Background to the Archives

The Jane Cameron National Archives is the National Archives of the Falkland Islands, preserving and providing access to the records most important to the history and administration of the Islands from 1833. In November 2024, we participated in the ‘Explore Your Archive Week’ (EYAW) for the first time. It was the opportune moment for us as the Archives service had earlier in the year created social media accounts. We wanted to use the campaign to connect to a wider audience, showcase our collections, and use the dedicated week to engage and educate the local community about the Archive service.

Applying the EYA focus week themes

In terms of our collections, we were able to use the official themes and branding from the campaign to introduce our followers to the service, and the variety of records we hold. We used the templates from the EYAW to create visual posts focusing on snapshots of the Island’s past (including annual events like the May Ball, and dancing in Camp settlements), and demonstrate some fascinating elements to our collections (such as the recently digitised photographs from a private organisation, the Falkland Islands Company Ltd).

Planning local events

The ‘Explore Your Archive Week’ activities undertaken by the JCNA were an ideal continuation of outreach efforts. In addition to engaging with the standard social media themes, the service hosted additional events to allow the community to learn more about our National Archives service in the Islands, the work that we do, and more importantly about the original and historical documents we preserve.

Over the week, the Archives undertook the following activities:

• Group Tours of the Archives – The group tours provided an insight into the facility itself, showing the Archives Storage area and visitors were able to view/read a selection of records on display in the main Reading Room.
• Presentation and Q&A Session about the Archives – hosted at the Museum we had over 20 people attend the session, learning more about the history of the Archives and how our collections have developed over the year
• Speaking to local radio and TV outlets – discussing the role of the JCNA and how we preserve documents
• Falkland Islands Government Departmental Visits – An opportunity for FIG staff to visit the Archives, in a similar session to the public group sessions and showing records from their department/section and emphasise the link between records created today, becoming the archives of the future.

A success story

Over the course of EYAW, we had over 200 engagements with our posts and welcomed 47 people through our doors – which might not seem like a lot but in a small community in the Falkland Islands this was a great turnout!

We were also fortunate that in the same period as EYAW, the service hosted two Year 10 Work Experience students – also for the first time – allowing the team to show the students first hand the importance of advocating for the archive service. They were themselves able to assist the team in selecting and developing the posts for social media, and in supporting the tours by answering questions and telling visitors about the controlled conditions in our Archives Storage area, and about the records we hold.

Professional reflections

The experience overall was really great. On a professional level, the team enjoyed pulling together material and promoting our service. It was excellent to see each day how other Archive services interpreted the themes and focused on different elements. For our placement students, they approached the themes with refreshed ideas and even used the themes, such as ‘Family’, to learn more about their own connection to the Islands and also showcase what they had been up to over their week’s experience.

Almost four months on from the campaign itself, we are still seeing the benefit. More people have been approaching the service to donate material, a steady number of research queries are being received, and we have had people register interest in our new Volunteering Programme. It has also been great to receive positive comments and feedback from the community following all of these events, with a lot of local people having never visited the Archives or being very aware of its role and particularly how it works compared to the local Museum.

As a small Archive – with a team of two people – situated 8,000 miles away from the UK and Ireland, being able to participate in these types of online events is really important. It helps us professionally to feel better connected to the wider sector and support other professionals and archive services across the world. The JCNA will be adding the EYAW to its annual set of events and are next looking forward to creating content for #Archive30 in April.

Further information

You can find out more about the Archives by following us on Facebook, Twitter and BlueSky at @JCNArchives or accessing our website at: https://www.nationalarchives.gov.fk/

Written by: Chloe Anderson-Wheatley, Corporate Records & National Archives Manager

Edited by: Isabel Lauterjung, Blog Coordinator