The Vancouver Island Project: Historical Research and Archival Practice

Abstract

The writing of history and the keeping of records have traditionally been closely related activities.Until recently, archival training usually involved the study of history, while historians usually conducted all their research in archives.The establishment of specific graduate programmes for archivists and changes in the theory and method of historical research have rapidly altered this situation during the past decade.Archives have always had a clientele beyond professional historians and increasingly historians are utilizingdata outside traditional archival control.' As several recent reviews of relations between historians and archivists suggest, the two groups may be drifting farther apart than at any time in the past.2The connection between historical research and archival practice is a central issue for the Vancouver Island Project [VIP] which is compiling an on-line machinereadable research tool covering local public repositories on Vancouver Island.The resource tool will contain brief histories of the organization and function of the surveyed agencies and will provide descriptive and evaluative lists of holdings at both the record group and series level.The Project is surveying the Island's five cities, eight district municipalities, four towns, twelve villages, thirteen school districts, six regional districts, seventy-five improvement districts, and approximately fifty other repositories including museums, historical societies, and businesses."The Vancouver Island Project has been assessing and building upon developments in both the United States and Canada.These developments range from changes in historical perspective to redefinitions of archival practice.The significance of the I Social Sciences and Humanitics Research Council of Canada.Consultative Group on Canadian Archives.Report, Ian Wilson, chairman, (Ottawa.1980).pp.37-38 (hereafter The Wilson Report).2 Terry Cook."Clio:The Archivists Muse?,"

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