Rescuing, Interpreting, and, Eventually, Digitizing Regional Postcolonial Archives: Endangered Archives and Research in Pointe-Noire, Republic of Congo

Abstract: This is a study of research and conservation activities into a newly rediscovered and opened regional archive in the Préfecture of Pointe-Noire in the Republic of Congo. The study illustrates the constraints attaching to complicated post-independence materials and the need for flexibility in approaching them. Begun as an initially well-defined project targeting a vanished colonial territorial archive, the work turned instead into the finding and reorganizing of an extremely valuable but dispersed post-independence archive. The article discusses the implications of such conditions for priorities in preservation measures and questions of digitization; it makes the case for a pragmatic approach.