The Kenney Papers Archive Omeka User Guide
General Navigation
On the home page you will see two different options for navigating the site. The first is to simply click the top righthand icon that gives you a list of all the pages. If you would prefer descriptions of each page and a short introduction to the project, scroll down through the home page and click into the various pages of the site. These include:
Exhibits: A Guided Tour -- Follow a path through the key exhibits of Suffragette Stories. Further explanation down below.
The Kenney Papers Archive -- Explore the 100 digitized items in the collection made available for a new generation of Suffragette Scholarship.
Suffragette Stories -- An anthology of short stories published throughout 2019 to commemorate the women represented in the trees planted at Eagle House Plantation. The stories give us an opportunity to reimagine the legacy of the suffragettes and celebrate the centenary of women winning the right to vote.
Stories can be accessed in the drop town tab in the top right of the home screen or by clicking on the suffragette stories page to read a short description of the anthology.
Annie’s Arboretum -- Biographies of suffragettes represent the lives of those who planted trees in the lost arboretum. If there is a story published in the creative writing anthology that was inspired by a suffragette, a link will also be provided at the top of her biography page here.
How We Joined the March: Events -- A closer look at the past events and activities that formed a part of the project
Learning Resources -- Materials available for you to adapt and use, including a suggested reading list and other learning resources. Follow instructions on the page for accessing resources
Unboxed -- Read more about suffragette material being uncovered in the UEA over on the Unboxed blog
About Suffragette Stories -- A broad overview of the project and our team
User Guide -- How to access the Kenney Papers Archive and get the best use out of the site (you are here!)
Exhibits: A Guided Tour
Browsing the exhibits for the first time? The functionality of Omeka is such that first time users may be unsure where to start when navigating the Archive categories. Though we have tried to mitigate this by providing a short introduction on the home page, a new visitor to the archive may wish to spend some time reading more about the project.
For a more curated path through the archive, you can start in Exhibits: A Guided Tour and read through the introductory paragraphs on this page, which serve to orient your search. In the drop-down menu, click Exhibits: A Guided Tour to begin your journey through the many facets of Annie and Jessie Kenney’s story.
The collection has been curated into 10 categories with roughly 10 items each, dealing with different aspects of the personal and political life of the Kenney sisters. The scope of each category can be found below.
- Childhood: This includes birth certificates, notebook of creative writing, and excerpts of materials recalling childhood.
- Work: This includes all paid work as adults. For Annie this will be her administrative roles as WSPU organiser in East End, Bristol, and Clement’s Inn, as well as writing her published manuscript. For Jessie, her WSPU organiser roles, post war work for Red Cross, wireless training, stewardess work and work as school secretary. War work is included in War.
- Family: This includes any texts or photographs which relate to the Kenney family. This would include any letters from siblings but also references to the family/class in suffragettes. The family section also covers Annie and Jessie’s view on class in aspects of their manuscripts.
- Friendship: This section shows the intensity of and enduring nature of their friendships. It includes themes of fellowship and comradeship, as well as how class does or does not impinge on these relationships.
- Activism: This includes all non-militant demonstrations and imprisonments, mainly before Black Friday (November 1910) and not after they became targeted property in 1912.
- Militancy: Any actions involving targeted violence against another person or property. Most of this wtakes place after 1910.
- War: All jobs and roles during WWI, including most of their travel and the Russian material, creation of women’s party and anti-communist activities with unions. Also included is any discussion musing on WWII and its aftermath.
- Commemoration: The legacy of the movement as a whole. This includes formal acts of remembering suffragettes, usually by government or society. The tree cuttings from Eagle House are featured here.
- Reputation: The legacy of the Kenneys as individual actors give a sense of them struggling with their own personal legacy. This includes personal tributes to Annie and Jessie during life or death, letters from royals/PMs talking about their individual achievements, and media depictions of Annie.
- Religion: This includes anything relating to the Kenney’s religious views in terms of letters, certificates, manuscripts and also the faith of the wider suffragettes.
You can click through these categories in the Exhibits and read a short synopsis of each to accompany the archival materials. In each exhibit there will be an opportunity to discover relevant materials from the archive, which you can click on and get further context. At the end of each exhibit page is a link to the full archive for that category, which will contain all the items related to the exhibit. Click on the images for a full description of each item, with information organised according to the Dublin Core, such as the date, subject, and creator.
If you are reading a written document such as a letter that is faint or difficult to discern, you can also find a full transcription beneath the description. Note that to zoom in on an item, the best way to do so is to open it in full screen rather than trying to magnify on the exhibit page.
To get the most out of the Dublin Core fields, read on in the next section about the search function in Omeka.
The Kenney Papers Archive
This path is most suitable for return users and academic researchers who are already familiar with background information on the Kenney sisters. Browsing the collections directly from the Archive allows you to move through the exhibits without so much text intervention.
You can start your search from the Kenney Papers Archive tab located in the top righthand menu or further down on the home page. Here, you may choose to search for an item by clicking on one of the categories and viewing all digitized material in that category.
Another way to find specific material is to use the search tool, found my clicking the magnifying glass icon at the top righthand side of any page on the Suffragette Stories website. You may decide to search for a particular year/decade (1922, 1910’s), place (Eagle House), or name (Emmeline Pankhurst). Using keywords like “letter” or “autobiography” will also inform your search results. You will then be able to see any archival material related to your search terms listed on the page.
Do note that while the search function is useful for discovering what material is held across the different categories, the tool may not always pick up the key word or phrase you are looking for. You may need to experiment with different tags.
There are future plans to tie the Suffragette Stories Omeka site and the Kenney Papers Archive together. Access to the physical archive through the University of East Anglia Archives can be found here.
Learning Resources:
Materials used during the project for intergenerational workshops and school lesson plans are available on the website for current and future use. These can be found in the Learning Resources tab or through the Kenney Papers Archive, where there is a Suffragette Stories Resources Collection.
You can also click through our past events pages (How We Joined the March: Events), located further down on the home page or in the menu tab in the top right of the screen, to discover all of the community engagements that took place around the centennial celebration in 2018.
All materials are available to download in PDF/JPEG format.
Navigation Tips:
The zoom function on item images is best used by clicking the rectangular icon in the bottom right hand corner of the image viewer, next to the page number. This brings the picture into full screen and gives you more control when viewing the document up close.
If you are viewing the items on a mobile phone or tablet, you can zoom in manually without this step.