Preliminary Programme

Wed 24 March
    11.00 - 12.15
    12.30 - 13.45
    14.30 - 15.45
    16.00 - 17.15

Thu 25 March
    11.00 - 12.15
    12.30 - 13.45
    14.30 - 15.45
    16.00 - 17.15

Fri 26 March
    11.00 - 12.15
    12.30 - 13.45
    14.30 - 15.45
    16.00 - 17.15

Sat 27 March
    11.00 - 12.15
    12.30 - 13.45
    14.30 - 15.45
    16.00 - 17.00

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Friday 26 March 2021 16.00 - 17.15
A-12 ETH20 Digital and Life Cycle
A
Networks: Ethnicity and Migration , Spatial and Digital History Chair: Mary Nagata
Organizers: - Discussant: Mary Nagata
Rik Hoekstra, Marijke van Faassen : Computer Vision for Removing Blind Spots in a Migrant Registration System
In this paper we discuss the extension of established methodology with computer vision to make it possible to almost literally see into the blind spots that using established methods on large serial collections only leave. We argue that this method overcomes the dangers of implicit selection that are commonly designated ... (Show more)
In this paper we discuss the extension of established methodology with computer vision to make it possible to almost literally see into the blind spots that using established methods on large serial collections only leave. We argue that this method overcomes the dangers of implicit selection that are commonly designated as ‘cherry picking’, or selecting the ‘most important’ files. Furthermore, in using combined traditional and DH-methodology it becomes visible what is and what is not in the collection as a whole. As such it is a a replacement for traditional leafing through an archive. As a method of source criticism, this gives many more possibilities than would have been possible with established methodologies only. We illustrate our findings on our project Migrant, Mobilities and Connection on Dutch-Australian emigration 1950-1992.

The main research question in the project is which factors determined the whole migration experience and what the relation was between policy, civil society and individual agency. Australia was, together with Canada, the main destination of Dutch emigrants after 1945, receiving around 160,000 migrants from 1950 to 1992.

The point of departure is a registration system that was kept by the Dutch migration authorities, based at the Dutch consulates. It consists of 50,000 cards (100,000 images scanned) and contains data about the interactions between migrants and the migration officers from 1950-1992. The cards themselves contain a wealth of information that is not readily available as the writing on the cards is a mixed of manuscript and typescript that are distributed unequally over the cards.

Before starting to answer the main question we had to determine first how to study Dutch-Australian emigrants with this extensive registration system that is hermetic by its size and composition. Traditionally, historians would tackle a collection like this by taking a sample from the cards and additionally study the most interesting cases.
However, case selection is difficult as it is impossible to read a hundred thousand images or even leaf through them. Moreover, it is not clear how cases fit into the registration system and whether there are hidden features of the system influencing the size of files.

Thus, a combination of a large archive collection of mostly undifferentiated material and methodologies not devised for distant reading, leads to blind spots for the historian and asks for additional methods to inspect the whole collection. The computer vision method we adopted measured the amount of writing on the cards. Viewed over the whole registration system, this gives a distribution of the information over the cards.Combining this with traditional sampling we were able to identify distinguishable groups of migrants (eg. by as religion, marital status or age).

In the paper we will elaborate on the (non-)possibilities of relating these groups to the ‘information distribution’ as a whole and on the (non-)possibilities of distinguishing changes in policies and executive strategies of the Dutch migration authorities by using this combined methods. (Show less)

