Celebration of the International Archives Day

by Katerina Zografou, General State Archives (GSA), Athens, Greece

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The General State Archives (GSA), the Association for the Study of the History of the leftist youth and the Research Center of Contemporary History (Panteion University), in cooperation with Filothei – Psychiko Mynicipality, celebrated the International Archives Day 2019 by organizing the public event “60’s: youth in revolt”, on Thursday the 27^th of June.

The event focused on the 1960s generation, an era during which the youth dynamically demanded a new social role and emerged as a determining factor in the political, social and cultural sphere.

Overall, the 1960s is considered as a period of liberating liveness and anticonformism, the youth, in all its different and interrelated social identities, being its main, though not sole, protagonist: massive social protest, widespread (sub)cultural expression, ranging from musical and cinematic cosmogony to visual and performative arts flourishing, urban landscape transformation, familiarisation with the new technologies, among others, characterized the period.

At the beginning of the event, a guided tour to the archival material exhibition took place. The exhibition contains original, as well as digitized material from the collections of the General State Archives and E.M.I.A.N. and will remain open to the public until this December.

After the welcome speeches, the first presentation focused on the importance of the so-called histories of common people and their dynamic relation with History. The next presentation was based on GSA archival material, dealing with the reactions of the Greek society towards “Nudist, hippies and other anomalies”. A historical overview of the political radicalization of the student movement (1962-1963) followed, while the topic of the last presentation was the broad use of flipper in Greece and other western-european countries.

The event ended outdoors, where wine and snacks were offered, accompanied by a selection of ‘60s songs that made people flood the dancefloor!