Final Thoughts....Role of an Archivist

"[The archivist] exists in order to make other people's work possible, unknown people for the most part and working very possibly on lines equally unknown to him: some of them perhaps in the quite distant future and upon lines as yet unpredictable. His Creed, the Sanctity of Evidence; his Task, the Conservation of every scrap of Evidence attaching to the Documents committed to his charge; his Aim, to provide, without prejudice or afterthought, for all who wish to know the Means of Knowledge." (Jenkins, 1948). I loved this quote about archiving.

Over the past two months, my role has been to demonstrate the role of archiving on this blog. I learned a lot along the way and hope that you did too! I appreciate all who have visited this blog and commented. For my final entry, I have created my model of archiving. I wonder if anyone will archive this blog?

Jenkins, J. (1948) The societal role of archives. Retrieved April 14, 2008, from

http://www.clir.org/pubs/reports/pub89/role.html

Let's Hear It for the Pack Rats!

I was in the airport returing from my vacation and I overheard an interesting conversation. A woman was trying to loan her friend a video (VHS) tape of her wedding to watch. The friend laughed and told her that she no longer had a VCR, she donated it years ago and now she could only view DVD's. The first woman said she is a pack rat and saves everything. She even had some old 45's. Wow, how quickly things become obsolete. I realized that I no longer own a VCR either and I have a whole box of VHS tapes in the attic that I wouldn't be able to see. I know I could (and should) have them transfered to DVD, but I never seem to get around to it. I wish my grandparents had taken the time to transfer their reel movies to another format. This made me think about archivers and how useful pack rats could be to them. Sometimes things change very quickly and before you realize it they are gone. I am sure archivist are thankful for the pack rats of our society. It gives them one more opportunity to find and perserve items before they are gone forever. Are you a pack rat? Don't worry about the clutter, you could actually be providing a valuable service!

Majority Loses

Another poll has closed and thanks to all who have voted. In this case, the majority lost. According to the National Archives, "Of all documents and materials created in the course of business conducted by the Federal Government, only 1%-3% are so important for legal or historical reasons that they are kept by us forever." (National Archives, 2008). Frankly, I was really surprised with this statistic. As mentioned in a previous post, the National Archive contains over 6 billion pieces of paper in the Washington archive alone. Think about all the billions of pieces of paper that didn't make the cut. What an overwhelming job the archivist must have deciding what to keep! I thought about this in terms of my own personal office. How much paper do I personally archive? Are my documents really more important than those generated by the government? Do I need to save more than 1%-3% for legal or other purposes? I decided, probably not. So, off to purge I go. If the national archivist can do it, so can I. Can you?

National Archives. (2008). About the National Archives. Retrived on April 10, 2008, from http://www.archives.gov/about/

A Model of Archiving

According to the Dictionary.com, an archivist is "a person responsible for preserving, organizing, or servicing archival material." (Random House, 2006). Archivist work in many fields, not just libraries. Above is a model for an archivist working in the pharaceutical industry (Biomedical Central, 2008). This is just one example. Does anyone else have another example? If so, please post and let me know.

Archivist. (2008). Random House unabridged dictionary. Dictionary.com. Retrieved March 30, 2008 from http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/archivist

Unknown. (2008). Role of an archivist. Retrieved March 30, 2008 from http://www.biomedcentral.com/content/download/figures/1472-6939-7-4-1.PDF

The National Archives

According to our recent poll, the visitors to our web site support a national archive program. Fortunately, we have one located in Washington D.C. It is called the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA). NARA is open to the public and includes "...essential evidence that documents the rights of American citizens, the actions of Federal officials, and the national experience from the nation's beginning in 1774." (NARA, 2008). It includes the Declaration of Independence, Consitution, Bill of Rights, military and Presidential records, geneology information, maps and photos. There are over 6 billion pieces of paper archived in the Washington D.C. branch. NARA was established in 1934 in Washington, D.C. and there are an additional 22 regional locations throughout the United States. In addition, NARA operates the 12 Presidential libraries. The Presidential Records Act of 1978 requires all President and Vice Presdient records to become public records. The NARA maintains these records and releases them according to the predetermined schedule. I have never visited the National Archives but found their website very informative. Has anyone visted the archive? If so, please post. If not, feel free to visit their web site http://www.archives.gov/and let me know what you think.

