Historical and Geographic Institute of Santa Catarina:

dialogues between information, identity and national memory

Abstract

The objective of this text is to analyze the social function of the Historical and Geographical Institute of Santa Catarina in maintaining national memory and disseminating information held in custody in its documentary collection. As a methodological procedure, it is characterized as a qualitative research, which uses bibliographic review and analysis of documentary sources for its construction. To achieve the proposed objective, it was decided to contextualize the historical situation of the end of the 19th century, a period in which the Historical and Geographic Institute of Santa Catarina was created. It also analyzes the impacts arising from the absence of public policies that make it impossible to improve the services offered by the Institution. It points out which social groups were represented and forgotten in the Institution's publications and how the multiple cultures contributed to the formulation of Santa Catarina's identity. In addition, it specifies the composition of the documentary collection held by the library and the archive, as well as discussing how the Institution can contribute to the practices of access to information for the effective use of documentary records and for the reframing of memory. As a result, he observes that an indispensable factor for the re-reading of memory is the informational imperative held by memory institutions. It concludes, that the Historical and Geographic Institute of Santa Catarina is a considerable locus of national memory and production of identity knowledge of Santa Catarina society.