Abstract
This article examines the document work involved in a workers’ enquiry conducted at the FIAT plant in Turin at the beginning of the 1960s. The study in question soon became well known in Italy both as an influential early example of post-war workplace sociological research, and for its unusual conclusions predicting an impending period of heightened industrial conflict at the auto firm. Taking a genre approach, this article attempts an archival excavation of a series of those ‘support documents’ (fieldnotes, interview schedules and transcripts) that were utilised in the original enquiry. Bringing critical attention to bear upon the creation and use of such documents, and charting their relationship to the ways in which the study’s findings were subsequently reported, the article highlights their key, if often undervalued role in the document work bound up with the enquiry itself. In the process, it also raises a number of relevant questions, including the significance of such support documents within the holdings of a community archive itself.
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Notes
There is also part of an eleventh—a series of reflections written after the conversation, in this case between Alquati and a supervisor, but with no account of the interview itself.
According to Carocci (1960, p. 18), 44.7% of FIAT workers in Turin were engaged at the level of ‘Manovali specializzati’ or ‘3a categoria’: that is, as ‘semi-skilled’ employees trained primarily for assembly line work.
One remaining interview was carried out by someone from outside the group—the professional sociologist Antonio Carbonaro, along with one ‘Verina’ (an individual whom I have not yet been able to identify).
The two sentences that followed were poignant: ‘The conversation took place in a room that served both as a kitchen and as a bedroom for at least three people. Other family members were present, but never took part.’
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Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Cris Badita and Alex Burlacu for their assistance in the gathering of documents in the Centro Studi Piero Gobetti, Turin (1960), as well as Jacopo Galimberti, Amanda Cossham, Gillian Oliver and two anonymous referees for their helpful comments. All mistakes of course remain my own.
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Wright, S. Genre, co-research and document work: the FIAT workers’ enquiry of 1960–1961. Arch Sci 18, 291–312 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10502-018-9299-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10502-018-9299-2