NARA. (2008). National archives and records fact sheet. National Archives. Retrieved on March 28, 2008, from http://www.archives.gov/press/factsheet.html

An Archive of Terminology

Archiving, like many professions, utilizes many technical terms. Below is a small sampling on common terms and their generally accepted definitions. Feel free to reference this list while reading post on archiving.

ACCESSION
(v.) To transfer physical and legal custody of documentary materials to an archival institution.
(n.) Materials transferred to an archival institution in a single accessioning action (Daniels, 1984)

ARTIFICIAL COLLECTION
n. A collection of materials with different provenance assembled and organized to facilitate its management or use (Pearce-Moses, 2005).

DISPOSITION
The final action that puts into effect the results of an appraisal decision for a series of records. Transfer to an archival institution, transfer to a records center, and destruction are among possible dispositions (Daniels, 1984).

INFORMATIONAL VALUE
The value of records or papers for information they contain on persons, places, subjects, and things other than the operation of the organization that created them or the activities of the individual or family that created them (Daniels, 1984).

ORGANIC COLLECTION
n. A body of records that grows as the result of the routine activities of its creator( Pearse-Moses, 2005).

ORIGINAL ORDER
The archival principle that records should be maintained in the order in which they were placed by the organization, individual, or family that created them (Daniels, 1984).

REPOSITORY
n. A place where things can be stored and maintained; a storehouse (Pearse-Moses, 2005)

Daniels, M. (1984). Introduction to archival terminology. Archives Library Information Center. Retrieved on March 6, 2008 from http://www.archives.gov/research/alic/reference/archives-resources/terminology.html

Pearse-Moses, R. (2005). A glossary of archival and records terminology. The Society of American Archivist Glossary. Retrieved on March 6, 2008 from http://www.archivists.org/glossary/index.asp

Please comment on additional words you would like to see added to our archive.

To digitally archive or not....that is the question.

An archivist job has changed significantly over the last few decades. The biggest change has been the issue of archiving data that was originally created as digital medium; this includes websites, satellite images, digital recordings. The problem with this information is that it has shorter lifespans and is limited by technology constraints (Hodge, 2000). How many times have you found a great website and went back a month, a week, or even a day later to find it gone? Have you ever purchased software or computer games that no longer work with your new hardware? These are some of the issues archivist face everyday.
The International Council for Scientific and Technical Information (ICSTI) formed a committee to develop a model for digital archiving (Hodge,2000). The study focused on when, where, why, and how to best archive digital material. The group consisted of members from various countries and disciplines.
The job of an archivist really begins at the very beginning. If not, the item may not be available when an archivist wants it. The group suggested that the creator of the information should recommend the lifespan of the information (Hodge,2000). Who better to understand if information is necessary in the long run than the creator. For example, I write a weekly shopping list and toss it after I finish shopping. I don't feel it is necessary to archive this list. On the contrary, I keep a monthly budget. I archive each budget so I can analyze it at year end and make future projections. Having created the information, I know its usefulness.
Even if everyone thought everything should be archived, it would be virtually (no pun intended) impossible to do so. The archivist must still decide what is appropriate and necessary to archive.
In the case of websites, how much of the site do you archive? Do you archive the links to the site? The possibilities are endless, which makes the archivist job more difficult.
Once an archivist decides what to archive, the job is only half-done. At this point, several issues come into play: copyrights, cataloguing, and meta data (Hodge,2000).
Finally, the archivist has to think about access. Who and how will this be accomplished? It sounds exhausting to me. What do you think?

Hodge, G. (2000, January). Best practices for digital archiving. D-Lib Magazine, 6(1). Retrieved March 5, 2008, from http://www.dlib.org/dlib/january00/01hodge.html