Sometimes I wonder what's going to happen to our field when this recession is over. As it stands today, its generally accepted that the problem comes from several circumstances coming together at one point in time and space. We're experiencing a poor economy, funds are limited and when funds get limited, archives and libraries are the first to get the axe. Its already happened all over the place. The doors have closed, the records shipped off site, and the budget will no longer turn its gaze towards finding a curator to provide access, preservation, acquisition or any other procedures. For those that haven't yet closed, its only a matter of time.

There are still countless archival collections out there that are being run by a mighty staff of one - and that mighty singular intelligent identity has been fighting to maintain their mighty, underfunded projects for many years. When the time comes that this mighty singularity finally retires (because let's face it, who's jumping at the chance to retire in a recession?), the hosting organization will sense the loss at its greatest in the form of no longer having to listen to strong, articulated and compelling arguments as to why the funding must continue to be allocated for this particular resource of unique documents or unique collection of published material. And when they no longer have to face that argument, they will decide its best for everyone to close the doors and save some money.

There are a lot of qualified professionals in our field that are out of work. Many conversations I've had end with "one day, they'll retire and then we'll get our chance." I wonder how wrong that statement is. I wonder what will happen to all of these records and publications. In the next 3 years the economy will swing back upwards (we hope) and kudos to those of us who are employed when it does. But if we're all employed in the manner we expect because its the manner that has been handed down from the last living, intelligent, singular archivist or librarian - I'll eat my shoe.

What happens to all of these research materials when the budgets are finally cut? More importantly, how does this impact the future of research? There are those of us already discussing the Digital Dark Age, but what about the Analog Dark Age - the period when vast quantities of information were lost unto the knowing world not because of technological failure, but because of society's lack of dedication of the concept of memory, accountability, lineage? How will historians look back upon our time in 100 years? In 500? How will they quantify what's lost and the impact it has on what they will consider contemporary research?

Characteristics of a Pornographic Record

A record who's function is defined by its owner. Unlike a birth certificate, which remains a certificate of one individuals birth regardless of who owns it. A newspaper is the same in that regardless of who owns a particular printing of a newspaper, it is by definition a newspaper and nothing more. A map, is a map, regardless of who's holding it, and whether they're holding it right side up.

Conversely, moving images with sound depicting two people engaged in a game of Twister while clothed in only their birthday suits can have very different functions. If this film is under the ownership of a film-maker, it is regarded as art. If it is under the ownership of a collector of films that portray naked people doing, well, anything, then its a pornographic record. A still image of a woman's genitalia is a medical record when it is an official record of the placement of freckles on a humans body and it is owned by a dermatologists office. That same picture owned by John Q Public, is a pornographic record. I don't have to detail the difference between images of young children that are owned by their parents versus adults who are not in any way related to the child; the function of records which have the potential to be labeled as pornographic changes the classification f the record itself as the owner of that record changes.

The implication is that the act of recording sexual activity, sexual body parts or the naked human form is not what is devious; it is the ownership of such material which implies an inherent devious behaviour. Thus is it also implied that those persons participating in the act of creating pornographic records are not as devious as those owning those same records? And if those participants are not the devious record makers, is this not a source of support to the argument that pornographic records are just as valuable as any other recorded unit of information which is bestowed with the proud title of a "record", and thus, worthy of archival processing?

Cross-blogging with Loculamenta.

It has been graciously pointed out that my last post regarding the Grateful Dead collection at UCSC may have been barking up the wrong tree. In part, this is due to the relatively small amount of audio material that is contained in the acquisition in question; the bulk of the collection appears to be paper based. Ok, I can live with that. My questions regarding the digitization facilities still stand, but that's more attributable to my over-protective audio-visual archival tendencies than UCSC's own in-house capabilities.

Still there is something bugging me: this "social component." Does an academic institution have any place meddling in the world of open-source tagging? Again, I'm jumping ahead, but I'm comparing the type of social component that is supported by projects like Steve.Museum. I would argue this method works well for orphaned museum artifacts, but does this method suitably fit the academic institution's model for housing (and making available to researchers) archival material.

