Archiving the 8th: academic, archivist, activist network

In May 2018, the constitutional ban on abortion in Ireland was overturned after a highly charged referendum on the Eighth Amendment, which brought about one of the most significant changes to women's health and reproductive rights in Irish history. The scale and impact of the referendum campaigns has been profound, generating enormous amounts of records, political ephemera, websites and digital material, as well as visual/material culture. 

In its aftermath, a group of academics, archivists and academics formed the Archiving the 8th Network, which aims to explore how evidence of this significant social shift in women's health from both sides of the campaign should be preserved for use in future research, exhibitions and learning. 

This research project aims to develop the activities of the network, supporting the development of protocols for ‘rapid response’ collecting related to women's health and consolidating and expanding research on reproductive rights, archiving and activism.