Animating the Archive: Quantifying Forgetting, Censorship and Embedded Bias with Agent-based Modeling

In this long paper, we present the theoretical foundations and a software for Animating the Archive . This novel approach brings together historical inquiry with simulation and statistical methods and thereby allows to quantitatively address possible mechanisms of active censorship, selected forgetting, or structural differences in memory generation.

Malte Vogl (vogl@gea.mpg.de), Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology, Jena, Germany and Bernardo S. Buarque (bernardo.buarque@motu.org.nz), Motu Economic and Public Policy Research, Wellington, New Zealand and Aleksandra Kaye (kaye@gea.mpg.de), Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology, Jena, Germany and Raphael Schlattmann (raphael.schlattmann@tu-berlin.de), Technical University of Berlin, Germany and Jascha Schmitz (jmschmitz@mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de), Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin, Germany; Humboldt University of Berlin, Germany and Lea Weiß (leweiss@mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de), Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin, Germany and Laura von Welczeck (lwelczeck@mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de), Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin, Germany