Literature review on local history collection, its various

sources and roles of libraries

Dhritiman Bhar
Librarian, AMRI Hospitals, Salt Lake, Kolkata, West Bengal
dhrit9237@yahoo.com, +91 9433398043

Abstract

Local history is the study of regions in the past. The region under study generally tends to be
geographically small city, town or village. The writing of local history enriches the life and
times of the community of a particular place by providing information related to historical
sites and societies. The local history collection can help the students, researchers, historians,
local administrator, social workers and writers by giving them the past history of that locality
and this collection can be used in community information service. A large number of various
types of documents like maps, pnjis, punthis, and paintings are to be considered as the
information sources for local history writing. These are the valuable information sources for
the historians, researchers and writers. Library can play a big role for local history collection.
It may collect, organise and disseminate right information about local history of a place to the
right user in right time for solving their queries.

Key words

Local history collection, Library collection development, Public libraries, Information

sources.

Introduction

Firstly it is very important to know what a public library is and what its duties are. According
to the IFLA/UNESCO Public Library Manifesto 1994 “The public library, the local gateway
to knowledge, provides a basic condition for lifelong learning, independent decision- making
and cultural development of the individual and social groups. This Manifesto proclaims
UNESCO's belief in the public library as a living force for education, culture and
information, and as an essential agent for the fostering of peace and spiritual welfare through
the minds of men and women. The public library is the local centre of information, making
all kinds of knowledge and information readily available to its users. The services of the
public library are provided on the basis of equality of access for all, regardless of age, race,

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sex, religion, nationality, language or social status. Specific services and materials must be
provided for those users who cannot, for whatever reason, use the regular services and
materials, for example linguistic minorities, people with disabilities or people in hospital or
prison. All age groups must find material relevant to their needs. Collections and services
have to include all types of appropriate media and modern technologies as well as traditional
materials. High quality and relevance to local needs and conditions are fundamental. Material
must reflect current trends and the evolution of society, as well as the memory of human
endeavour and imagination.” (IFLA/UNESCO, 1994)

Local history

History, it seems, is more popular than ever before. While recent decades have seen falling
interest in the study of history at schools, there has been a simultaneous leap in public
participation in history-oriented activities—including family history, visiting museums and
exhibitions, history segments in the media, appreciating heritage and publishing history. As
the popular application of history has continued to broaden and grow, so has the scope of
history publishing. (Doyle, 2004) History is the past and mirror of the present. When the
‘local’ is prefixed to the word ‘history’ then the connection is changes. ‘Local’ is a word
which conveys a relational concept. For example, Asia as a continent is ‘local’ to the world
and in the same way Boral a village, is ‘local’ to Twenty Four Parganas, an administrative
district of the State or Province of West Bengal which was Bengal before 15th August 1974.
Here ‘local’ has narrowed down the geographical boundary of a place and also added to it
many things such as emotion, patriotism, identity etc. (Ghosh, 2001)

The term “local history” is not as simple as it might first appear. Conventionally, local
histories have been thought of as writings about a town, region or state written by an amateur
writer for a local audience. Since the late nineteenth century professionalization of history,
many accredited historians have held amateur local historians and their writings in disdain
and have not considered them to be part of the profession. In contrast, in the last decades of
the twentieth century, some academics appropriated the term local history to refer to
community studies — highly academic monographs that explore questions about a particular
community. (Pasternak, 2009) The local history has to be written from the point of view of
the local people (better still, if it could be written by the local people themselves). The idea is
to draw a distinction between ‘national history localized’ and ‘local history parse’. The
writing of local history, shorn of bias, will thus become the story of the origin, growth,
transformation (and may, be decline) of a community, ‘a set of people occupying the area

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with defined territorial limits and so far united in thought and action as to feel a sense of
longing together, in contradiction from the many outsiders who do not belong’. (Roy, 2002-
2004)

