Paper Short Abstract:

This paper explores how archival digitization, through Rhetorical Genre Studies, challenges traditional metadata frameworks, democratizes access, and reinvents archives as dynamic platforms. Using the Grundtvig Archive, it reveals how digitization disrupts authority, enabling new interpretations and inquiries.

Paper Abstract:

This paper explores the transformative potential of archival digitization through the lens of Rhetorical Genre Studies (RGS), arguing that digitized archives disrupt fixed discursive communities and challenge the interpretive authority traditionally embedded in archival organization. Conventional archives, shaped by historical catalogues and metadata, impose pre-existing discursive frameworks on users. By re-imagining metadata as “finding aids,” the archive's function in the digital age can be re-framed, offering opportunities to challenge inherited narratives and open new interpretive pathways (1).

Central to this study is the digitization of the Grundtvig Archive. At his death on September 2, 1872, Danish nation-builder N.F.S. Grundtvig left an unparalleled collection: app. 45,000 manuscript leaves (90,000 pages) spanning 1798–1872. As Denmark’s largest private archive, it remains a cornerstone for Danish scholarship, frequently invoked to contextualize contemporary societal values within Grundtvig’s legacy.

Digitization does more than preserve the archive – it reinvents it. By democratizing access and providing dynamic entry points, the digitized archive challenges traditional notions of authority, interpretation, and historical motivation. The Grundtvig Archive becomes more than a static repository; it transforms into a living platform that unsettles entrenched narratives and empowers fresh inquiries.

(1) Heather MacNeil, 2012, “What finding aids do: archival description as rhetorical genre in traditional and web-based environments” in Archival Science, vol. 12, pp. 485-500. Rasmussen, K.S.G., Tafdrup, J., Ravn, K.S., & Baunvig, K.F., 2022, “The Case for Scholarly Editions” in Proceedings of the 6th Digital Humanities in the Nordic and Baltic Countries Conference, pp. 401-405. CEUR Workshop Proceedings, vol. 3232.