What is an Archivist? AskArchivists day

June 9th is #AskArchivists day on Twitter. On this day, archivists around the world will be monitoring Twitter to answer questions people tweet directly to them by using #askarchivists at the end of their messages. I have signed up to be one of the archivists sitting at my desk waiting for questions. In preparation, I am tweeting about the event to generate interest. While thinking about this today, I wanted to tweet about what an archivist is. I'll talk more about this in a couple of paragraphs.

Last year, #AskaCurator was a huge success and has become a model for others in the cultural heritage fields to follow. #AskaCurator trended on Twitter, which means that so many people were talking about it that it became one of the most talked about topics of the day online. Because of its success, AskaCurator is currently nominated for a coveted Best of the Web Award.   I wrote about the event on the ArchivesInfo blog in a September post entitled "What We Can Learn from Ask a Curator on Twitter." I hope that my colleagues will review the page for some ideas. I think that this one paragraph is especially important:

"This brings up the question of how to educate about what we do on a more basic level. Someone referred to a page that explains what a curator is, though I don't think it gave a thorough enough view of the profession. I think if archivists attempt this that they should be prepared beforehand with a web page that describes archives and archivists in simple terms. People can be referred to it when necessary throughout an #askanarchivist day."



This morning, I searched for a good, thorough definition of "archivist" to refer people to. I cannot find one. The definitions of my profession that I found are either too simplistic or use jargon to describe what we do. The general public does not want to hear jargon and we are more interesting than a very short description can convey. Yet, the public will not want to read a long definition of our role either. If we wish to make "AskArchivists" successful, I think that we must start from square one and explain ourselves succinctly, but thoroughly. (How many of my colleagues get blank stares when they respond "I am an archivist" when someone at a party asks what they do for a living? How do you more thoroughly explain what you do without  watching those confused eyes looking at you glaze over?) So below is my quick attempt an explanation of us. Please feel free to add the important things that I leave out - no jargon please. Change my wording. Make it better. Make it more precise. Make it more interesting to better convey the excitement we feel about the collections in our care. Please, please be ready on June 9th with a fabulous explanation. Most people have a better idea of what a curator is than what an archivist is. This is our chance to help change that....


What is an Archivist? 


The Materials for Which We Care


Archivists are the people who care for original recorded information that tells about society. We work to retain materials that serve as evidence of human lives and actions. 
These materials are generally called "archives"and are used to write history, to review our past, to secure our rights, and to plan for our future.
The recorded information for which we care includes, but is not limited to such things as diaries,  photographs, business records, and birth certificates. These materials come in a wide variety of formats including written documents, audio /  visual recordings, and digital media.


How We Care for It


We care for archives using standards in our field that guide us in choosing, collecting, keeping, and organizing information with long term value. We care for materials in ways that help ensure that the materials themselves or copies of them last as long as possible. We work to make the information from the materials in our care available to those who need it by creating tools that provide easy access to their contents. We identify gaps in written knowledge and fill them by organizing or taking part in projects that record useful information that has not been documented and saved.


Where We Care for It


Archives are everywhere, documenting the day-to-day functioning of society.
Some archivists work in or for institutions that keep collections of records related to the organization's operations. Other archivists work in or for institutions that care for papers related to individual lives and communities. 
Some archivists work in small places such as local historical societies where they are expected to provide a broad range of care to materials.
Some archivists work with large collections in Universities or with government records where they focus on a particular task. 
Some archivists are employed in an institution where their collections are not the main focus. Such archivists keep the records of businesses, museums, medical institutions and others to support and document the work of that institution.


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Add your comments below. I'd love to hear your thoughts. And / or take some of these ideas and add them to your own web pages in preparation for #AskArchivists day. 
   

A genealogist and an archivist walk into a cemetery....

No...this isn't the start of a good joke. Instead, it may be the start of something more wonderful.

This past week, I had a lovely networking meeting (aka "tweetup") with a genealogist colleague I met through Twitter. We decided it was worth getting to know each other off-line because we keep bumping into each other online, our interests intersecting in many places. We were thinking of meeting for coffee. However, one of the main interests we have in common is visiting old cemeteries. I suggested we should meet at one. My companion later laughed while were examining gravestones and told me that she herself had almost suggested a graveyard tweetup, but decided not to because she thought that I might find it too strange. Indeed, on my drive down, I told one of my closest, non-history professional, friends that I was heading to a business meeting in a graveyard. She responded with silence on the other end of the phone. And since that particular friend is rarely silent, I know that she must have been thinking some strange things about me!

