Archival science encompasses the theory, methods, practice and analysis of the safe storage, cataloging and accession of materials. Its history has been primarily concerned with preservation and safe handling of documents as well as measuring and reporting the provenance of documents to assure their reliability and authenticity. With the advent of digital documents the science has taken on an expansion of each of its process parts. Duranti[i] and Gilliland-Swetland[ii] refer to an archival paradigm. Interestingly, the former suggests that the science has experienced a paradigm shift, where as the latter presents a strong case that the paradigm remains intact and has only taken on new opportunities. In this paper a few of their key thoughts will be discussed leading to a conclusion that semantics aside, the science has undergone significant evolution leading to the ultimate adoption of principles from multiple disciplines of information science to emerge as an all-encompassing system to support the proper archiving of documents, electronic and otherwise.
In Duranti’s description of archival science as a system, she proposes that all the system parts must function together (theory, methodology, practice, and scholarship) to achieve a clear objective. When one part of the system is changed, then the whole system can be considered changed. Galliland-Swetland identifies the newest iteration of the science’s functional requirements to be an amalgamation of process requirements from various disciplines (librarians, archivists, curators, preservationists, technical information specialists, and information systems and museum professionals) encouraging each community to be conversant with the practices and principles of each of the other communities. In the articles, each author in her own way is supporting the concept that archival science is dealing with more than mere information. It is a discipline and a profession that deals with knowledge. It is further posited that archivists should be engaged at the original development of knowledge and that engagement should carry on right through the long-range preservation of knowledge for future users. Archival science is preserving the story of knowledge development in order to save the context. Awareness and understanding of that context help to fully appreciate the knowledge and how it was created, and perhaps even its future uses. With that in mind, the sooner the archivist is brought into the process of knowledge creation and information handling, the better the preservation of that knowledge, since its ultimate storage and uses can be anticipated from the start.
The articles cite a number of studies and projects which have tackled the issues of collaboration between disciplines, specifically in confronting new challenges in dealing with electronic documents and their preservation. Several of those projects, such as the Preservation of the Integrity of Electronic Records research project at the University of British Columbia (UBC Project) and its follow-on project InterPARES (International Research on Permanent Authentic Records in Electronic Systems), set out to address the archivists’ challenges with records created or stored in electronic systems. These and other international committees and project teams, formulated in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s, studied specific digital document problems and made recommendations on how the archival science community should deal with and solve these new challenges. Duranti was a part of the two projects specifically mentioned here and edited the final reports and recommendations. The InterPARES project[iii] is important for many reasons, not the least being its decidedly international flavor and thus the encouragement of archivists around the world to adopt strategies and methodologies that will best preserve the world’s knowledge and the future knowledge that will be developed in new formats and environments. Galliland-Swetland reviews the experiences and contributions of these projects and many other contributors from the archival community. Their findings and recommendations for preserving the documentary heritage of records, regardless of their format, are presented and analyzed.
Further, it is suggested that projects undertaking the development of future electronic systems should acquire and maintain a vision of this integration of multiple disciplinary theories and methodologies. It is deemed important for the future of archival science to become a part of such development efforts. For example, on pages 24 and 25 of Galliland-Swetland’s report, the author poses several questions about metadata after stating the need for identifying the “tensions between the rich and complex metadata sets that individual communities have developed”. With more and more non-specialists using digital archives the need for simpler metadata sets seems apparent. An example or two of real case implementations as a response to this need are described by the author. The first cited case is the use of a new archival descriptive standard in the United States called Encoded Archival Description (EAD), which can be a more flexible metadata infrastructure, and which is capable of supporting information retrieval and display without compromising any archival objectives. The second example given is SPIRT, a recordkeeping metadata standards project conducted in Australia. SPIRT has had success in integrating standardized metadata schemes into record keeping systems and retaining support of archival uses as well.
Based on the evidence of such cases and the findings of the reports in general, the authors suggest that archival science must become more collaborative now and in the future than it has been in the past in order to more fully inculcate the theories and practices of archival science into the process of knowledge creation and long-range handling of knowledge documents and document storage. Some questions to consider for class discussion are:
1) Why hasn’t there been more collaboration in the past? What is it about electronic documents or the current environment that suddenly caused awareness of this need, or at least willingness to address it?
2) How best can archivists approach this challenge and garner the invitation to be involved in the knowledge creation process at the outset, instead of when it may be too late? How can a more holistic view be instilled in all knowledge and information workers to enable adoption of the collaboration principles espoused by the Galiland-Swetland and Duranti articles and reports?
3) Who will be best positioned to bring the various disciplines together, especially those outside the realm of information science (i.e. computer science)? Will it be archival scientists, computer scientists, or some other group?
Taken together, these articles provide an outline of a number of steps that, to some extent at least, have already been implemented and that should be widely adopted in order to continue the evolving process of establishing guidelines and rules for the work of archivists when dealing with all types of documents, including the newest formats and those yet to be developed.
The goals of the projects and committees cited in the articles include a refinement of the archival rules and models so as to eliminate duplication and to bring into the field many good practices, theories and models from other disciplines that strengthen the archival process. The system of archival science needs the adoption of outside models and theories to enrich and modernize its own processes. The other disciplines are also enhanced when their theories and methodologies adopt a keen awareness of the principles of archival science. In this way, the archival principles of reliability, authenticity, provenance and transparency are maintained in a changing environment that continually introduces new knowledge creation technologies and also produces new document formats.
Notes:
[i] Duranti, Luciana (2001). "The Impact of Digital Technology on Archival Science" in Archival Science 1(1), pp. 39-55.
[ii] Gilliland-Swetland, Anne J. (Feb. 2000). “Enduring Paradigm, New Opportunities: The Value of the Archival Perspective in the Digital Environment”. Council on Library & Information Resources, Washington D.C. http://www.clir.org/pubs/reports/pub89/pub89.pdf
[iii] The InterPARES Project (2001). The Long-term Preservation of Authentic Electronic Records: Findings of the InterPARES Project. http://www.interpares.org/book/index.cfm
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