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Carter & Conrad, "In Possession of Community: Toward a More Sustainable Local"
Discipline/Field: Writing Studies, Rhetoric & Composition, Archival / Library Sciences
Year: 2012
Main Arguments & Concepts
This article outlines the far-ranging benefits of using and contributing to archives in rhetoric & composition research. The researchers emphasize the importance of sustainability, focusing on three main principles of sustainable community research & archives:“(1) sustainability of the local for the community and the discipline, (2) transparency of methods and sources, and (3) accessibility of source materials (data sharing)”
Sustainable archives should be available, useful, and accessible for academics and for the community.
Carter and Conrad point out how some institutional practices can make it difficult, or de-emphasize the importance of community guidelines. They point out that oral histories are not considered ‘research’ by IRB, as they are meant to be shared (91), but that some materials considered true research may need to be private or destroyed, “per IRB requirements” (92).
Nonetheless, the authors encourage researchers to use and contribute to archives as much as possible. Doing so can take the pressure off of subject communities, who may be burdened by researcher requests (97). It also creates opportunities for other researchers to compare their local findings to archives in other locations.
Throughout the articles, the authors emphasize the rhetorical nature of both interviews and archives, noting that there is no such thing as “raw data” (84). Creating and using archival sources involves a series of “rhetorical acts” (93) that researchers should understand and acknowledge.
Quotes
“Like almost any other human activity, the oral histories found in any public repository are the product of a specific series of rhetorical acts in a particular rhetorical context shaped by material, political, and ideological circumstances” (93).“Blurring boundaries between those who own the data collected by considering its potential for future researchers and within the archive opens up rich possibilities for giving back, which opens up still further options and still additional archival purposes and possibilities” (101).
Notes
The point about oral histories being “memories, not facts” (98) sets up an interesting dichotomy about the nature of knowledge. What distinguished a ‘memory’ from a ‘fact,’ especially when we accept the premise that archives, interviews, and oral histories are “rhetorical acts?”Related
Arola, “Composing as Culturing”Mathieu, Tactics of Hope