The writing of Local History enriches the life and times of the community of a particular
place by providing information related to historical sites and societies. Local history
concerns itself with many different subjects within that area; factual events, cultural heritage,
genealogy and folklore. All such works provide valuable information of all kinds on
historical sites, events, individuals and institutions, cultural practices, worship patterns, folk
songs and art forms. Good local history is one of the most enduring contributions that can be
made to social science. It gives veritable information of all kinds to several sections of
population to such an extent that local history has virtually come to be recognised as
instructor to politician, guide to statesman and a school of virtue for all. Further it becomes
handy in pursuing unanswered questions of mega history, supplement or complement them,
support or contradict their postulates and generalizations; and so also in the case of meta-
history. It is a reservoir of facts and myths which can be subjected to interpretative analysis
and further probe. (Cherian, 2009) Local history is the study of regions in the past. The
region under study generally tends to be geographically small city, town or village. In France
and England it grew in the 16th century as a conscious effort out of interest in nobility. In
18th century America, history writings usually portrayed political points of view and stressed
a provincial identity. In the case of most of the nations conscious efforts at writing the history
of a particular community (local history) dates from the 1840’s. Writers of local history in the
19th century were members of the nascent professional classes whose occupations allowed
them time for such an activity. In 20th century local history is a source of entertainment and
eventually local pride. In India the cycle of regional studies began with modernization and
westernization and it intensified in 20th century by the rise of the nationalist movement. The
growing concern with regional issues and aspects also has led to the study of regions. In
recent times interest in local history has leaped up with the coming of the decentralized
planning. (Cherian, 2009)

More recently historians like Terry Barnhart broadened the parameters of local history to
include the work of historical geographers and anthropologists as well as case studies of
national, regional or community history. He writes, “Local history is a big tent — the
demographic province of both amateurs and professionals — and local historians are as
diverse as their audiences.” (Pasternak, 2009)

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Carol Kammen’s ‘On Doing Local History’ gives a sympathetic overview to the past of local
history, in the end her book is prescriptive, providing guidelines to help amateurs write local
history that looks more like academic history. This is evident in her definition of local
history, which is simple at first, — “the study of past events, or of people or groups, in a
given geographic area,” — but then she continues with how she thinks local history ought to
be done: [local history is] a study based on a wide variety of documentary evidence and
placed in a comparative context that should be both regional and national. Such study ought
to be accomplished by a historian using methods appropriate to the topic under consideration
while following general rules of historical inquiry: open-mindedness, honesty, accountability,
and accuracy. (Pasternak, 2009)

The concept of local history was emerged in the West after the renaissance and received
greater attention after the bourgeois revolution, primarily for cultural, political and economic
reasons. But local history as an academic subject was introduced in the secondary schools in
England only in 1908. (Ghosh, 2001)

Academic historians moved into the field of local history writing in the 1950s and 1960s,
convinced that they could improve the field with professional research techniques and
academic inquiry. Academic history has since contributed many new perspectives on the past,
from which local history has benefitted, including the emergence of specialist fields, such as
social history, women’s history, labour history, urban history, cultural history, environmental
history and Indigenous studies. The influences of urban history and social history made the
study of place and community an important new field in the 1980s with works such as Janet
McCalman’s history of the Melbourne suburb of Richmond. (Doyle, 2001) The challenge for
local history publications is to understand the context without losing sight of the detail. The
book must successfully address the ‘why’ as well as the ‘who’, what’, ‘where’ and ‘how’.
Otherwise the result is ‘scissors and paste’ history, with little context or analysis.

According to the Oxford English Dictionary local is “Belonging to a town or some

comparatively small districts as distinct from the state or country as a whole”. On the other
hand region is “Administrative division of a city or district”. (Ghosh, 2001)

On the basis of some definitions and above discussion now it becomes easier to understand
the meaning of the local history. Now it is important to identify the sources of local history
and it is also necessary to make a strong knowledge about the local history collection and the
role of local libraries to collect, organise and preserve those documents for future use.

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Local history collections and its sources

The local history collection is a source of knowledge, ideas, stories and memories of the
people and history of Madison County. It is developed and managed as a community resource
to inspire, educate and inform the community and visitors, and to contribute to the
conservation of the history and heritage of the county. (Madison, 2011) Harrod has defined
‘local collection’ as “A collection of books, maps, prints, illustrations and other materials
relating to a specific locality, usually that in which the library housing the collection is
situated”. But the ‘other material relating to a specific locality’ would be treated as most
important so far as the local history is concerned. But the difficulty lies in identification and
location of such materials. The collectors would require necessary training and expert
knowledge in the specific task. (Ghosh, 2001)

John L. Hobbs, in Local History and the Library, states, “a live local history collection will be
used not only by the historian, genealogist and general students, but by workers in
economics, sociology, political science, public administration, geography and science, and by
writers and literary historians.” (Hobbs, 1962) The local history collect can help the students,
researchers, historians, local administrator, social workers, writers by giving them the past
history of that locality and this collection can be used in community information service.

