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National archives<\/span><\/a> An 1866 manuscript of the opera Il guarany<\/em>, by Carlos Gomes, inscribed on the MoW register in 2017 as part of collections from Brazilian and Italian institutionsNational archives<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n In 2012, a joint multi-year effort by Brazilian and Italian institutions to catalog the oeuvre of composer Carlos Gomes (1836\u20131896) led to the discovery of an incomplete score at the National Museum. The score had been thought missing from the institution since the end of the nineteenth century, but was found during the effort at the Historical Museum, among papers from the estate of emperor Pedro II, to whom Gomes had donated a part of his musical composition.<\/p>\n Years earlier, in 2004, the committee approved the national MoW listing of documents related to the Rio de Janeiro political police at the Public Archives of the State of Rio de Janeiro (APERJ). Historian Paulo Knauss, a professor at Fluminense Federal University (UFF) and a former director at APERJ, recalls his surprise at the sheer size of Brazil\u2019s political police archives, with documents compiled by different repression agencies in the country between 1905 and 1983. Indeed, the Brazilian collection is one of the largest in the world on political repression. \u201cSince then, there has been an effort to identify and catalog the entire body of political police archives in Brazil,\u201d says Knauss.<\/p>\n When organizing its collection for nomination to the Brazilian MoM Program, the Public Archives of the State of Rio de Janeiro discovered that it included documentary collections from other states as well, including Alagoas, Para\u00edba, Bahia and Rio Grande do Sul. \u201cThe precursor agency of the Federal Police was headquartered in Rio de Janeiro, and received and archived political police correspondence and documents from all over the country,\u201d says the researcher. Knauss notes that it was thanks to the work of the MoM committee that the existence of such a large collection of archival heritage on this topic gained notice. \u201cThis collection offers insight into issues around democracy, human rights, civil rights, and law. It has provided material for extensive research, and expanded research horizons beyond Rio de Janeiro and S\u00e3o Paulo, where the larger and better-known collections are kept. It has also sparked a debate about access to information and regulations on personal data, laying the foundation for the Access to Information Act,\u201d explains Knauss, referring to a law passed in November 2011.<\/p>\n National archives<\/span><\/a> Original correspondence between the government of Par\u00e1 and the Court: this letter from 1789 provides a report on shipments of natural productsNational archives<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n \u201cRecent years have seen an effort to extend recognition as heritage to items other than text documents, including photos, motion pictures, and sound recordings,\u201d says anthropologist Maria Elizabeth Br\u00eaa Monteiro of the National Archives, who is also a member of the committee. She cites as an example the Iconographic Records of the Navy Revolts (1893\u20131894), which were submitted for heritage nomination by the General Archives of the City of Rio, Instituto Moreira Salles (IMS), and the National Historical Museum. \u201cThe collection includes images produced by photographers such as Marc Ferrez [1843\u20131923] and Juan Gutierrez [1859\u20131897], and opens opportunities for analysis of the political forces that were vying with one another in that historical period,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n Jussara Derenji, a retired professor at the School of Architecture and Urban Planning at the Federal University of Par\u00e1 (FAU-UFPA), who currently heads the UFPA Museum, explains that the MoM Program was launched in 1992 as a way to mitigate the impacts from catastrophes such as wars, religious conflicts, and natural disasters on documentary heritage. Headquartered in Paris, France, the program currently has offices in around 70 countries. \u201cThe program helps to safeguard historical documents for reference in the future,\u201d says Derenji. She notes, for example, how 20 years ago floppy disks were the gold standard for file storage, but today there are virtually no computers that can read the data they contain. \u201cStorage media quickly becomes obsolete. To ensure that the contents of a document will be accessible for years to come, it is essential that the original object is preserved,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n In 2018, 10 collections were listed on the Brazilian MoM register, including collections at different institutions describing the legacy of Bertha Lutz, one of the founders of the Brazilian Federation for Women’s Progress. Lutz also worked as a researcher at the National Museum, at a time when the participation of women in science was still limited. \u201cThe nomination of these collections by the Itamaraty Historical Archives, the National Archives, the Documentation and Information Center of the Chamber of Deputies and the Memory Center at the University of Campinas [UNICAMP] has led to the cataloging of objects that were previously stored at several different organizations. This will facilitate research on the life of this remarkable pioneer,\u201d says Kantor of USP. The inclusion of documents that were destroyed by the fire at the National Museum should also stimulate discussion about the long-term impacts from the lost collections on research in biology,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n