Public Engagement with Visual Historical Resources: The 2012 “Temperance and the Working Class” Project

Abstract

This piece offers a brief account of strategies used to bring archival resources to a wider audience to stimulate public engagement. It demonstrates possible links and synergies for traditional visual arts scholarship with other fields and institutions, such as oral history, museums and galleries, and commerce. Such an enterprise not only demonstrates the possibilities for outreach and community involvement, but also the rich rewards gained in terms of fresh approaches to material and revivified scholarship.