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This paper aims to investigate the role of documentary editions in supporting the development of historical collections in libraries, their function as evidential and informational objects and considerations for their evaluation in collection development. Framed as objects possessing bibliographic and archival characteristics, attention is given to the evaluative challenges these objects present during collection development.

This paper provides an archival and bibliographic analysis of documentary editions through examining and discussing their archival and bibliographic elements. Consideration is given to how these elements are expressed as information and evidence, how they operate as scholarly and archive-like objects and how they acquire value as collected objects. This approach clarifies the informational and evidential characteristics of these works, offering a framework for their evaluation in libraries.

Documentary editions possess archival and bibliographic characteristics, requiring that evaluators critique the scholarly value and archival integrity of their content. This has implications for the curation of archival objects in library collections, where library and archival expertise can support a more nuanced assessment of these works.

The blurred documentary character of these works has been identified by scholars (Cox, 1991). This paper presents evaluative considerations. Here, these characteristics are clarified, and an approach for evaluating these works is offered.

This paper aims to provide a more comprehensive understanding of the concept of community archives, offering a critique of the community archives discourse through a historical case study focused on the origins of the Gerber/Hart LGBTQ library and archives in Chicago.

This study explores the archival collections of the founders of the Gerber/Hart library and archives and the librarians that have worked there as a means for understanding the origins of the archival impulse, the rationale for building the collections and the practices that shaped the collections during the first decade of the organization’s history.

The historical analysis of the Gerber/Hart library and archives situates community archives and LGBTQ collections within the broader historical context that lead to the founding of the organization and reveals deep connections to the information professions not previously considered by those studying community archives.

The paper offers a reconceptualization of community archives as archival projects initiated, controlled and maintained by the members of a self-defined community. The authors emphasize the role of the archival impulse or the historical origins of the collection and the necessity for full-community control, setting clear boundaries between community archives and other participatory archival models that engage the community.

In the decades since the founding of the Society of American Archivists (SAA) in 1938, the array of functions considered core to archival work have grown and evolved. In the early years of SAA, the profession was largely focused on issues of collection maintenance, heavily emphasizing preservation as the fundamental mission of the archivist. Yet, at this time, there were archivists calling on their colleagues to engage with audiences outside of the archival reading room. It was not until the social history movements in the 1970s, however, that discussions of outreach as a core function of the archivist's work took hold in the profession. From the 1970s and moving through to today, outreach and proactive engagement with external communities has moved from a peripheral activity of the archivist to one seen as essential to the overall success of an archival program. In this chapter, we examine the evolving discourse surrounding outreach and engagement activities by archivists, focusing on how outreach has been discussed in professional literature. We also explore ways in which this shift in professional perspective is reflected in the work done today by archivists at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.

The topic of personal archives has mainly been discussed by two research traditions in information science: archives and records management, and personal information management. The purpose of this paper is to compare a corpus of the archival literature written by the archival community with the concepts and challenges posed by Catherine Marshall, who exemplifies the personal information management approach. Many of the personal digital archiving challenges that Marshall identifies are related to discussions within the archival community.

In order to demonstrate the similarities between Marshall's work with the archival discussion about personal archiving, Marshall's challenges, tasks and attributes of personal digital archiving were compared with a total of 33 articles from two library and information science databases.

Many of the personal digital archiving challenges that Marshall identifies are related to discussions in the archival community. The author suggests that certain aspects of the archival literature may be utilized to address Marshall's identified challenges. Lastly, future collaborations between members of the archival community and members of the personal information management community may prove useful in addressing the challenges of personal digital archiving

The paper demonstrates that two areas of information science share ideas about how to address the issues related to personal archives, but rarely consult one another when writing about personal digital archiving. The author highlights the archives and records management tradition in an attempt to introduce the literature to the broader discussion on personal digital archives being had by the personal information management tradition.

This paper aims to explore definitions and notions of what a community archive is, and the tensions between different understandings of community archives.

The paper is a critical analysis of community archives definitions and understanding from researchers and practitioners across the wider heritage information sector.

Community archives are a growing area of interest for researchers because of the archives’ intrinsic link to the community and their provision of the evidence of it. While discussion often focuses on a paradigm of transformative purpose, existing definitions around community archives continue to be tenuous, reflecting different real or perceived types and practices and the perspective of the author and the sector they work within. Variations in definition can also occur because of differences in perspective around theory and practice, with many practitioner-based definitions intrinsically bound with the community they represent. This can result in community archives being defined as “alternative” based on mainstream practice or “political” based on theoretical purview, or “meeting the needs of community” by the community archivists themselves.

The paper is conceptual and does not attempt to provide one definition that covers the perceived extent of community archives. It is part of work in progress on the nature of community archives and the impact such discourse may have on archival theory and practice.

This paper provides an overview of some of the key issues and themes impacting a definition of community archives, and in doing so works towards a broader understanding the nature of community archives. In most cases, the concept of “community” seems to provide a common definitive element and practitioner definitions focus on addressing the needs of self-defined community to a greater or lesser extent.

In the future, library applications related to traditional functions may increasingly assume some of the roles and characteristics of archives and museums. In this article, the author describes fundamental archival concepts and theories and their evolution in recent times. Basic archival functions—appraisal, arrangement, description, reference, preservation, and publication—are also introduced. Finally, early applications of automation to archives (including SPINDEX, NARS‐5, NARS‐A‐1, MARC AMC, presNET, CTRACK, PHOTO, and DIARY) and automation trends for the future are discussed. The article presents a cogent introduction to archival operations, thereby providing 1) a basis for understanding distinctions between current archival and library practices and 2) insight concerning the possible convergence of selected roles and functions.

