Summer Internship at the Archive of Chatsworth House
Chatsworth is a family home, a working farm and a living landscape. ©Chatsworth House Trust
Applications are now open for Oxford University students to undertake a 4 week-long summer internship at the archive of Chatsworth House. This internship is funded by the TORCH Heritage Programme and was set up in collaboration with the Careers Service of the University of Oxford. Students who are selected for this internship will work remotely and receive the equivalent of National Living Wage for the duration of the placement.
The Chatsworth House Trust was established in 1981 and endowed by the Cavendish family, who have lived at Chatsworth since the 16th century. A registered charity, its principal purpose is the long term preservation of Chatsworth House, the house, its art collection, garden, woodlands and park for the benefit of the public.
Our remote internship is embedded in the Archives & Library team which curates one of the largest and most significant family and estate archives still held in the house of its origin; and one of the finest private libraries in the UK. The team is part of the wider Collections, Exhibitions and Housekeeping Department.
The internship focuses on two key areas:
- Compiling a comprehensive and up-to-date bibliography of publications (biographies, monographs, articles etc) relating to the history of the Cavendish family, associated individuals, Chatsworth House and its estate, which will: be published online via the Chatsworth website; inform the development of the printed reference collections at Chatsworth; aid other researchers, and the Cavendish family.
- Analysing recent research trends in the study of country houses, their families, estates and communities, and to set Chatsworth’s archives in this wider research landscape. This will enable us to identify potential academic partnerships, promote our archive in the most relevant contexts, and highlight the research strengths of the collections more effectively via catalogues, conference papers, articles, our blog and other social media.
Specific activities will include:
- Undertaking background research into the history of Chatsworth, the Cavendish family, associated individuals, and family estates.
- Synthesising and reformatting existing reading lists and resources relating to Chatsworth (supplied by Chatsworth staff) as a basis for the project.
- Augmenting the existing lists according to priorities established by Chatsworth staff.
- Analysing recent research trends in country house research in its widest sense – including social histories, biographies, and works on libraries, historic collections and architecture.
- Evaluating the current body of publications about Chatsworth against these wider trends in order to identify gaps.
- Based on this evaluation, analysing the content of the archives at Chatsworth in order to identify their untapped research potential.
- Writing two blog posts about your project for publication on the Chatsworth blog.
Key deliverables will be:
- A comprehensive bibliography compiled to an agreed structure and style.
- A report setting Chatsworth’s collections in the context of wider research trends.
- Two blog posts.
The intern will be supervised by Fran Baker, Archivist & Librarian at Chatsworth. There will be two catch-ups via Zoom each week, and regular email contact.
For more information and to apply, log in to the Careers Service website with your SSO.
Monday 3 August for four weeks
06 July 2020
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