In a nutshell, is not the penultimate difference between museums and archives the genesis of the concept of context and provenance? In museums, artifacts re-discover old and new contexts in exhibitions; in archives context and provenance are carefully guarded against the affects of entropy through the maintenance of intellectual control. Where does social tagging fit into intellectual control? Or does it not, instead only finding a suitable fit in the realm of access? If the later is the case, then are we not at risk of repeating a pattern that we have already condemned as a "no-no": when digitization projects became so prevalent, the original argument from the profession was that these projects should be supported as a means of alternate access. The practicality of that notion having been shot down, the new method is to use digitization as a means to support preservation and thus access as well.

I'm all for getting the public involved in the "behind the scenes" of archives especially because any chance to get the public interested in archival material, research, history, culture... the list goes on. But if the cost is potentially alienating certain documents or items while others' status is raised over the rest, then the entire exercise is counter to traditional archival methodologies. I don't see how this could be beneficial in the long run.

The Grateful Dead Rise Again

Cross blogging with Loculamenta.

(Author's note: Alex, can you post some of the links to the original announcements re: this collection and its funding donation? See the comments to my previous post on this subject for the reason why).

User populations and policing of content are always of paramount importance to an archive, because if only for the most simplistic of purposes, your users and your content are why you exist, and why you will continue to exist. If you don't support your user's needs or appropriately manage your content, your archive will cease to function, and soon cease to exist. But getting to the point where we can focus on user populations and the policing of user-updated content skips over a few key steps in the process of digitizing any cultural artifact, whether for preservation or access (or ideally both!).

I'm curious if the questions that guide the first analysis of the Grateful Dead funding and digitization project should be focused more on ... well, the digitization!

The problem with this kind of simplified approach is that it is at risk of cutting out the sexy social component, which is pretty much the buzz word (or phrase?) in the profession right now. But I wonder, with approximately 1.25 million dollars available and backing a name like the Grateful Dead, to what extent should this particular user group have an increased social component, particularly when discussed within the context of the rest of UCSC’s holdings? For example, I was curious what kind of audio preservation resources are available at UCSC already; operating under the assumption that the facilities must in some way exist for this material to be properly and best handled at this specific institution (else, why wouldn’t this material have gone to Stanford?) I did a basic Google search using the words “audio”, “preservation” and “UCSC.” Not only is there no facility that comes up within the first three pages of Google’s produced results (which is farther than your normal Google search-user will look), but the first link that shows up was this article: "UCSC receives gift of rare audio interviews and photos of late '60s jazz and rock icons".

Considering that both collections are liable to house un-published information on a variety of overlapping themes, issues, concepts, people and events (to name a few!), my immediate reaction to this is: Why shouldn’t some of this funding include bolstering access for both collections? Wouldn’t this constitute a social component? When we look at the “social component” and we skip right to our users as a primary source of key information, I argue that we are not only taking the professional responsibilities out of our own hands, but we are de-valuing those professional responsibilities we have on a broadly reaching scale.

I say “kudos!” to UCSC for getting an un-thinkable amount of funding to handle one collection; but you now want me to agree that a critical part of this funding must be dedicated to an un-controlled, un-known, un-attached “social component” that will in no way directly link to any of the rest of the institution’s mandated responsibilities? Good luck with that.

My searches so far have yielded very little information on the actual facilities available for audio preservation of original recordings into digital format. I am aware the UCSB has some formidable audio preservation resources, but I am also aware that these resources are largely dedicated to wax cylinders and vinyl discs, and I doubt that many of the Grateful Dead recordings were ever done on wax; though a large portion was likely recorded to vinyl. If you're outside the business, then you'd assume that the two UC campuses would work together on this - lending the resources of one lab to the collection resources of another archive. You would assume wrongly, for two important reasons: 1) Academic environments in the public sphere are always under-funded and over-worked - if the money isn't going to UCSB, then UCSB isn't about to take on the risk of wear and tear on their machines for records that they will not be owning; 2) archival material does not travel off-site! EVER!

