Life Everlasting? The Absurdity of Perpetual Privilege

This article looks at solicitor-client privilege and the lawyers’ duty of confidentiality from the perspective of the harm done to legal history and Canada’s documentary heritage by the claim that privilege never ends. After discussing the emergence of the field of legal history, the scarcity of lawyers’ papers preserved in archives, and efforts to address the perpetual privilege problem, the author examines the rationales for privilege and the justifications for its purportedly absolute and unending nature and finds them wanting. The article then sets out the role of archival institutions in preserving historically valuable records and making them available for research. The author argues that, after a reasonable interval, the public interest in access to lawyers’ papers trumps privilege and that archivists have the tools and experience to manage (temporary) access restrictions to such materials. The recent guidelines on disclosure of historical records under the Access to Information Act signal that privilege need not be perpetual and indicate the need to start a conversation to finally resolve the conflict between privilege and fuller documentation of both the legal profession and its impact on society

Silence in the Archives: France, the Algerian War, and National Identity

In 2021, French President Emmanuel Macron announced that the French government would make classified archives about the Algerian War accessible 15 years ahead of schedule, in an effort to improve Franco-Algerian relations. The announcement, which came after decades of requests that the archives be returned to Algeria, seemed to be a good-faith effort to address France’s difficult heritage with respect to the Algerian War (1954–1962) – particularly the widespread use of torture and the “disappearing” of dissidents during the war. The Algerian War has always occupied a contentious place in French history, having been largely left out of history textbooks and referred to as a war only after 1999. By opening the archives ahead of schedule, Macron seemed to commit the French government to healing generational wounds and improving relations with Algeria. The declassification of Algerian archives led the status of the Algerian War and, as a result, that of Algerian immigrants in contemporary France, to become major talking points for candidates on the right and on the left during the 2022 presidential election. While the opening of the archives appears to have done away with the archival silence that has shrouded the history of the war, this article will argue that France and its political actors have selectively lifted archival silence to privilege certain narratives and continue to silence others

Archival Literacy and Primary Source Literacy: A Collaborative Instructional Toolkit for Introductory Composition and Beyond

This article is a case study that addresses challenges archivists and introductory composition instructors can experience when working to embed archival and primary source literacy into a course and models how to successfully overcome related obstacles. Building on the excellent work of James Roussain, it employs the archivist-as-educator model not only to teach the students but also to train the disciplinary instructor. Teaching instructors archival and primary source literacy and training them how to teach these types of literacy enhances student success. Acknowledging the literature that discusses the ineffectiveness of one-shot guest lectures, the authors have designed and piloted an archival and primary source literacy toolkit that provides a scalable and effective model for embedding a module and assignment into an introductory composition course at a large research university. The inquiry-based active-learning activities in the toolkit are scaffolded to prepare students for the assignment. Furthermore, the toolkit provides guidance on how instructors and archivists can collaboratively develop the skills they need to successfully embed the module into introductory composition courses

Theoretical Approaches to the Collection and Appraisal of Graffiti Ephemera: A Toronto, Ontario, Case Study

This article explores aspects of the archival value of graffiti and street art. It applies an intersectional feminist lens and draws upon Althusserian subject interpellation to elaborate some potential techniques for appraising graffiti. Understanding graffiti as ideological calls can help us understand how graffiti acts on us and functions for us: as a record of oppression, institutional and social relations, and individual negotiations with power. The article offers examples of graffiti acting as a form of speech for the unheard and marginalized and illustrates these examples with photographs of graffiti captured by the author and images of graffiti and street art located in various collections. It compares the appraisal and collection methods of the Urban Art Mapping Project, a North American participatory graffiti archive, with the Street- ARToronto (StART) street-art map maintained by the City of Toronto. Through these comparisons, the article argues for the evidential value of locally driven archives of the type of political graffiti excluded from the StART map.Cet article explore des aspects de la valeur archivistique des graffitis et de l’art de rue. Il applique une approche intersectionnelle et féministe inspirée de l’interpellation du sujet althussérienne afin d’élaborer des méthodes potenti- elles d’évaluation des graffitis. La reconnaissance des graffitis comme des appels idéologiques peut nous aider à comprendre la manière dont ils agissent sur nous et fonctionnent pour nous. Les graffitis peuvent être considérés comme une archive de l’oppression, évoquant des relations institutionnelles et sociales et représentant des négociations individuelles avec le pouvoir. Cet article offre des exemples de graffitis agissant comme une forme d’expres- sion pour les personnes sans voix et marginalisées, en illustrant ces exemples avec des photographies de graffitis réalisées par l’auteur ainsi que des images de graffitis et d’art de rue conservées dans différentes collections. L’article compare l’évaluation et les méthodes de collecte du projet Urban Art Mapping, un espace archivistique participatif nord-américain sur les graffitis, avec la carte d’art de rue de StreetARToronto (StART), une initiative chapeautée par la Ville de Toronto. À travers ces comparaisons, cet article insiste sur la valeur de témoi- gnage des archives locales sur ce type de graffitis politiques, présentement exclus de la carte de StART

Faro Mine Records: Archival Work in Extractive Projects

The Faro mine was a large resource extraction project in central Yukon that operated from 1969 to 1998. Despite its historic relevance to the world economy and significant contemporary research interest, the Faro mine’s records (which at closure were contained in approximately 1,800 banker’s boxes) are not well understood due to a lack of capacity to process this volume of records and complex issues regarding the application of archival theory. This article provides an overview of the hundreds of thousands of records produced by and at the Faro mine, includes a history of their creation, and uses this case study to investigate the application of archival theories of provenance, respect des fonds, and creatorship. The difficulty of applying these theories to the Faro mine records reflects a broader complexity regarding ownership and account- ability in major resource extraction projects. The article concludes that the resulting lack of access to mine records hinders transparency and historical research and that further archival work is needed to ensure adequate records management in future projects.La mine Faro, située au centre du Yukon et en activité de 1969 à 1998, représentait un projet d’envergure d’extraction de ressources. Malgré leur impact historique au niveau de l’économie mondiale et leur intérêt de recherche contemporaine marqué, les documents de la mine Faro (qui au moment de sa fermeture comprenait environ 1 800 boîtes d’archives) ne sont pas bien compris, dû au manque de ressources allouées au traitement d’un important volume de documents et aux problématiques complexes concernant l’application des théories archivistiques. Cet article offre un survol des centaines de milliers de documents produits sur les lieux par la mine Faro. Il inclut un historique de leur création et présente une étude de cas afin d’examiner l’application des théories archivistiques relatives à la provenance, au respect des fonds et de la production des archives. Les difficultés d’application de ces théories aux archives de la mine Faro reflètent une complexité plus importante qui comprend des interrogations concernant la propriété des documents et la responsabilité des projets majeurs d’extraction de ressources. L’article conclut que le manque d’accès aux archives de la mine soulève des problèmes considérables de transparence et impose des barrières à la recherche historique. Il soutient que davantage de travail archivis- tique est nécessaire afin d’assurer une gestion adéquate des documents pour des projets futurs