Starting with the archive: principles for prospective collaborative research. (April 2023)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Thomson, Rachel; Berriman, Liam
• Is Part Of: Qualitative research. Volume 23:Number 2(2023)
• Page Start: 234
• Page End: 251
• Publication Date: 2023-04
• Subjects: archives -- collaboration -- children -- young people -- families -- ethics -- data -- reuse; Qualitative research -- Periodicals; Social sciences -- Research -- Periodicals; 300.72
• DOI: 10.1177/14687941211023037
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1468-7941

Abstract

What are participants and researchers agreeing to when they consent to having data archived and what do they imagine the future life of their data to be? In this paper, we reflect on a project that deliberately started rather than ended with the archive. The Everyday Childhoods project invited children and their families to take part in the creation of an open access public archive documenting everyday childhoods using a range of multimedia data. Families and researchers were invited into the archive, encouraged to imagine different kinds of secondary use and to speak directly to future user of their data through short films and postcards. This paper raises questions concerning the place of the archive in different disciplinary traditions; the roles of researcher and archivist in safekeeping, gatekeeping and caring for data collections; and the place of qualitative longitudinal research as a site of innovation within a new data landscape.