Abstract
This article will explore the idea of the archive as medium, with sub-themes of neutrality, silence, and truth. An archive can serve as the intermediary in the construction of the archival series and collections around a central theme or scope. The messages bound in the archival container are selected to fit into an archival series or collection to reiterate or document a particular aspect. Archival collections have the power and effect of creating cumulative viewpoints over time by way of the contained messages. Selected case studies of more recent user-generated digital archives will be explored in context to these themes; such as A People’s Archive of Police Violence in Cleveland and Take Back the Archive (University of Virginia).
References
Booth, Alison. “Responsible Parties.” Talk presented as part of panel (“Narrating Sexual Assault”), Modern Languages Association Convention, Austin, TX, January 9, 2016.Search in Google Scholar
Caswell, Michelle. Archiving the Unspeakable: Silence, Memory and the Photographic Record in Cambodia. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2014.Search in Google Scholar
Cook, Terry. “Evidence, Memory, Identity, Community: Four Shifting Archival Paradigms.” Archival Science 13.2/3 (2012): 95–120.10.1007/s10502-012-9180-7Search in Google Scholar
Dekker, Annet. “The Restless Repository: Interview with Annet Dekker.” Memories of the Future, volume II. Edited by Michael Bojkowski, November 11. at AKV|StJoost Institute, ‘s-Hertogenbosch, The Netherlands, 2017a, available at http://www.openset.nl/reader/#!/article/2017-1516827339134 (accessed 1/15/18).Search in Google Scholar
Dekker, Annet. Lost and Living (in) Archives: Collectively Shaping New Memories. Amsterdam: Valiz, 2017b.Search in Google Scholar
Giannachi, Gabriella. Archive Everything: Mapping the Everyday. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2016.10.7551/mitpress/9780262035293.001.0001Search in Google Scholar
Groeneveld, Elizabeth. “Remediating pornography: the On Our Backs digitization debate.” Journal of Media & Cultural Studies 32.1 (2018): 73–83.10.1080/10304312.2018.1404677Search in Google Scholar
Ham, Gerald. “The Archival Edge.” The American Archivist 38.1 (1975): 5–13.10.17723/aarc.38.1.7400r86481128424Search in Google Scholar
Leavitt, Arthur. “What Are Archives?” The American Archivist 24.2 (1961): 175–78. doi:10.17723/aarc.24.2.v7361211161644v5.10.17723/aarc.24.2.v7361211161644v5Search in Google Scholar
Levi, Amalia Skarlatou. “Silences as News: The Relevance and Urgency of Preserving Historical Newspapers in Postcolonial Settings.” Paper presented at the IFLA News Media 2018 Conference, Gainesville, FL, April 18–20, 2018. doi:10.17613/M6R57B.10.17613/M6R57BSearch in Google Scholar
Lindblad, Purdom. “Advocacy by Design: Moving Between Theory & Practice.” Keynote address presented at the Library Research & Innovative Practice Forum, College Park, MD, June 8, 2017.Search in Google Scholar
McLuhan, Marshall. “The Message is the Medium.” In Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man. Toronto: McGraw-Hill, 1964.10.4324/9781315080918-31Search in Google Scholar
National Digital Stewardship Alliance (NDSA). “Archives Have Never Been Neutral: An NDSA Interview with Jarrett Drake.” Feb 15, 2017, available at http://ndsa.org/2017/02/15/archives-have-never-been-neutral-an-ndsa-interview-with-jarrett-drake.html (accessed 1/20/18).Search in Google Scholar
Nurse, Andrew. “Archives as Narrative: The Politics of Ethnographic Archiving at the National Museum.” In Archival Narratives for Canada: Re-Telling Stories in a Changing Landscape, edited by Kathleen Garay and Christi Verduyn, 41–55. Winnipeg, Canada: Fernwood Publishing, 2011.Search in Google Scholar
People’s Archive of Police Violence in Cleveland. “Contribution Terms of Service.”, available at http://www.archivingpoliceviolence.org/contribution/terms (accessed 1/20/18).Search in Google Scholar
People’s Archive of Police Violence in Cleveland. [Home page], available at http://www.archivingpoliceviolence.org (accessed 1/20/18).Search in Google Scholar
People’s Archive of Police Violence in Cleveland. “Purpose.” available at http://www.archivingpoliceviolence.org/purpose (accessed 1/20/18).Search in Google Scholar
Schwartz, Joan M., and Terry Cook. “Archives, Records and Power: The Making of Modern Memory.” Archival Science 2.1 (2002): 1–19.10.1007/BF02435628Search in Google Scholar
Shannon, Claude E., and Warren Weaver. The Mathematical Theory of Communication. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1949.Search in Google Scholar
Thomas, David, Simon Fowler, and Valerie Johnson. The Silence of the Archive. Chicago, IL: American Library Association, 2017.10.29085/9781783301577Search in Google Scholar
University of Virginia. “Take Back the Archive.”, available at http://takeback.scholarslab.org/ (accessed 1/20/2018).Search in Google Scholar
Wagner Webster, Jessica. “Filling the Gaps”: Oral Histories and Underdocumented Populations in The American Archivist, 1938–2011.” The American Archivist 79.2 (2016): 254–82.10.17723/0360-9081-79.2.254Search in Google Scholar
White, Kelvin L. “Meztizaje and Remembering in Afro-Mexican Communities of the Costa Chica: Implications for Archival Education in Mexico.” Archival Science 9.1 (2009): 43–55.10.1007/s10502-009-9102-5Search in Google Scholar
Williams, Stacie M., and Jarrett M. Drake. “Power to the People: Documenting Police Violence in Cleveland.” Journal of Critical Library and Information Studies 1.2 (2017): 1–27. doi:10.24242/jclis.v1i2.33.10.24242/jclis.v1i2.33Search in Google Scholar
Yaco, Sonia, Ann Jimerson, Laura Caldwell Anderson, and Chanda Temple. “A Web-Based Community-Building Archives Project: A Case Study of Kids in Birmingham in 1963.” Archival Science 15.4 (2015): 399–427.10.1007/s10502-015-9246-4Search in Google Scholar
Yeo, Geoffrey. “Concepts of Record (1): Evidence, Information and Persistent Representations.” American Archivist 70.2 (2007): 315–343.10.17723/aarc.70.2.u327764v1036756qSearch in Google Scholar
Zinn, Howard. “Secrecy, Archives, and the Public Interest.” Midwestern Archivist 2.2 (1977): 14–27.Search in Google Scholar
©2018 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Introduction
- From the Editors, Karen F. Gracy and Leisa Gibbons
- Feature Articles
- Archiving and Preserving Social Media at the Library of Congress: Institutional and Cultural Challenges to Build a Twitter Archive
- Archive as Medium
- Digital Disaster Preparedness of Indonesian Special Libraries
- Beyond Findings: Conversations with Experts
- Currents and Comments
- Report on the 2018 Archival Education and Research Institute (AERI)
Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Introduction
- From the Editors, Karen F. Gracy and Leisa Gibbons
- Feature Articles
- Archiving and Preserving Social Media at the Library of Congress: Institutional and Cultural Challenges to Build a Twitter Archive
- Archive as Medium
- Digital Disaster Preparedness of Indonesian Special Libraries
- Beyond Findings: Conversations with Experts
- Currents and Comments
- Report on the 2018 Archival Education and Research Institute (AERI)