I know journalism reports on what is actually happening, but I was wondering what role and practices do historias have when an event is over, in order to document it without much time passing afterwards.
My curiosity was sparked because of posts and answers that have dealt with the passing of time from events happening, to historic sources documenting them long aftwerward. I know current technology allows for a lot of information to be kept with redundancy, but it still a lot to handle and also probably a lot of useless/biased/false information in there.
I'm also curious because a lot of questions deal with long time ago things.
Also as a follow-up, how long is usually considered the enough minimum (if there is any) after an event to consider it finally over and studied by historians (don't know if it's even a correct question to ask or if this comes from personal misconceptions), without risk of it or its direct aftermath be something that is still going on?
These questions are asked all the time by historians themselves. It's a whole debate.
First question: There is a digital turn happening right now. Before data was always kept in physical archives, but now because a lot of data is created online, a new system needs to develop very quickly. Sites as a whole (forums, eventsites, governmental sites) can be archived. This happens for some, especially when historians are involved in the making.
But a lot of other data will still be lost. The biggest difference with physical data is that there is endless space available for digital data and it won't be subject to things like decay. BUT it can be removed at any time, sites can be taken off air, articles can be deleted etc. There is more security but no certainty basically.
The other big thing is how to handle Big Data. Internet gives the ability to make huge online databases. This happened for newspapers for example, they are archived and digitalised in massive numbers. But what to do with millions of articles etc. You cannot possibly research that, the way you do normal archival research. So now you need to either sample data instead of look through ALL of it, or you have to trust algorithms which is a whole other big thing.
In conclusion; historians/archivists can now store WAY more recent data, in a more unbiased way (they don't have to chose, they can just preserve everything). Big downside of it: how to change research to fit Big Data but still keep the integrity of the historian.
second question; there is also a big debate about this and it changes per country. The main gest is, periodisation is a made-up construct. We can say the Middle Ages ended in 1500, but it's just so we can make a study object out of it, it's not historic reality. So the historian decides when something is 'over'. Some argue this is not true and there is a historic reality, and we need to wait until there is temporal distance before we can study something (Leopold Von Ranke). But that's an outdated view.
In the recent postmodern trend it is decided that history is NEVER over basically. It always plays part in the present, or can come back up at any time. So there is no use in 'waiting', you will never be objective anyway. You can study anything as long as you recognize and explain your subjectivity.
I agree with the last thing, but then again I'm doing research on shift to third generation Holocaust memory, which is literally happening right now.
I have way more to say about this but don't want to make the reply longer than it already is. If you have any followup questions or want recommendations on articles to read, let me know :)