Colin Pooley, Marilyn Pooley : Mobility Change over the Life Course: a Case Study from 20th Century Lancashire
How we travel for everyday activities varies in relation to many factors. These may be personal (for instance income, employment, location, family circumstances, age, health, perception of risk or personal preference); technological changes in the transport modes available at a particular time and location; and societal shifts in the norms ... (Show more)
How we travel for everyday activities varies in relation to many factors. These may be personal (for instance income, employment, location, family circumstances, age, health, perception of risk or personal preference); technological changes in the transport modes available at a particular time and location; and societal shifts in the norms and expectations of travel behaviour. All these will interact to create the travel patterns and behaviours of any individual. In this paper we use the detailed personal diaries of one woman (Betty) who lived in North Lancashire from 1928 to 2018 to explore such shifts in everyday mobility, and to relate them to the technological, economic, societal and cultural changes that occurred during her lifetime. Betty kept a detailed record of her everyday activities – including travel – every year from the age of 13 until shortly before she died. Information in the diaries is also supplemented by her oral testimony collected only months before she died in 2018. Betty never married, she moved home only twice in her life, and most of her activities were mundane; but in many ways it is the ordinariness of her experiences that provide such a rich source of information on the shifting currents of one woman’s everyday life as her circumstances changed and society altered around her. Betty was the daughter of a farmer and her early life was spent in quite remote rural parts of North Lancashire with very limited transport. Most everyday mobility was undertaken on foot, by bike or, for longer journeys, by bus. Occasionally she would get lifts in a motor vehicle of some kind. At the age of 24 she and her parents gave up farming and moved to a semi-detached house on the edge of a small town, some nine miles (15km) from their previous address. This gave her easier access to a wider range of public transport but she also continued to cycle for many local journeys. In 1958 (age 30) she passed her driving test and increasingly used her father’s car for many social activities, but continued to cycle and use the bus for more routine travel. However, from 1964 when she bought her own car for the first time almost all mobility, including very short trips, was undertaken by car. This continued for most of her life until forced to give up driving due to old age. For much of her life Betty’s mobility was limited to local journeys, rarely travelling more than about 20 miles (32km) from home, although in later life as she had more resources and with the advent of low-cost airlines from the 1980s she did occasionally holiday outside the UK. It is argued that these detailed personal diaries are in many ways a microcosm of changes that affected most people in Britain during the twentieth century, and that they illustrate clearly the complex interaction of personal, technological and societal factors that shape everyday mobility over the life course. (Show less)

Linda Reeder : Strangers in Italy: Field Notes from the Archives
Scholars have long insisted that Italy is a country of emigration. The millions of Italians who left their homes between 1860 and 1945 figured prominently in the histories of Italy. Researchers showed how emigrants shaped the meaning of national belonging, defined notions of empire and anchored the growth of global ... (Show more)
Scholars have long insisted that Italy is a country of emigration. The millions of Italians who left their homes between 1860 and 1945 figured prominently in the histories of Italy. Researchers showed how emigrants shaped the meaning of national belonging, defined notions of empire and anchored the growth of global capitalism in Italy. Yet, few historians have taken note of the presence and power of immigrant men and women. Until recently, “stranieri” (foreigners) rarely appeared in the public imagination or historical narratives, taking concrete form only in particular moments: studies of the Grand Tour; Mazzini and Garibaldi’s coterie of foreign women; the arrival of war refugees in the 1930s; or local studies of ethnic enclaves. The invisibility of immigrants in nineteenth and early twentieth century Italy is in part a consequence of numbers. The known number of foreigners was tiny in comparison to the size of the Italian diaspora. Yet, despite their apparent numerical, historical or political insignificance, travelers, artists, expatriates, students, refugees and returning emigrants played a central role in shaping 19th and early 20th century Italian politics and society. This paper represents the early stages of a much bigger project investigating why and how the history of foreigners in Italy was erased, and where and why they became visible.

When I first began to think about ways of historicizing contemporary Italian immigration, I went to the census documents, and found indeed that only a fraction of the people resident in Italy were foreign nationals. The census records traced the shift from foreigners as landowners in the 1850s to tourists and students by the end of the century. Resting on the census documents with their narrow legal definition of foreigner as a fixed point of reference, this paper seeks to trace those foreigners who are left out of the census. Deportation records reveal the existence of new transnational migratory circuits. Enemy alien lists during the two world wars highlighting the wartime concerns with foreigners and refugees suggests the existence of foreign immigrant communities in the fast growing cities. This paper argues that the ways in which foreigners in Italy were categorized, seen or made invisible had much to do with gender, class and ethnicity. Through these sources an alternate understanding of Italian migration emerges, where immigrants join emigrants in ever-widening transnational migratory circuits. This narrative challenges the notion of a once homogenous Italy. (Show less)



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