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IMAG First Meeting, May 21-23,
1999
On May 21-23, 1999, twenty-five
international scholars gathered at the University of Ottawa to discuss
prospects for integrating international historical census microdata. Present
at the workshop were representatives of historical and contemporary census
projects in the United Kingdom, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, France, Mexico,
the United States and Canada, as well as representatives of United Nations
Population Divisions for Europe, and Latin America and the Caribbean. Observers
from Statistics Canada also attended our meeting. The goals of this workshop
were to enhance knowledge of:
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the census as a primary source
for historical research in different nations,
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the availability of datasets based
on historical census microdata,
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the characteristics of these microdata,
and
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international similarities and
differences in government and institutional practices concerning these
data.
Dr. Jean-Pierre Wallot, visiting
professor at the Institute of Canadian Studies and former National Archivist
of Canada, opened our meeting with timely and inspiring remarks about the
value of international historical comparative research and the need for
historians to influence state institutions to preserve national records
for future study. Settling down to business, the workshop participants
reported on the status and availability of manuscript censuses and census
microdata in each nation, and discussed the particular challenges of integrating
occupation, geographic, and household and family relationship variables.
Many of our discussions about how to undertake this ambitious project continued
over lunch and dinner. The opportunity to get to know our colleagues’ practices
and priorities through informal conversation contributed greatly to the
success of the workshop.
The final day of the workshop,
we made concrete plans to take our initiative forward. Discussion centered
on ways to expand membership, set up the organization, create a presence
in the scholarly community, build a constituency of support, and fund the
data acquisition and database construction. A schedule of future meetings
was also identified, beginning with a panel discussion at the Social
Science History Association conference in Fort Worth, Texas, November
11-14, 1999, followed by future discussions at the European Social Science
History Association conference in Amsterdam, April, 2000, and the International
Congress of Historical Sciences in Oslo, Norway, August, 2000.
The first IMAG workshop was
funded by a Strategic Research Development Initiatives grant from the Social
Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, grant # 820-98-0040.
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