But, when you feel comfortable bouncing loony ideas like cemetery meetings off of someone, you know that you make a good match. For me, big and sometimes strange ideas have usually led to big and exciting developments. My brain is twisting and turning with ideas about how my new genealogist / house historian friend can mesh with my archivist / cultural heritage professional self. The idea of bringing together the people who care for historical resources and the people who use them in some kind of collaboration is exciting. We often sit on opposite sides of the fence, so to speak. Archivists, curators and librarians are seen standing guard over materials, providing access to researchers such as genealogists. But I think that the more we share ideas, the more we strengthen ourselves and the study of history. Whether caring for records or pouring through them looking for specific information, those who come in contact with the materials spot information and learn things  that can help others with related history promoting goals. That's a good thing. Our professions, in my opinion, should meld together to help us all elicit multi-faceted views, descriptions, and critical ideas about historical materials.

The stories we can discover in a graveyard, such as this of
family members that died within days of each other, are
backed by historical records and the research of those in
diverse history fields. We have more in common than
we realize on the surface. Our professions bring together
diverse community knowledge.

I live north of Boston. My colleague lives south. We met half way in the lovely town of Chelmsford, Massachusetts. She and I chatted about gravestones as one aspect of material culture. The landscape on which a graveyard sits and the houses surrounding it are one part of a community story. The records about the people in the houses and those buried at the cemetery are sitting up the street in the historical society and town clerk's office. The people who visit the graveyard, the stones themselves, their carvers, and the people who repair them provide more dimension to a community story. Though as history professionals we have each chosen to specialize in an aspect or two of that story, we are each adding to the same community tale. A graveyard was indeed a perfect place to focus on the similarities between a genealogist and an archivist. Combining our strengths will help us and others better understand the resources we collect, seek, and make available and will open up new avenues for developing the stories that one can build from those resources.

Right across the street from the cemetery was a coffee shop. After our jaunt among the stones, with chilled insides, Marian and I sat and chatted over a cup of coffee. It seemed to be a nice traditional way to warm cold March hands after a fun untraditional meeting.

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So how can archivists and genealogists collaborate? This is how some of my colleagues are re-thinking the relationship between archivists and genealogists.

David Ferriero - National Archivist of the U.S. at the Federation of Genealogical Societies on the genealogist as a citizen archivist

Aprille C. MacCay - "Genealogists and Records: Preservation, Advocacy, and Politics" - genealogists as allies for archivists

Gail Redmann. Archivists and Genealogists: The Trend toward Peaceful Coexistence

Organizing family photos - getting over the hump

Family photos can be organized in
albums or boxes. Your perfect method
may differ from someone else's perfect
method

The subject of caring for personal photos has come up numerous times in the past couple of weeks, so I find myself posting about it once again. I spent part of this morning working with a client on a personal photo organization project. Sometimes the hardest part a consultant plays in such a project is convincing a person that the "collection" is not unmanageable. Most people store items in bureaus and shoe boxes. Many people spread them all over their homes. Most people feel overwhelmed. Remember that the organization of your personal papers and photos can be taken in steps and everything can be organized. You are not hopeless or helpless. Realize that a little help can go a long way.

It is hard when a family member is more inclined to be organized than another. It is not helpful when others remark about one's disorganization. Words of criticism tend to increase one's feeling of being overwhelmed. I walk into many homes where the person who has hired me feels that the personal papers they are about to show me are the worst mess that I have ever seen. They are embarrassed because they feel the material has gotten out of control or someone else has told them that it is out of control.

An example of a "mess" that I have found

I can unequivocally say that I have never seen a home collection in worse disarray than some of the town collections I have seen. The common home is smaller and the average person collects less paperwork, etc. than the average town. Archivists deal with "mess" everyday. There is little you can show us in the way of personal papers that will throw us out of step. I actually enjoy tackling piles. It is part of the reason I got into this line of work.

Do not be afraid to begin because of overwhelming feelings. Many people do not take on projects or stop projects because those "this is too much" feelings grow. Work out what needs to be done. Write a plan by yourself, or with a little help from a professional. Take your organization step by step. Start from where you are and dive in. Do not just hope to be more organized. Create a guide that plays to your personal lifestyle. Create a reasonable plan that outlines what you want to do and write out the steps. Think about your end goal. Do you want to display your favorite images? Do you want to create albums? Do you want to organize digital files? Be specific about what you really want.

