The Pararchive Project

Sanket Somaiya shares his thoughts on the importance of archiving artefacts, on the lessons they teach us, and on the value we derive from them.

Read about the first newly-launched Digital Transgender Archive whose mission is: “to increase the accessibility of transgender history by providing an online hub for digitized historical materials, born-digital materials, and information on archival holdings throughout the world. Based in Worcester, Massachusetts at the College of the Holy Cross, the DTA is an international collaboration among…

In this piece by Gina Fairley, not only is the link between archives and culture made explicit, but the role of digitisation in facilitating broader access to and wider engagement with shared heritage is highlighted. The following comments from a contributor to the piece appear to capture this well: “Archives are unsettling, and have within…

  Pararchive was recently invited to take part in the Festival of Ideas in Rusholme, Manchester. More commonly known as the Rusholme Festival of Ideas – which I will henceforth abbreviate as (RFoI) in this piece, the event provided an opportunity for local communities and people to map their ideas and perspectives of how they…

A travel app that puts storytelling and cultural immersion above all else. More at humanity.tv/about.html…

  Pararchive won a small grant to participate in this year’s Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) Festival of Social Science which took place from 1st – 8th November. The aim of the Festival was to showcase some of the “leading” social science research being undertaken across the country and to demonstrate how such work…

The reality is that much of our digital history is in the hands of companies that could disappear tomorrow. If archivists are blocked as they were here, can we expect a company like Twitter to keep those artifacts alive every time one of these services is threatened? And should we even want that to happen?…

  Following on from the First World War Engagement Centres Everyday Lives in War and Hidden Histories we now look at Voices of War and Peace: the Great War and its legacy. Voices of War – or Voices as it will be referred to henceforth in this piece – is based in the Library of…

The Uralla Story Project is a partnership between Uralla Arts, The Story Project and the communities that comprise the Uralla district. The project has, in its initial phase, recorded over forty conversations on a wide range of topics. These are everyday stories which weave an extraordinary web of connectivity across our community. We thank the…

At last week’s Connected Communities Festival, we finally met some of the team behind Tangible Memories, notably Tim Lloyd-Yeates from their project partner Alive! The project is using stories, artefacts and media to help improve the quality of life for the elderly in care homes; what struck me immediately were the parallels between our co-design workshops for Pararchive and their…