EHRI in the UK | Three Workshops – Many New Opportunities
By Rachel Pistol, EHRI-UK National Coordinator, KCL, and Maria Dermentzi, KCL
On May 4-5, 2023, EHRI organised two workshops that were hosted by the Wiener Holocaust Library (WHL) in London, UK. The first day focused on the work of the Work Package (EHRI-3 WP11) that is tasked with engaging and supporting micro-archives, while the second day was a special EHRI-UK workshop, run through EHRI-PP (Preparatory Phase).
A third workshop took place on 15-17 May, when EHRI-UK teamed up with CLARIN - the research infrastructure for language as social and cultural data - for a combined EHRI-CLARIN workshop "Using Holocaust Testimonies as Research Data".
Oral testimonies of survivors of the Holocaust, recorded in audio and video interviews, are historical records of huge historical importance. Can language technologies, as CLARIN offers, help to make them more usable as research data? The event, that took place at King's College London, was a first attempt to bring together practitioners associated with these two research infrastructures at the European level, and to plan ongoing collaboration and joint initiatives. Martin Wynne wrote a report about the workshop for CLARIN, which you can find on the CLARIN-UK website.
Micro-archives
The first EHRI workshop on May 4th was designed to explore the challenges and opportunities that arise from engaging with micro-archives. In the context of EHRI, micro-archives are defined as collections held by individuals or small private initiatives outside traditional archives. Those invited to attend the workshop were a mix of professional and non-professional archivists, researchers and curators from different regions of the UK as well as Germany and Israel. Small, medium and large archival and heritage institutions were represented, who all had different levels of experience dealing with micro-archives.
The workshop began with an introduction from Christine Schmidt, Deputy Director and Head of Research at the Wiener Holocaust Library. Sigal Arie Erez and Giora Zwilling, both representing Arolsen Archives then introduced the EHRI project, Work Package 11 and EHRI's activities with micro-archival communities. Sandra Lipner (Royal Holloway, University of London), co-curator of WHL's exhibition Holocaust Letters, led a tour of the exhibition which was curated from different micro-archives. She discussed the process of putting the exhibition together, highlighted the challenges but also the value and richness of these types of collections.
Elise Bath and Samina Rickards (WHL) demonstrated WHL's portable digitisation kit and introduced attendees to WHL's Recovery & Repair Project, a bespoke programme of family research and personal document collection preservation support.
Subsequently, Mike Bryant (KCL) conducted a demonstration of EHRI's Micro-Archive Publication Tool (MAPT), an experimental prototype that simplifies the process of publishing image-based micro-archives in a sustainable, standards-compliant, and rights-holder-friendly manner.
The workshop concluded with a focus group discussion on the definition of micro-archives, legacy planning and the potential usefulness of MAPT as well as other digital tools that could be deployed by EHRI to support micro-archive owners or larger institutions working with them. (Image above: Sigal Arie-Erez presenting at the micro-archives workshop.)
UK Holocaust Research Infrastructure
On May 5th, many of the workshop participants from the previous day as well as additional representatives from Jewish heritage organisations and British academic institutions, attended the EHRI-UK workshop. The purpose of the EHRI-UK event was to introduce relevant UK organisations to the UK Holocaust Research Infrastructure and the work it plans to undertake. Toby Simpson, Director of the WHL, started the day by welcoming participants and showing two of the videos the WHL commissioned for their 90th anniversary year. EHRI-UK National Coordinator, Rachel Pistol (KCL) then proceeded to explain the mission and values of EHRI, its work so far, and updated the audience on the work that has already been undertaken to create EHRI-UK. Rachel, with Christine Schmidt, Deputy National Co-ordinator of EHRI-UK (WHL), then explained how two new EHRI-UK schemes would work – the National Research Fellowships and the Regional Placement Scheme.
In addition to other EHRI services that will continue when EHRI becomes a permanent European Research Infrastructure Consortium (ERIC), EHRI-UK also hopes to offer two UK specific programmes:
The EHRI-UK National Research Fellowships are designed to support and stimulate Holocaust research conducted by researchers, archivists, librarians, curators, and junior scholars, especially PhD candidates with limited resources within the UK; while the EHRI-UK Regional Placement Scheme will be led by archival and heritage institutions and aims to provide postgraduate and undergraduate students with the opportunity to enhance their employability and learn new skills working on projects pre-designed by project partners. Both schemes were welcomed with much excitement from organisations who can already see how these schemes could be useful to themselves, their institutions and their students.
The workshop concluded with a Q&A session, and there was much interest from the participants about the possibilities of the UK Holocaust Research Infrastructure. Overall, both workshops were received very well and participants from both days appreciated the platform to discuss common challenges and best practices, as well as to connect with different institutions from across the UK who are working in similar areas. We look forward to continuing to build new relationships within the research community in the UK as well as continuing to develop best practice for those working with micro-archives.
From the EHRI-CLARIN workshop: Schematic framework for turning interviews into research data. www.clarin.ac.uk/article/using-holocaust-testimonies-research-data