According to the SLA annual meeting resolution the local history is “A collection of books,
maps, prints, illustrations and other materials relating to a specific locality usually that in
which the library housing is located”. It is very much essential to preserve the past to prepare
for the future. They give emphasis on the collection development for local history, type of
collected material, preservation process and use of those materials. They also said to generate
public services on the local history collection and to do so it is very essential to provide
training of the staffs. (SLA, 2011)

It is very difficult to identify the exact sources of information for defining the local history of
any place. A verity of documents can be considered as the sources of information for local
history. The documents are like : (a) Printed books, journals, reports, newspapers etc., (b)
Manuscripts (Punthi), (c) Private papers (family history, land and business documents,
correspondents, panjis etc.), (d) Oral evidence (tape recorded or hand written versions of
important people of the locality on any topic considered relevant), (e) Folk Tale and Songs
(collected from oral tradition), (f) Visuals (‘Pat’ scroll, local paintings, photography of local
temples and buildings, maps etc.), (g) Archaeological remains of the locality, (h) Museum

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objects (local dress, handicrafts, musical instruments etc.), (i) Traditional Indian literature
(reprints of which are readily available, because they contain references to places and social
groups and their practices are valuable in the ascertaining the formation and character of local
societies of the past), (j) Old official reports and surveys (gazetteers), (k) Census handbooks
and municipal publications, (l) Local histories written by the local peoples which containing a
wealth information concerning that particular locality, oral traditions etc., (m) Journals,
pamphlets of local social and commercial organizations, associations, puja committees., (n)
Occasional souvenirs, journals published from different educational institutions. (Ghosh,
2001) (Roy, 2002-2004)

Roles of libraries regarding local history collection

Libraries of all categories (Public and Special) used to collect the materials relevant to local
history. In the collection and preservation of source materials for local history libraries have
an immensely important role to perform. Librarians have to create the databases of libraries
in their regions complete with brief descriptions of holdings. Also all the librarians must keep
faithful records of books purchased and borrowed since inception, such lists help historians to
write about the reading habit of a local population at any period of time, which in turn
contributes towards the reconstruction of the cultural history of the area. Hence the role of the
Public Library in the library system is very important since it is the major institution for
educating the common people and also for keeping them informed about their professional
interests. (Ghosh, 2001) (Roy, 2002-2004)

What are the possible sources of local history that a library may collect? In order to provide
information about the community’s history, the library will collect all types of documents
including reports, magazines, news clippings, census report, leaflet etc from local
government, business organizations, homes, schools, churches, temples, community
organizations, families and from individuals and collect also the information about the
doctors, lawyers, local administrator, scientist, social workers, public representative which
can be a valuable information for the local people. (Raychowdhury, 2000) (Parchment, 2006)
According to the Library of Congress the “local history materials are defined as those relating
to the history of a country below the national level, such as the history of states, provinces,
outlying territories, regions, countries, cities, towns or institutions located in such
jurisdictions. Local history however, an integral part of history at the national level and
serves augment the collection on a national level by focusing on the specific rather than the
general. ” (Library of Congress) The libraries collecting the local history material can also

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undertake the project of compiling ‘local bibliography’ which has been defined by Harrod
“As bibliography of books and other form of written records relating to a geographic area
smaller than a country. It normally includes books by and about the people born in, or who
have resided in the area as well as books relating to the geography, natural history,
architecture and social history of the area”. Some of the research libraries collect information
and documents relating to ‘area studies’. (Ghosh, 2001) Conard says that now a day the
library can organise the digital story telling which can help the community building as well as
encourage documentation of local history. (Conard, 2013)

