Women’s Histories in a Digital World: An Exploration of Digital Archives, Family History, and Domestic Violence in Early Twentieth-Century Australia
In recent years, scholars have increasingly recognised the ways that colonialism, and related racism, embedded intergenerational trauma within families and communities. The role of domestic violence within families is widely accepted as important, but often treated separately. This article uses a case study from Western Australia, the life and death of Annie Grigo Dost, to explore the dynamics of both issues. Importantly, it also critiques the presentation of complex colonial family histories within a range of digital platforms, especially Ancestry.com. Such platforms obscure complex family dynamics, enforcing normative (often Westernised and highly gendered) digital frameworks for data, and consequently for stories about the past. This article offers an important critique of the ways that Ancestry.com in particular seems to actively sanitise family history, and the ways that they may be doing a disservice to their customers, who may want to acknowledge a more complex, critical family history.
Nearlyknowledgeable 👻
Jörg Lehmann
Quelle Surprise
Ben Schmidt
Moose Allain
Stefan Bohacek
Knowledge Commons