This means that the entire collection will arrive to UCSC and sit there, awaiting the proper machines to not only digitize, but to playback the original records. The field of audio recordings is arguably more complex than that of moving images (ok, I mostly just make this statement to piss off the film buffs out there that are paying attention. Kudos, you're paying attention. Now accept that audio records are just as if not more unique than your own precious film holdings.). Take for example the Harvard Audio Preservation Studio. Their listing of equipment is nice to see, but its far from extensive. The University of Toronto's Media Archive boasts a similar listing of equipment on their site; again it is far from complete. Part of the budget for each of these institutions must include continual efforts to purchase playback machines which will properly play audio recordings (failure to use proper playback equipment of any audio-visual record will result in the destruction of the content and/or physical record, which is counter-productive in the most primitive of situations).

Throughout all of this, the point I’m trying to make is: how do we look at this “social component” realistically? Do we apply the concerns for a social component only to one collection? Now that the collection is officially an acquisition, I want to know that its existence will be in harmony with the rest of the institution’s holdings, instead of its existence being paramount to all of the holdings (and the resources dedicated to them) that came before it. To be sure, if it weren’t for the institution’s pre-existing collections and their collection mandate, then this new acquisition for UCSC would have had no archival social component that would have brought it under their management in the first place.

Canadian Pop Culture as a matter of historical record

The University of Toronto's Media Commons' Archive is Canada's home for popular culture and mass-media archival records and documents; everything from television and film productions, journalists and great journalistic achievements, recording studios and rare vinyl records, media production companies, advertising companies and prolific members of this vast Canadian media culture are all represented there in one form or another.

To my understanding, there have been a few direct influences that have come from the archival and cultural fabric of Canada which can be identified as the reason this archive exists at all. The proliferation of a/v records and documents (which is inherent to the nature of a/v materials) coupled with technology's endless appetite for discovering the next market-swaying recording format, has resulted in archival collections which are physically large with respect to box count or surviving record. Sadly, there is never enough room to house this material indefinitely; especially when the statistics on access are less than ideal.

The Canadian government has slowed its acquisitions to a near standstill, while in the meantime, Canadian popular culture is still producing valuable, culturally-reflective products. The CBC as well has moved away from long-term storage of original a/v document formats: their current goal is to digitize everything they can in their storage in order to reduce its size, and ultimately the rent they are paying (or inversely to regain their own precious real estate which is dedicated to helping old archival records collect dust).

The Media Commons' Archive is actively going after archival material, but their real estate can't last forever. In the meantime, there are one or two collections which come to mind as fitting nowhere in any of the preceding collecting (or digitizing and destroying) mandates. These collections would be those that are not old enough to be considered historically or culturally significant; archival materials generally have to be at the very least 3-5 years old before they can be assessed to have significant, lasting impact on Canadian culture. There are also those collections which fall between the collection mandate cracks because they are in part produced by CBC, which is government funded (and we've already discussed the current situation there), or by American broadcasting/production/distribution companies, such as Show Time.

In the meantime, valuable collections are ... where? That's really the crux of the problem, isn't it? Media magnates are highly incestuous: pre-distribution copies of productions in whole or part are frequently passed around between companies for a variety of reasons, resulting in the existence of these documents in disparate ways and numbers, sprinkled throughout Canadian recorded history. But where are the bulk of these collections that parented these odd orphaned records? And what are the plans of those who currently are responsible for those records?

The two collections I have in mind while I monologue these concerns.... "Kenny v Spenny" and "Trailer Park Boys". Individually, you may love, hate or have never heard of these two productions. But, nationally and arguably more significantly internationally, these two productions have exposed contemporary Canadian popular culture across the globe. And yet, in light of the current collecting mandates, acquisition complexities and cultural appraisal methodologies, I do wonder what will be available for research and study in 100 years, when the mass-market dvds are digital leftovers and the 'how' and 'why' become of paramount significance.

