The workshop titled Archive Case Files, a collaboration between DAG Museums, Kolkata and Department of English Literature and Language, Adamas University involved a core-group of 30 students in an interactive workshop on DAG’s existing module on India and the first World War. Between 20 and 30 August 2024, participants were introduced to a curated selection of historical artefacts and ephemera from the DAG archives and had access to them throughout the workshop which was designed to help them engage with visual primary material and explore archival research.
Through a series of activities, which involve close-looking at visual sources, learning the steps of archival research, and close reading of critical texts among others, the workshop probed into questions of how history is written, how historians have engaged with visual, material, and other forms of evidence, and how historians have approached the process of ‘reading’ evidence. The entire range of activities aimed to hone multiple skills—visual learning and thinking, archival research, teamwork, public speaking skills, artmaking, writing, among others. Further, this workshop was counted as a form of experiential learning for the selected 30 students.
As a direct outcome of the Workshop, the participants came up with ways of engaging with the archives in critical and creative ways, culminating in them making a photo-book, under the mentorship of visual arts practitioner Ushnish Mukhopadhyay, that incorporated their learnings from the workshop.
