Archives, Criticism, and Care: Tending to Archival Work in the Rhetoric of Health & Medicine

This essay centers care as a generative methodological orientation for feminist rhetorical historians working in medical archives. Moving beyond archival research that prioritizes recovery, the authors outline how caring for the materials housed in medical archives shifts focus to the ideological and institutional infrastructures that shape how rhetorical histories of health and medicine are preserved and produced. Through theoretically informed mediations on their respective work in polio and AIDS archives, the authors illustrate how seemingly mundane archival practices can significantly impact how researchers engage with historical materials and the stories they tell. This essay encourages RHM scholars to develop a more nuanced understanding of how archives shape and constrain historical narratives by foregrounding care as an intellectual, embodied, and sensuous mode of engagement. Ultimately, the authors argue that caring for medical archives requires a commitment to understanding and addressing the transhistorical forces that continue to marginalize and silence marginalized commu-nities.