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Re: Greeting cards
I can think of several reasons why a collection might want to save
cards- or why researchers might be interested in them. Please note that
these ideas come mainly from research projects that people I know have
conducted- not with greeting cards but with other popular forms of visual
media. It seemed to me that these questions/ideas could certainly extend
to cards.
Reasons for saving greeting cards collections:
1. Value as a collection (there are people who collect such things, just
as they collect stereocards, postcards and ad cards)
2. Information on family ties for people investigating his family- who
sent cards? For which occasions? Who spent more money? What can we
infer about family structure from these behaviors? What if a family
member stopped sending cards?
3. Social behaviors- for what sorts of occasions did people send cards?
4. Art and graphic arts history- what sort of images were popular at a
particular time? How did graphic arts change over the course of a
lifetime?
5. Graphic arts and social history (already touched on by one respondent)-
what do popular images tell us about fads in society?
6. Graphic arts and social history- what do popular images say about
values or prejudices? How does society construct a sense of taste and
decide what images are attractive or appropriate? How does society
depict minorities? Women?
There probably are many other reasons as well.
Nina Stoyan-Rosenzweig
Archivist, College of Medicine
Adjunct Assistant Professor, History Department
University of Florida
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