The PICCH research project contributes to opening a dialogue between cultural heritage archives and users. Hence, the users are identified and their information needs, the search strategies they apply and the search challenges they experience are uncovered.

A combination of questionnaires and interviews is used for collection of data. Questionnaire data were collected from users of three different audiovisual archives. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with two user groups: (1) scholars searching information for research projects and (2) archivists who perform their own scholarly work and search information on behalf of others.

The questionnaire results show that the archive users mainly have an academic background. Hence, scholars and archivists constitute the target group for in-depth interviews. The interviews reveal that their information needs are multi-faceted and match the information need typology by Ingwersen. The scholars mainly apply collection-specific search strategies but have in common primarily doing keyword searching, which they typically plan in advance. The archivists do less planning owing to their knowledge of the collections. All interviewees demonstrate domain knowledge, archival intelligence and artefactual literacy in their use and mastering of the archives. The search challenges they experience can be characterised as search system complexity challenges, material challenges and metadata challenges.

The paper provides a rare insight into the complexity of the search situation of cultural heritage archives, and the users’ multi-facetted information needs and hence contributes to the dialogue between the archives and the users.

This paper aims to assess the role of archives in documenting African National Congress Women’s League (ANCWL) records on the liberation struggle of South Africa from 1960 to 1990 with a view to recommending the best method of collection and preservation of archival materials.

Qualitative data were collected through interviews with purposively selected employees of the African National Congress (ANC), the Nelson Mandela Foundation centre of memory, the national heritage and cultural studies at the University of Fort Hare, the National Archives of South Africa and provincial archives of South Africa. Interview data were augmented through content analysis of ANC documents such as policies, websites and annual reports.

The study found a gap of documentation of the role of archives in documenting ANCWL’s contribution to the liberation of South Africa. The National Archives of South Africa did not play a meaningful role to document the history of African National Women’s League in the liberation struggle of South Africa. There was also a lack of coordination of community archives that keep ANCWL archives materials. There is a need to embark on oral history and bilateral relations with overseas archival institutions to repatriate ANCWL archives to South Africa. Furthermore, contemporary history records about the ANCWL records need to be listed, arranged and described and made available to the public.

The research is limited to the role played by the National Archives of South Africa and community archives such as the ANC archives, the Mayibuye Centre archives based at the University of Western Cape in documenting ANC and ANCWL and contemporary issues that impact the development of ANCWL records created from 1960 to 1990.

The findings are expected to be instrumental to document the history of women’s struggle for democracy in South Africa. The ANCWL collection may contribute to social cohesion to enable society to understand the role of ANCWL during the struggle for democracy in South Africa. While the literature on women’s archives is limited, there is still much research that needs to be conducted. Increasing the body of research will strengthen understanding of the role of the National Archives of South Africa and community archives on documenting women’s liberation struggle in South Africa.

The document of women’s history would enrich the archival collection. This means that records with historical, cultural and social significance will be permanently preserved by archives.

The research appears to be the first of its kind to assess the documentation on the role of archives on documenting ANCWL. The archival heritage of women’s struggle for democracy forms part of the national archival heritage of South Africa as they bridge the gap of undocumented history of South Africa.

User‐based evaluation in archives and special collections is in its infancy, and this paper aims to discuss the conceptualization, development, and testing of Archival Metrics Toolkits. The development and adoption of standardized metrics to support the management of both analog and digital collections is a critical need in archives and manuscript collections.

The Archival Metrics Toolkits were created, and comprised five user‐based evaluation instruments for archives and special collections in colleges and universities: researcher, archival web sites, online finding aids, student researchers, and teaching support.

The Archival Metrics Toolkits, as developed, represent a first step toward standardized evaluation created specifically for archives. Now it is up to the community to adopt these tools and report their use.

These are the first standardized questionnaires to target archives and special collections and take into consideration the unique environment of primary sources and the specific dynamics involved in connecting researchers with archival and manuscript collections.

This paper aims to explore the opportunities and challenges that immersive virtual reality (VR) technologies pose for archival theory and practice.

This conceptual paper reviews research on VR adoption in information institutions and the preservation challenges of VR to identify ways in which VR has the potential to disrupt existing archival theory and practice.

Existing archival approaches are found to be disrupted by the multi-layered structural characteristics of VR, the part–whole relationships between the technological elements of VR environments and the three-dimensional content they contain and the immersive, experiential nature of VR experiences. This paper argues that drawing on perspectives from phenomenology and digital materiality is helpful for addressing the preservation challenges of VR.

The findings extend conceptualizations of preservation by identifying gaps in existing preservation approaches to VR and stressing the importance of “experience” as a central element of archival practice and by emphasizing the embodied dimensions of interpreting archival records and the multiple scales of materiality that archival researchers and practitioners should consider to preserve VR.

These findings provide guidance for digital curators and preservationists by outlining the current thinking on VR preservation and the impact of VR on digital preservation strategies.

This paper gives new insight into VR as an emerging area of concern to digital curation and preservation and expands archival thinking with new conceptualizations that disrupt existing paradigms.