Archives: Recordkeeping in Society

by Sue McKemmish, Michael Piggott (Editor), Frank Upward (Editor)

Recordkeeping in Society introduces the significance of archives and the results of local and international research in archival science. It explores the role of recordkeeping in various cultural, organisational and historical contexts. Its themes include archives as a web of recorded new information technologies have presented dilemmas, but also potentialities for managing of the interconnectedness of archives. Another theme is the relationship between evidence and memory in archives and in archival discourse. It also explores recordkeeping and accountability, memory, societal power and juridical power, along with an examination of issues raised by globalisation and interntionalisation.

The chapter authors are researchers, practitioners and educators from leading Australian and international recordkeeping organisations, each contributing previously unpublished research in and reflections on their field of expertise. They include Adrian Cunningham, Don Schauder, Hans Hofman, Chris Hurley, Livia Iacovino, Eric Ketelaar and Ann Pederson.

The book reflects broad Australian and international perspectives making it relevant worldwide. It will be a particularly valuable resource for students of archives and records, researchers from realted knowledge disciplines, sociology and history, practitioners wanting to reflect further on their work, and all those with an interest in archives and their role in shaping human activity and community culture.

368 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2005

Reviews

[Bluebelle-the-Inquisitive (Catherine) · Rating 3 out of 5]

All events have their witness, their memory: their trace. — Matt Matsuda

I usually don't review textbooks read for uni but I've read all but one chapter of this book in the last few days. This is one of those books that is really useful for those reading and trying to learn about records and archives. The sections on Archives and Memory and Recordkeeping and Societal Power take views I hadn't seen in my readings. In Archives and Memory, Piggott questions the assumption of archives as the keeper of societal memory. In Recordkeeping and Societal Power, Ketelaar discuses the duel nature of records in society, that to suppress and that to liberate. At one point one of the authors does point out the most interesting record I've seen yet, the cabin of the Unabomber was used as evidence and as such was a record. It is 15 years old but things haven't changed much since then, there is more electronic information now but the core principles remain the same.

Some things that need to be noted before you read the book. The editors and authors are largely Australian as such a large amount of the analogies are Australian, though the language used is American or general academic. One of the stories carried through the book is the Children Overboard Scandal. This was a big political story in early October 2001. Do you see the problem here? It was largely only Australia or footnotes anywhere else due to the recentness of the September 11 attacks. I was 13 at the time, trying to deal with the horror of 9/11 and questioning if I wanted to deal with the nightly news at all, this scandal did not leave an impact. There is some framing, just enough that does mean the section is readable,

The struggle of man against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting. — Milan Kundera