Appraisal and Acquisition Strategies is the latest instalment of the Trends in Archival Practice Series from the Society of American Archivists. Previous instalments cover arrangement and description, digital preservation, teaching with primary sources and digital rights. Each instalment contains modules written by well-known US-based experts. Appraisal and Acquisition Strategies contains three modules, which in effect are modules fourteen to sixteen in the series.
Module fourteen, ‘Appraising Digital Records’ by Geoff Huth, begins by outlining a couple of truisms:
| • | Life is messy and archives mirror life. | ||||
| • | Appraisal determines everything. | ||||
After initially scaring the reader, it then outlines a range of useful strategies and tools to address this complexity, through the mechanism of appraisal. Interestingly, the first strategy is to ‘start before the beginning’ (p. 14), before the point of record creation in order to influence the world where archives are made. Five pages are dedicated to making this point. It made me curious whether the complexity of the digital information eco-system is drawing our American colleagues toward continuum thinking.
Some aspects of the ‘everything’ that appraisal determines are methodically addressed, with an emphasis mostly placed on highlighting differences to the analogue paradigm. For example, determining the authentic copy of a record and what to do with large databases or records in local network storage. There is also a reminder to appraise the metadata embedded in digital records that may or may not support appropriate access.
Several pages are spent on technical appraisal – a process of technical analysis of files to determine issues around preservation and access that supports appraisal decision-making. Technical appraisal is a term and workflow well-established in collecting archives, but doesn’t seem to be as established within public archives. Both should find it useful.
Module fifteen, ‘Collecting Digital Manuscripts and Archives’, by Megan Barnard and Gabriella Redwine, also has a range of recommendations on how to be active in the creation space, focusing on establishing and maintaining good relationships with creators.
After several pages on incorporating born-digital into collecting policies, there is some very good, practical advice on how to have conversations with creators. Conversation topics include: discussing the creation process; addressing old media first; the relationship between letters and emails; and discussing their online presence. The authors also provide options for taking a more active approach to encouraging good personal records management, through file name conventions (with none of those pesky special characters that cause problems later in the workflow), inventories and backup options. There are also good sections on discussing privacy and copyright issues.
The second half of the module outlines strategies and tools that can be used for appraising digital material in the collecting archive context. The standard equipment, such as write blockers and forensic tools, are briefly discussed. The module finishes with an outline of the documentation required to complete the acquisition – essentially a summary of all of the key issues outlined earlier in the module.
I liked this module a lot. I liked its optimism and vim balanced with the (sometimes dour) practical realities of collecting archives. I liked the comfort and assurance I felt from reading recommendations that came from a place of experience. Of lessons learned. Of conversations had that weren’t so great but were better the next time, and are now shared for us all to benefit from.
Module sixteen, ‘Accessioning Digital Records’ by Erin Faulder, outlines a range of models, standards and tools that can support the workflow for transferring and processing digital material that is provided in the second half of the module.
I thought this module was a little more confused than the other two. It starts by stating that ‘accessioning is the archivist’s first step in processing and preserving archival materials’ (p. 121), when the other two modules have been clear in their approach that working with the creation process is the first step. Later, when introducing the accessioning workflow, it states that ‘accessioning procedures formalise the steps an archivist takes to document the transfer’ (p. 148). This mixed view of what accessioning is and where it fits in the overall appraisal and acquisition process makes it sit a little awkwardly alongside the previous two.
Nevertheless, there’s plenty of value here, especially for collecting archives. The summary descriptions of the standards and models will be useful to those seeking to understand many of the acronyms for digital collecting. There’s also a good summary of some of the infrastructure required to support digital collecting and preservation.
The second half of the module is a detailed step-through of a transfer workflow in the collecting archive context, including file format identification, validation and ingest, which will provide a good introduction to archivists. However, the workflow is presented as though everything will go swimmingly. I thought the several pages on validation should have been followed by some of the options available when validation fails – the more likely scenario in my experience.
Overall, I thought Appraisal and Acquisitions Strategies would provide useful reading to archivists taking their initial steps into digital collecting. It also reminded me that, in the collecting archive context, our American colleagues are leaders with digital collecting and have a range of experiences and implementations for the rest of the world to learn from. Maybe we in Australasia should be looking State-side to build the relationship we need to improve our professional practice.
National Library of New Zealand
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© 2017 Mark Crookston
https://doi.org/10.1080/01576895.2017.1330598