Comments on: ACADEMIC, PUBLIC AND FAMILY HISTORY

By: Ruth Banfield

Ruth Banfield — Mon, 31 Mar 2014 08:46:55 +0000

Your comments David have shown that Family History should not just be relegated as a past time for pensioners.

By: Babette Smith

Babette Smith — Tue, 25 Feb 2014 02:31:12 +0000

Great to see public support for family historians David. As you probably know it was family history that inspired me to write A Cargo of Women all those years ago. In addition to historians writing about their own families which is certainly valuable, the work done by family historians can of immense value to people writing a scholarly book, something I have found on many occasion. I hope you will write a large-scale history through the lens of family history. That’s exactly what I did with Cargo and it has proved valuable. Stephen Foster’s own work which I’ve read is a wonderful example of the value of tracing a family’s history. It was good to hear him talk about it at the conference.

By: Bruce Baskerville

Bruce Baskerville — Wed, 19 Feb 2014 13:04:24 +0000

Excellent post David. I spent a lot of my boyhood with grandparents and elderly uncles and aunties, all great storytellers keen to entrance a boy with tales of the ‘olden days’. Anyone who has grown up in a small and isolated place has probably experienced the same thing. Those old people certainly provoked my love of history, and I have explored the family histories of my partner and myself for many years now. It has been a journey through historical imagination all over the world and across many centuries (and types of records), and it has left me sceptical about much of what passes under the rubric of ‘Australian history’.

You mention transnational lives, and I think one thing family history has given me is an ambivalence (at best) towards nationalistic or essentialist histories. Family history has shown me how changeable identities can be, how adaptable people can be to new situations, how readily people can re-invent themselves. Perhaps that’s not unusual in societies based on migration – but then, what societies aren’t? It has lead me to a deep interest in why societies desire, and how they imagine, historical continuities and commonalities. I suppose that’s how I have come to practice history in cultural and environmental heritage? I have sometimes thought of writing a large-scale history thorough the lens of my family history, rather than as family history for a solely genealogical or personal interest. Perhaps its time to read some more Atkinson!

By: Family History – the Kernel of All History | Stumbling Through the Past

Family History – the Kernel of All History | Stumbling Through the Past — Wed, 19 Feb 2014 10:44:51 +0000

[…] David Carment’s post demonstrates that historians recognise that they are part of the history they research and they value what family histories have to offer. […]

By: Margaret Blundell

Margaret Blundell — Wed, 19 Feb 2014 05:08:07 +0000

David’s observations on the Atkinson conference and Michelle Nichol’s comment particularly resonate with me as I am involved in the assessment of an important archive of company records relating to the Australian textile manufacturing industry. Many of the former employees or their families may use the archive to find details of their own working life for their family histories. My role, as a public historian, will be to provide a wider context for their stories. With the preparation of a history of the company’s activities and its place in a technologically complex industry which was once part of Australia’s booming post WWII economy I am hoping that those former employees and their families will have another reason to be proud of the crucial role they played.

By: Jennifer McLaren

Jennifer McLaren — Wed, 19 Feb 2014 01:49:02 +0000

Thanks for this summary David, it sounds like an interesting conference. Family history is certainly practiced from the ground up, and is the way huge numbers of people connect with history. I couldn’t’ agree more that the methods and insights gained from delving into family history have so much to bring to academic history (and vice versa). Your post has reminded me to make time to delve further into my own family’s past.

By: Laila Ellmoos

Laila Ellmoos — Wed, 19 Feb 2014 01:47:06 +0000

Thanks for an interesting post David. I used family histories (not my own) when working on a project that linked individuals / families living in the Rocks area of Sydney in the 19th century to archaeological deposits found on the site/s of houses they lived in. It was an interesting way to understand more about ordinary working class people in this period, who left behind few written records and are only really knowable through family histories and the material culture they left behind. The post also made me think of a book I read last year by historian David Walker (Not Dark Yet) which wove family history with memoir but then connected it to broader historical narratives and happenings.

By: Yvonne Perkins

Yvonne Perkins — Tue, 18 Feb 2014 23:31:56 +0000

Everyone is part of a family, including historians. The kernel of all history is family history.

This post has burrowed into my mind, popping up unbidden at odd moments. I grew up in a family who actively researched and retold their own history. My journey in history started with listening to visiting relations retell family stories. When I was older I looked up things in the archives at their behest – a great education in archival research. But there is still a lot to be done to contextualise what is known and to carefully (and diplomatically) understand more about those loud silences that families are often burdened with.

Thankyou David for such a thought provoking post!

By: Michelle Nichols

Michelle Nichols — Tue, 18 Feb 2014 15:40:49 +0000

Great article. It seems to have taken some scholarly historians sometime to get to this point? What is one without the other? It would be difficult to study local history without the people and in turn it is important for family historians to put their research into context at least at a local & state level. Each has much to offer the other, family historians are good at locating the nitty-gritty whilst the historian can pull it altogether. Imagine if ALL historians could work together what could be produced!!

By: Janette Pelosi

Janette Pelosi — Tue, 18 Feb 2014 08:30:18 +0000

I certainly agree with David. The knowledge I gained of historical sources through studying my own family history has helped me to direct other researchers where to look whether for famiy, local or academic history. I have applied the methods used for family history to conference papers on biographical and transnational history. Family history can reveal much about people and their experiences in different times and places adding to our wider understandings.