The main objective of a library based local history collection is to provide an information
service to all sectors of the community while providing for the security and conservation of
unique materials. The scope of the collection needs to defined and a comprehensive selection
policy drawn up which addresses the issues of its place in the context of regional and national
history collections, the multilingual nature of the community. The range of the materials
required the value of local history as a component of the collection and the philosophical and
practical aspects of collecting local source materials which demonstrates the area’s history.
(Pearson, 1988) American Library Association provides a guideline for establishing the local
history collection which describes the scope and services of the collection, way of collection
development, collection location, access and what type of consideration can be taken for this
type of collection. (American Library Association, 2006)

In India where local history has not really caught the imagination of established historians,
there exists no such seminal work that local history enthusiastic, including librarians, may
refer to. In the absence of any standard reference work on the subject then, there are some
homespun suggestions that librarians might find useful. They must, of course, remember that
historians differentiate between primary sources materials or records created at the time of an
occurrence and secondary sources or any interpretative material based on primary source
material. (Roy, 2002-2004)

References

American Library Association. (2006). Library and user services quarterly. 46(1), 85-86
Retrieved March 30, 2015 from http://www.jstor.org/stable/20864634

Cherian, S. (2009). Local history of Chengannur : a study of institutions and social relations.
(Doctoral dissertation, Mahatma Gandhi University, 2009). Retrieved June 20, 2015 from
http://shodhganga.inflibnet.ac.in/bitstream/10603/22817/10/10_chapter1.pdf

Electronic copy available at: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3198824

Conard, S.K. (2013). Doumenting local history : a case study in digital storytelling. Library
review. 62 (8/9), 459-471. Retrieved March 31, 2015 from http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/LR-02-
2013-0013

Doyle, H. and Johanson, K. (2006). Publishing history : a guide for historical socities.
Canberra : Federation of Australian Historical Socities Inc. Retrieved June 20, 2015 from
http://www.history.org.au/Documents/publishing_history.pdf

Ghosh, A. (2001). Local history : its meaning, source, collection and library. In Journal of
Library and Information Science. 6. 37 – 42. Paschim Medinipur : Department of Library
and Information Science, Vidyasagar University.

Hobbs, J.R. (1962). Local history and the library. London. cited in the article of Bryan, W.W.
The use of local history materials in two public libraries : a in the Peoria public library.
Retrieved May 15, 2015 from
https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/bitstream/handle/2142/6182/librarytrendsv13i2e_opt.pdf?sequ
ence=1

IFLA/UNESCO public library manifesto. (1994). Retrieved May 15, 2015 from
http://archive.ifla.org/VII/s8/unesco/eng.htm

Library of Congress collections policy statements : Local history. Retrieved April 25, 2015
from http://www.loc.gov/acq/devpol/localhistory.pdf

Madison county library system. (2011). Retrived May 15, 2015 from
http://www.mcls.ms/policies/Local%20History%20Collection%20Policy.pdf
Parchment Community Library. (2006). Local history collection development policy.
Retrieved May 15, 2015 from
http://www.parchmentlibrary.org/parchment/documents/local%20history%20collection%20d
evelopment%20policy.pdf

Pasternak, S. (2009). A new vision of local history narrative : writing history in Cummington,
Massachusett. (Master’s Thesis, University of Massachusetts, 2009). Retrieved June 20, 2015
from http://scholarworks.umass.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1445&context=theses

Pearson, G. (1988). The development and role of local history collections in Australian public
libraries. Australian Public libraries and Information Services, 1 (1). Retrieved March
30,2015 from http://search.proquest.com/docview/57149349?accountis=16284

Raychowdhury, P. (2000). Sadharan gronthagarer itihas o tathya songkolon o ey somporkrito

poriseba. In Granthagar.50, (11). 3 – 10. Kolkata : Bengal Library Association.

Roy, G. C. (2002 – 2004). Local history : the role of libraries. In Journal of Library and
Information Science. 7 – 9. 99 – 106. Paschim Medinipur : Department of Library and
Information Science, Vidyasagar University.

SLA annual meeting. (2011). Organizing a local history collection in a small library.
Philadelphia. Retrieved April 2, 2015 from http://transportation.sla.org/wp-
content/uploads/2011/06/zaletel.pdf

Electronic copy available at: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3198824