Infrastructure as intermeditation – from archives to research infrastructures

TY - JOUR

T1 - Infrastructure as intermeditation – from archives to research infrastructures

AU - Anderson, Sheila

AU - Blanke, Tobias

PY - 2015/10/12

Y1 - 2015/10/12

N2 - Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to analyse the steps taken to produce new kinds of integrated documentation on the Holocaust in the European Holocaust Research Infrastructure project. The authors present the user investigation methodology as well as the novel data design to support this complex field.Design/methodology/approach – The paper is based on the scholarly primitives framework. From here, it proceeds with two empirical studies of Holocaust archival research and the implementation steps taken. The paper employs key insights from large technology studies in how to organise such work. In particular, it uses the concepts of social-technical assemblages and intermediation. Findings – The paper offers a number of findings. First from the empirical studies, it presents how Holocaust researchers and archivist perceive the way they currently do research in archives. It then presents how the intermediation and digital transformation of such research can be enabled without violating its foundations. The second major insight is the technical research into how to use graph databases to integrate heterogeneous research collections and the analysis opportunities behind. Originality/value – The paper is based on existing work by the authors but takes this work forward into the world of real-life existing historical research on archives. It demonstrates how the theoretical foundations of primitives are fit for purpose. The paper presents a completely new approach on how to (re)organise archives as research infrastructures and offers a flexible way of implementing this. Next to these major insights, a range of new solutions are presented how to arrange the socio-technical assemblages of research infrastructures

AB - Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to analyse the steps taken to produce new kinds of integrated documentation on the Holocaust in the European Holocaust Research Infrastructure project. The authors present the user investigation methodology as well as the novel data design to support this complex field.Design/methodology/approach – The paper is based on the scholarly primitives framework. From here, it proceeds with two empirical studies of Holocaust archival research and the implementation steps taken. The paper employs key insights from large technology studies in how to organise such work. In particular, it uses the concepts of social-technical assemblages and intermediation. Findings – The paper offers a number of findings. First from the empirical studies, it presents how Holocaust researchers and archivist perceive the way they currently do research in archives. It then presents how the intermediation and digital transformation of such research can be enabled without violating its foundations. The second major insight is the technical research into how to use graph databases to integrate heterogeneous research collections and the analysis opportunities behind. Originality/value – The paper is based on existing work by the authors but takes this work forward into the world of real-life existing historical research on archives. It demonstrates how the theoretical foundations of primitives are fit for purpose. The paper presents a completely new approach on how to (re)organise archives as research infrastructures and offers a flexible way of implementing this. Next to these major insights, a range of new solutions are presented how to arrange the socio-technical assemblages of research infrastructures

KW - Archives

KW - History

KW - Interconnection

KW - Knowledge management systems

KW - Online databases

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84942323061&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1108/JD-07-2014-0095

DO - 10.1108/JD-07-2014-0095

M3 - Article

AN - SCOPUS:84942323061

SN - 0022-0418

VL - 71

SP - 1183

EP - 1202

JO - JOURNAL OF DOCUMENTATION

JF - JOURNAL OF DOCUMENTATION

IS - 6

ER -