Preserving private archives of immigration

Génériques has launched a vast programme of listing, safeguard and valorization of archives of immigration
directed to private holders. It aims to demonstrate the enormous contribution of foreigners to the cultural, political
and socio-economical French history.

This action is part of the core activities implemented by Génériques. It reveals two features related to private collections.

- The emergency of such an action. Indeed, private archives are very diverse and geographically dispersed. They also face many dangers link to their precarious status: lack of room available for conservation, poor conservation conditions, geographical dispersion and progressive disappearance of holders and organs.

- Despite the very high quality of academic publications on the topic, the history of immigration is still disabled by many unexploited and poorly known resources. Therefore, Génériques aims at encouraging scientific works by easing the access to these collections.

In this purpose, on Friday 19th October 2007, Génériques launched a programme to encourage private archives holders to submit their collections to public conservation centres. This campaign is the fruit of a narrow and long standing collaboration between Génériques, private collections holders and the irection des Archives de France and its network.

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