A free event with local history talks and behind the scenes tours.

Explore Your Archive: Celebrating One Year at Y Storfa

Archives are full of wonderful and intriguing things – not just documents! Explore Your Archive week is an opportunity for archive services across the UK and Ireland to share their treasures with the public.

This is a free event for the public to get advice from archives staff and experts in community histories, to really fire up your imagination and get everyone exploring the archive. As well as presentations from our two speakers, you will be given a behind-the-scenes tour of the building, to see for yourself where all these local treasures are stored. This event will take place at West Glamorgan Archive Service, Swansea. Refreshments will be provided.

Our two presentations are:

Wales and the Basque Children of 1937: Community-curated exhibitions as itinerant archives. Discover the stories of the nearly 40,000 children evacuated from the Basque Country during the Spanish Civil War, including those who found refuge in Wales. This presentation from Mónica Jato explores how archives, museums, artists, memory activists and local communities are working together to bring their experiences to life.

Mapping Margam: How archive maps and plans can unlock past landscapes: Alex Langlands demonstrates how we can use archive materials to reconstruct past landscapes with special reference to ongoing work at Margam Park where geophysical survey has identified one of the largest Roman Villas in Wales.

Both presentations will be in English. Please note that arrival and refreshments is from 13.30. Our presentations will start at 14.00.

........................................................

Archwiliwch Eich Archif! Y Storfa: Dathlu’r Flwyddyn Gyntaf

Mae archifau yn llawn o bethau gwych a diddorol – nid dogfennau yn unig! Mae wythnos Archwilio Eich Archif yn gyfle i wasanaethau archif ledled y DU ac Iwerddon rannu eu trysorau gyda'r cyhoedd.

Mae hwn yn ddigwyddiad rhad ac am ddim i'r cyhoedd i gael cyngor gan archifwyr ac arbenigwyr mewn hanes cymunedol, i danio'r dychymyg a chael pawb i archwilio'r archif. Yn ogystal â chyflwyniadau gan ein siaradwyr, cewch daith dywys o amgylch yr adeilad i gael cipolwg y tu ôl i’r llen a gweld drosoch eich hun lle mae'r holl drysorau lleol hyn yn cael eu cadw. Cynhelir y digwyddiad hwn yn Gwasanaeth Archifau Gorllewin Morgannwg, Abertawe. Darperir lluniaeth.

Ein siaradwr yw:

Cymru a Phlant Gwlad Fasg ym 1937: Arddangosfeydd a guradwyd gan y gymuned fel archifau teithiol. Darganfyddwch straeon y bron i 40,000 o blant a gafodd eu gwacáu o Wlad y Basg yn ystod Rhyfel Cartref Sbaen, gan gynnwys y rhai a ddaeth o hyd i loches yng Nghymru. Mae'r cyflwyniad hwn gan Mónica Jato yn archwilio sut mae archifau, amgueddfeydd, artistiaid, gweithredwyr cof a chymunedau lleol yn cydweithio i ddod â'u profiadau'n fyw.

Mapio Margam: Sut y gall mapiau a chynlluniau archif ddatgelu tirweddau'r gorffennol: Bydd Alex Langlands yn cyflwyno ar sut y gallwn ddefnyddio deunyddiau archif i ail-greu tirweddau'r gorffennol, gan gyfeirio'n benodol at y gwaith ym Mharc Margam, lle mae arolwg geoffisegol wedi nodi un o'r filâu Rhufeinig mwyaf yng Nghymru.

Bydd y ddau gyflwyniad yn Saesneg. Sylwch fod lluniaeth ar gael o 13.30 ymlaen. Bydd ein cyflwyniadau’n dechrau am 14.00.

...............................................................

Additional information:

Mónica Jato is Professor of Hispanic Studies at the University of Birmingham. Her research interests focus on cross-cultural comparative approaches to exile and migration. She was the Co-Investigator of the three-year project (2017-2019) "Inner and Territorial Exile in Nazi Germany and Francoist Spain: A Comparative Study," funded by The Leverhulme Trust. Emerging from this project, her monograph, Fractured Frontiers: The Exile Writing of Nazi Germany and Francoist Spain (2020; co-authored with John Klapper) challenges the traditional view that inner and territorial exile constitute opposed and irreconcilable aspects of writing under oppression. The comparative approach pursued in this study provides a template for wider-ranging cross-cultural studies of fissure and legacy through longitudinal analysis of the discursive formation of alterity and displacement, territoriality and exterritoriality, and of contested national identity. She is also interested in problematizing Spanish twentieth century literary historiography by introducing new perspectives into its canon and producing scholarly editions of underrepresented women's voices. She currently coordinates the research group “Memory as Transgenerational Care,” which has co-produced several exhibitions in the Basque Country and the United Kingdom.

Alex Langlands (BA, MA, PhD, PGCert, FHEA, FSA) is an archaeologist, historian and broadcaster. He is co-director and founding member of the Centre for Heritage Research and Training at Swansea University, where he is also Associate Professor

Description supplied by the event organiser.