Atria, institute for gender equality and women’s history

Atria wants to connect women’s history and information on women and gender, with policy, topical matters and politics. Atria was established in 2012, after a merger between Aletta, institute for women’s history and E-Quality, Information centre for gender, family and diversity issues. On 28 January 2013, Atria was launched at the venue ‘Rode Hoed’ in Amsterdam.

Atria houses one of the oldest collections on women and gender world-wide, and documents and preserves women’s history. Placing issues in an historical perspective makes the institute unique. The department of Collections manages and preserves an extensive archive with, amongst others, material from various women’s organizations, diaries and audio-visual material. Atria manages more than 600 different archives of individuals and organizations. The oldest of these archives, date from around 1870, while new archives are being added regularly. All in all, the collection contains more than 1200 meters of shelf space dedicated to archive materials.

You can find information on the various archives using the integrated search engine on the website. The inventory for each archive will tell you more about what can be found within that archive.

Francisca de Haan, "A 'Truly International' Archive for the Women's Movement (IAV, now IIAV): From its Foundation in Amsterdam in 1935 to the Return of its Looted Archives in 2003", Journal of Women's History, Volume 16, Number 4, Winter 2004, pp. 148-172.