My client this morning told me that one of her top priorities is to create a photo album celebrating the first year of her daughter's life. Her daughter is now 6. She has such an album for her nine-year old son. I think that there are some guilty feelings attached with not having such an album for her daughter. So, step 1. will be to begin sorting images using guidelines I will provide for her. Step 2. is to create that album for her daughter. Once she gets that done, she should have a huge feeling of accomplishment that will help propel her through the rest of the steps we've decided together.

Begin somewhere. Make a dent. Set a specific goal for yourself that will feel like a milestone when you hit it to get over the hump. Focus on moving ahead and don't look back.

New England Cultural Institutions Using Social Media

I just put up a preliminary list with links to New England Cultural Institutions Using Social Media. I intend this list to serve a few purposes:

1. To serve as models for other cultural institutions wishing to develop their use of social media to promote and provide better access to their institution and what they do.
2. To help institutions in the region better communicate with each other and work together to develop social media strategies.
3. To serve as a list for our audiences who wish to see the diversity of cultural heritage institutions in the region and who wish to have a more direct connection to the institutions they support and enjoy.

I would like to work to make this list comprehensive. So far it includes a few institutions that contacted me for inclusion when I put out a call on Twitter. It also includes institutions I located over the past few days through Internet searching. If you have not been included and would like to be on this list, please contact me through my blog, twitter (@ArchivesInfo), or ArchivesInfo Facebook page or email me at melissa @ mannon . org. Please also let me know if you find errors in the pages.

My original intention was to include museums, archives and historical societies in this list. The New England Archivists has a nice list of archives blogs, so I linked to that instead of to the archives themselves. (I'm in favor of helping to drive traffic to associations I support!) I have added an "intangible heritage" category as well, after the nice people at Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theater asked if I were putting out a call to them too. On Twitter I regularly promote intangible heritage and the need to document it, So I thought this would be an appropriate additional category. I did not include public libraries because so many of them were early adapters of the Internet and social media that they are much easier to find in social media channels.

So, I hope that you find this list useful. It has been fun to do. I've learned about a few very unique institutions about which I was previously unaware. I hope that you will too!

Creating online resource for heritage institutions active on social media

 If your New England based heritage organization is active on Facebook, Twitter, or blogs, please send me information about what you are doing. I am working to create an online directory to help professionals in the region share information. This directory aims to be a comprehensive resource for locating historical societies, museums, and archives actively using social media to communicate with their audiences. We can learn a lot from each other. The willingness and eagerness our professions demonstrate to embrace social media will have a direct impact on our future missions and functions. It is my hope that institutions will be able to use this directory to explore more easily what others in the field are doing to take advantage of Twitter, Facebook and blog platforms. The directory aims to help us make stronger connections among communities and potential supporters. Innovative early adopters of social media in the cultural heritage professions will serve as models for others.

Please send me your organization's name and link to your site or your Twitter handle. I hope to have a first group of institutions online very soon.

(This may be another case of my curiosity getting the better of me...It happens often I'm afraid. It's not as if I really needed another project...Please help make this easy! Write to me so I don't have to perform extensive research to find you.)

Life in Context: Telling Your Story - A Beautiful Partnership

Conducting Life In Context workshop this fall

Your story helps define the 21st century for future generations. The narrative of your life should describe your personal journey and can be viewed as a piece of a larger puzzle reflecting values, traditions and trends in society. Colleague and certified professional organizer Sue West and I have developed the workshop Life in Context: Telling Your Story to help people think about their places in the world. Through an exploration of personal objects, individuals can define what aspects of their lives are most meaningful to them.  Sue and I encourage people to pursue a greater understanding of the context of their lives to help them focus on what is meaningful, and to collect and preserve stories that are essential to better understanding ourselves, our communities and our culture.

Sue's background in organization has helped us create a strong foundation for our explorations that begin with centering each individual. We begin by focusing on why and how one should tell one's story - to ground oneself, work out problems, and understand what "stuff" is important. My archives and cultural heritage background expands the conversation by relating personal stories to a larger context. We discuss how being an active participant, working to define your legacy now, cna help future generation. Sue and I encourage you to pay more attention to what you are keeping and how it relates to your life story and to a larger community and cultural story.

Sue's Space4U  web page defines a goal of helping you imagine your life "calm, organized and simplified." My mission through ArchivesInfo is to "promote the preservation of history and the building of community memories." Our unique partnership has given us greater insight into the value of what we do for different populaces. Sue has helped me better understand how an archivist can help individuals and I think Sue can better relate her work to larger communities.

