Curadoria de conteúdo no fundo arquivístico do círculo operário da Bahia no Memorial Santa Dulce dos Pobres

Abstract

This study presents a proposal for content curation applied to permanent archives, with emphasis on the documentation belonging to the archival collection of the Círculo Operário da Bahia, under the custody of the Memorial Santa Dulce dos Pobres, located in Salvador, Bahia, which constitutes the object of this research. In this context, content curation is conceived as a strategic practice aimed not only at preservation, but also at the planned and selective dissemination of archival information, thereby promoting access, enhancing the value of documentary heritage, and democratizing historical knowledge. The objective of the research is to implement content curation as an archival practice to effectively disseminate information within the Memorial Santa Dulce dos Pobres archive. This is a descriptive and documentary study with a qualitative approach. The chosen methodology is a case study, using as its corpus the minute books of general assembly meetings from 1941 to 1987. The analysis was conducted through the application of archival description standards, combined with the principles of Archival Knowledge Organization, in order to identify the context of document production, the actors involved, and the possibilities for documentary mediation through curation. The results indicate a need for further studies on content curation within the field of Information Science, highlighting the expanded role of the archivist as both curator and documentary mediator of collective memory. The study also underscores the importance of archival instruments in consolidating the post-custodial paradigm and legitimizing information sources in historical contexts. These findings reinforce the need to adopt contemporary dissemination strategies and demonstrate the potential of curation to make archival collections more accessible and meaningful to society. In conclusion, it is emphasized that archival documents are symbolic constructions that express—and, if left unaddressed, may perpetuate—only a single worldview. The guidelines for content curation as an archival practice were aligned with the proposed flowchart model, encompassing the stages of source retrieval, selection and analysis, value aggregation, and sharing. Archival description served as the normative framework at all stages, respecting provenance and Milton Santos’ concept of territoriality for narrative contextualization, thereby enhancing the collection’s educational and heritage-related actions. Furthermore, it is essential that the evaluation of the entire curatorial process take the user into account, fostering the relevance of the content and the value added to his or her experience.