Arhiivimaterjalide juurdepääsu ja konteksti küsimused Õpetatud Eesti Seltsi käsikirjakogu näitel / Issues of Access and Context of Archival Materials: Explorative Database of the Manuscript Collection of the Learned Estonian Society

Abstract

Artikkel uurib Eesti riiklikes arhiivides asuvate mitte-eestikeelsete käsikirjakogude juurdepääsu ja konteksti küsimusi. Juhtumiuuring keskendub baltisaksa estofiilide 1938. aastal asutatud Õpetatud Eesti Seltsi käsikirjakogudele Eesti Kirjandusmuuseumis, mis on jagatud Eesti Kultuuriloolise Arhiivi ja Eesti Rahvaluule Arhiivi vahel. Käsikirjakogude asukohtadest ülevaate saamine osutus keeruliseks aja- ja töömahukaks ülesandeks, mida komplitseeris veelgi fakt, et uurija ei valda eesti keelt. Täiendavaks takistuseks osutus seegi, et kättesaadavaid digihoidlaid oli võimalik kasutada ainult eesti keeles. Ühe võimaliku lahendusena neile probleemidele pakuti välja avastusliku relatsioonandmebaasi loomine, mis toob kokku mõlemas arhiivis hoitavad materjalid. Käesolevas artiklis kirjeldatakse selle andmebaasi teostamist: erisuguste metaandmete ühtlustamist ja andmebaasi täiendamist isikuregistriga, ning arutletakse, kuidas seda andmebaasi mugava kasutajaliidese abil edasi arendada.

Access to archival sources is often determined by the cultural-historical context of the archive where it is preserved. The Estonian state funded archives’ provenance is largely shaped by the Estonian Baltic-German colonial history, the earlier belonging of the Estonian territory to the Swedish Empire (1583–1721) and its later incorporation into the Russian Empire (1721–1917); as a result, archives contain very multi-layered and multi-language archival materials. This article is dedicated to the issues of access and context of German archival materials from the nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth century in Estonian archives. It is based on the manuscript collection of the Learned Estonian Society (LES), located at two different archives of the Estonian Literary Museum: The Estonian Folklore Archives and the Estonian Cultural History Archives. The access to this collection is obstructed for non-Estonian speakers by a complex Estonian archival system.

However, without the public being able to interact with materials and re-evaluate and re-figure their contents (Hamilton, Harris, and Reid 2002, 7), the relevance of materials to be preserved in an archive diminishes. The questions of what, how, and when materials can be made accessible, especially through digitisation processes, are convoluted and carry a lot of weight. Every decision made in this regard by the custodians can reflect and perpetuate power dynamics in archives, favouring certain groups of materials and dismissing others. The article discusses how an archive’s special role as a memory institution should influence these decisions about accessibility. Therefore, the relations between memory, history and institutions are reflected in the light of Aleida Assmann’s and Juri Lotman’s theories of memory. 

The article also proposes the building of a new explorative database as one possible solution helping to overcome some of these issues connected to access and context. It thus presents the Master’s Project by Larissa Leiminger (2020a) and the resulting website “Sammlungen der Gelehrten Estnischen Gesellschaft” (accessible via https://galerii.kirmus.ee/GEG/) (2020b), which explored and implemented this solution. The database is constructed on the basis of the Omeka Classic software and displays metadata according to the Dublin Core Metadata Initiative (DCMI). It currently contains 931 objects, (717 manuscript items and 214 individuals), which can be explored via two different search options as well as by a tag word system and the implicit relations between items and creators. At the same time, it provides some additional information on the context of the collections and the persons connected with the shaping of these collections. A short history of the LES, its collections and secondary literature can be found on the pages “Die Gesellschaft” and “Die Sammlungen”. To follow the principles of transparency and to reflect the archival practices involved, the website also holds information about the scope, intention, and shortcomings of this Project on the “Das Projekt” page. The “F&A” page further clarifies some of the website’s functions and provides some details on how the archival materials can be accessed either digitally or in person. As a newly established resource, the website and the incorporated database could pave the way to a multitude of different research questions.