Sue and I have been editing a workbook to accompany the workshop. This morning I finished my second pass through and have passed the manuscript back to Sue for further work. The section that is currently the last in the book got my brain churning this morning and I want to share it with you. I have posed three questions to help you think about what is valuable to you. These questions have enabled me to think about cultural heritage collaboration in a more focused way, encouraging a more thorough examination of how an individual can actively create personal documentation that is useful to society. Here are the questions for you to ponder along with me:

1. What do people in the future need to know about you?
It is not necessary or desirable to keep everything. Consider why objects (heirlooms, personal papers, photographs, etc.) were created; how they were used; what evidence they provide; the information they embody; their history, symbolism, and sentimentalism. Focus on what is important to you AND what reflects larger communities and societal functions.

2.What values, traditions, and ideals are not currently represented in your objects or papers and how can you remedy this through storytelling (writing, scrapbooking, crafting, etc.)?

3. How is your community documenting itself or not? Consider intangible culture and lost stories. Many of the stories that we've lost would have been desirable to keep. Properly label your materials and make sure that future generations have the tales documented and well-kept.

A beautiful partnership is one that allows your ideas to grow. Very often, professionals get stuck in their field networking with like-minded individuals and not reaching out to alternate communities. In cultural heritage fields, it is especially important to extend oneself beyond our traditional circles. New perspectives on why people collect and what they collect can help us improve and strengthen our missions. Thank you Sue for helping me strengthen my understanding of building community memories through individual's personal papers. I look forward to a long collaboration.
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"Life in Context: Telling Your Story" can help you think about your life in a whole new way. Join the conversation and share your life stories at Life in Context on Facebook. To learn more about the workshop see the Life in Context web page

Response to Culling Photographs

A photo I return to again and again...
my grandmother with an unidentified little girl.

I found an interesting conversation generated over at The Turning of Generations blog in response to my Culling Photographs post about a week ago. Blog author Michelle Goodrum provides thoughtful guidelines for working out how to decide if you should toss out an old photo. The comments related to her post were also wonderful and raise many concerns one might have with appraising images and discarding.

This topic actually gets very personal for me. My mother has a shoebox of nameless people from the early-twentieth century. These are presumably relatives who were scattered around the world or killed during the Holocaust. This makes the shoebox worth keeping...for now. We have a general idea about the subjects of the image. We know they were passed to my mother from her parents. We have a small bit of context, which is sometimes not the case with a shoebox of orphan photos.

There is talk in my family of using face recognition software to try to identify the people in the images. It would be exciting to find some answers. If we can't, perhaps a repository related to Poland or to the Holocaust would be interested in these images. Usually, realistically, Archives do not want orphan images. The millions and millions they can collect are virtually useless without information. Perhaps because I have some context, someone will want these images...but I am not sure if all of these photos are of people lost in the War. I'm not sure if they are relatives or acquaintances. How much information do these unlabeled images really give and how much context do they really hold?

Right now I have no information, but I have hope. Our family will keep this shoebox until we've exhausted the possibilities for identification. By the end of my lifetime, if we have not found family connections or the technology to help us identify people, surely I have given the search enough time. The next generation does not need a shoebox full of permanently lost information. The important thing is for me to label the images we know and to convey to my daughter what happened to her ancestors and why. I want to tell her the stories of her great grandparents who escaped from terror and spend my time recording the memories we have of them rather than holding out false hope that what cannot be found will turn up someday.

One thing struck me when reading comments from genealogists about keeping family photos. It often comes up as I move between the worlds of individuals with personal papers and families with personal papers. The professional archives can more easily turn away papers and orphan photos than families interested in history can release them. The repositories do not have a sentimental attachment. That distinction may seem obvious, but as a consultant, I must keep in mind that it makes it harder for clients to overcome hesitancies about getting rid of anything. In fact, genealogists are so well-versed with the search for information and the finding of unexpected threads that I can sincerely understand negative responses to the idea of "culling." However, there are images that one just will never be able to identify no matter how long one searches.

I want to tell you that there does come a time when you should let go. Eyes staring back at us from a printed sheet pull us in. Photographs have a unique ability to let us feel the humanity of their subject. It can be hard to break the attachment we feel with our heart. Let yourself accept that moment of letting go when it comes. Not everything can or should be saved. Do not let what is important get lost among the clutter.