The scenario so far: UC Santa Cruz has received a grant that is to be used to focus digitization efforts on their newly acquired collection: The Grateful Dead Archive.

At first blush, this is pure excitement. Possibilities seem endless. Original sound recordings that have never before been migrated from their original format that will finally enjoy playtime to whatever audience is available through digital information highways. On second thought, and after a little research, boundaries appear out of nowhere and constraints become a bit more than prevalent.

For example:

1) The Internet Archive already has an extensive listing of Grateful Dead material that is freely available to anyone with an internet connection. Thus the question becomes, what is there in UCSC's collection which is not already available via the Internet Archive? Perhaps more to the point, how does anyone get an idea of the differences in unique audio records without getting to look at the listing?

2) If UCSC's collection contains duplicates of the IA collection, how can the UCSC material be presented in way that brings more traffic to UCSC's site, and equally more research traffic to the UCSC archive in its totality. Would a comparison between proposed metadata and that metadata which is used by IA bring to light enough discrepancies that would warrant an entire digitization project? Aren't the funds being geared towards digitization, and not data entry? Yes, we're dealing with unique material; that doesn't mean a highly qualified, expertly skilled information professional will be needed for the entire duration of the project, ... or does it?

Without delving too deeply into related material, these are the 'shoot from the hip' reactions. Time for a little further investigation.

Re-visiting an old thought

This is an article abstract that a colleague and I wrote together almost one year ago, in an effort to get our perspective published in a special printing of Archivaria, which was to be focusing on Queer Archives. To date, nothing more has been done with this article abstract. All that this abstract represents are the thoughts and casual debates between two Information Professionals (one an archivist, the other a librarian) who happen to be very passionate about concepts of scholarship and the definitions of pornography; and the overlap between the two.

In the history of archival scholarship, numerous studies have focused on the specific function records and documents in society, such as medical records, legal dockets and architectural drawings; however there are no equivalent studies in quantity or breadth that focus on sex – those documents which are created to record the act of, the discussions about or social perspectives on sex and sexuality. This article focuses on the relationship between archival theory and practice and pornography.

We begin with an examination of available archival scholarly research focusing on alternative sexualities within mainstream sexual studies; then note the differences in primary source materials available for both alternative (LGBT, etc.) sexualities and mainstream sexualities (specifically in terms of quantity, accessibility, and quality of resources). This leads to an examination of archival theory and practice in relation to what are considered erotic or pornographic records and materials, which are often not recognized as significant cultural artefacts in their own right, and thus may be removed from a fond or collection as an ‘irrelevance’.

We will demonstrate that there are inconsistencies in archival values and practice by examining a sexually explicit collection. Our discussion thus focuses on the ways in which pornographic materials, and by proxy, alternative sexual records (LGBT, BD/SM, etc) are assessed, appraised, and made accessible within archives, and how such materials are addressed by current archival theory. The collection in question is the Max Allen collection, which is owned by the Center for Sexual Diversity Studies at the University of Toronto. We will discuss the nature of the collection with respect to archival science/theory; examine the history of the collection; and look at the acquisition of the collection.

The collection presents a number of interesting contradictions such as: the paradox between the potential for pornographic material to be the most prevalent form of record creating genre while being the least prevalent form of record keeping genre with respect to a society’s cultural and heritage institutions. The collection also presents a number of commonalities between archival studies and sexual studies such as the fact that both scholarly fields have a strong sense of marginalization within democratic societies, albeit for vastly different reasons. By this method of analyzing differences and similarities, the article exposes the censorship and bias that affects pornographic collections (for example, the classification of materials as “pornography” generally stigmatizes them, and thus equates them with records of no redeemable value).

Finally, the article reaches two conclusions: First, that the potential for primary resource research in the field of queer studies would be positively affected by re-examination of how pornographic materials or sexually explicit materials should be viewed as cultural materials in their own right allowing sexuality studies to occur within a context – not as an isolated factor; and second, with respect to sexual diversity studies, and thus queer studies, there is a pressing need for further archival scholarly research into stated values of context, democracy, and uniqueness.