 7 of 10).…”