Pier M. Larson Archive

The Pier M. Larson Archive consists of 35.6 linear feet (69 document boxes, 5 cartons, 5 oversize boxes, 1 map-case drawer), and 2.05 TB of academic and research materials of Dr. Pier Martin Larson (1961-2020), including both traditional and born-digital materials spanning 1985 to 2020—from the field research for his dissertation to the work in progress at the time of his death. The collection is made up of working files containing field notes, photographs, maps, manuscripts, drafts, and more used by Larson in his research, writing, and teaching during his over 35 years of professional activity. The collection has been arranged into 7 series, 1. Biographical Materials, 1989-2020), 2. Academic Career (1985-2020), 3. Field Research and Research Projects (1986-2020), 4. Archival Research and Work (1989-2020), 5. Publications (1990-2020), 6. Background and Secondary Research Materials (1988-2020), and 7. Larson Fieldwork Collection (Audiovisual Materials) (1990-2011).

The range of languages in the collection reflects Larson as a multilingual person who was fluent in English, French, Malagasy, and conversant and able to read in Norwegian and Kiswahili, and includes materials in Portuguese, Danish, Arabic, Nago, Latin, Malay and Swedish.

In his research work, Larson worked with research assistants and translators, and the materials reflect this aspect of his practice. His research and translation assistant during his Fulbright Program was Pamphile Rakotonjohany Rakotovelo, who worked with Larson for four months. “Rojo” was another assistant he collaborated with. Both of their works were essential to Larson’s transcription and translation project, and later to his data statistics and much more. Correspondence and personal notes with various archives and other researchers also reflect his devoted interest and relationship with the history and culture of slavery relating to social class, gender, race, descent group identity, and diaspora in Madagascar.

Series 1. Biographical Materials (1989-2020) includes his CV and multiple academic obituaries written and published at the time of Larson’s death, and anecdotes from colleagues.

Series 2. Academic Career (1985-2020) is grouped into 5 sub-series (1. Teaching materials; 2. Presentations and conferences; 3. Editorial and consultation work; 4. Undergraduate work, University of Minnesota; 5. Research and reference materials) with detailed preparation works for presentations, conferences, editorial work, consultation work, courses and class lectures that Larson had done for international and national organizations, publishers, institutions, and especially for the Johns Hopkins University where he taught from 1998 to 2020, and the Pennsylvania State University where he taught from 1994 to 1998.

Series 3. Field Research and Research Projects (1986-2020) is grouped into 3 sub-series (1. PhD and Fulbright field research; 2. Post-PhD field research; 3. Research projects) with materials from Larson’s PhD and Fulbright field research and post-PhD field research. This series contain materials that formed the basis of Larson's PhD dissertation, Making Ethnic Tradition in a Pre-Colonial Society: Culture, Gender, and Protest in the Early Merina Kingdom, 1750-1822 (1992), and of his first book, History and Memory in the Age of Enslavement: Becoming Merina in Highland Madagascar, 1770-1822(2000). Various materials in this series demonstrate Larson's methods and methodologies, such as on-site observation and snowball sampling that are reflective in his handwritten notebooks, photographs, color video footages, and oral history audio tapes and transcriptions. This series also includes Larson’s international and national site visit photographs, including contemporary visual studies of historic locations studied in Larson’s work. This extensive collection of 49.5 GB of images from decades of Larson’s national and international travels reflect his research focus on the history of Africa as well as his study of African art and the meaning of its exhibition in western museums.

Series 4. Archival Research and Work (1989-2020) is grouped into 7 sub-series (1. Archival materials documentations; 2. Catalogs; 3. Larson Fieldwork Collection transcriptions and notes; 4. Map collection; 5. Articles; 6. High Resolution Photo Archives (HRPA); 7. Transcriptions of Archival Documents in HRPA folder) with materials pertaining to Larson’s extensive archival research and his contribution to archives, such as the catalog he developed on documents written in Madagascar between 1866 and 1899 from the Norwegian Missionary Society archives, scanned and photographed archival materials, microfiches, oversize maps, transcriptions, translations, and notes. Larson had visited and utilized international and national archival collections in places such as Madagascar, France, La Réunion, New Zealand, London, Wales, Norway, Mauritius, and Johannesburg.

Series 5. Publications (1990-2020) is grouped into 3 sub-series (1. Publishing-related materials; 2. Last project-related materials; 3. Unpublished Manuscripts) with detailed preparation works for Larson’s publications and publishing career, such as his 1995-2010 published essays, writing drafts and notes, photographs, maps, tables and illustrations, a wooden relief portrait of King of Madagascar (1810-1828) Radama I “The Great” 1793-1828), research articles, inventories, and exhaustive research data and notes. This series also contains materials that had been kept on Larson’s working desk before his passing.

Series 6. Background and Secondary Research Materials (1988-2020) is physically the largest series and is grouped into 4 sub-series (1. Narrative of enslaved people research materials; 2. Diaspora research materials; 3. 17th-21st Century research materials; 4. Various research materials (by author)). These materials are arranged into two largest distinct research Larson did: narrative of enslaved people and diaspora research, two organization systems when these materials are donated: by year, from 17th to 21st century and by author. Throughout these materials, Larson took detailed notes and comments with underlined notations.

The last series, Series 7. Larson Fieldwork Collection (Audiovisual Materials) (1990, 2007, 2011, and undated) is grouped into 3 sub-series by format (1. VHS tapes; 2. Video cassettes; 3. DVDs). These materials are VHS tape that were digitized by collection donor, 8mm video cassette tapes with video register, and DVDs with footages that are integrated into other series: Academic Career (1985-2020), Field Research and Research Projects (1986-2020), Archival Research and Work (1989-2020).