Archival research
Reconstruct the past from surviving records
Archival research uses preserved records to investigate historical processes, organisations or populations. It may analyse correspondence, ledgers, personnel records or other historical traces qualitatively or quantitatively. Unlike treating an archive as a ready-made dataset, historical enquiry examines how records were produced, preserved, classified and made accessible, including silences created by power and institutional selection.
Choose when the question concerns developments that cannot be observed directly and relevant records survive. Access permissions, catalogues, language or palaeographic skills and the completeness of holdings determine feasibility.
Strengths
- Provides evidence of long historical sequences
- Enables study beyond living memory or retrospective interviews
Limitations
- Survival and access create systematic selection
- Context and meanings may change across periods
Know the boundary
An absent record is not straightforward evidence that an event never occurred.