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Preview ERIC ED399968: Archivists in Cyberspace.

DOCUMENT RESUME IR 056 111 ED 399 968 Fagan, Michele AUTHOR Archivists in Cyberspace. TITLE PUB DATE 96 16p.; Paper presented at the Nebraska Library NOTE Association (NLA) College and University Section Meeting (Seward, NE, May 17, 1996). Descriptive (141) PUB TYPE Reports EDRS PRICE MFO1 /PCO1 Plus Postage. *Academic Libraries; Access to Information; DESCRIPTORS *Archives; Computer Networks; Higher Education; *Library Collections; Library Role; *Library Services; Media Specialists; Online Searching; Universities; *World Wide Web Digital Data; *Home Pages; *Special Collections IDENTIFIERS (Library) ABSTRACT The emerging technology of the World Wide Web is a natural source of acquisitions for archivists. This paper discusses two areas of digital communications: a university archivist's role in the support and management of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL) home page, and the uses other archives and special collection departments at selected universities have made of home pages. Being a university archivist often entails acting as a central contact for university-related groups wanting to link a web page to the UNL home page. One of the main problems in working with providers who maintain their own home pages is occasional lack of continuity. The UNL University Archives/Special Collections Department began the project with just the informational site on the UNL Libraries home page, although they hope to begin providing more in-depth coverage about holdings. Other universities have made use of home pages for: information about the institution; public relations; displaying library holdings; and for research of collections. In 1993, the University of California-Berkeley Library received a grant to encode archival finding aids in SGML (Standard Generalized Markup Language). Carried out to its fullest extent, this or a similar project could eventually give a researcher online access to the finding aids of every manuscript depository in the country. University archivists everywhere are making use of the Web to make the holdings of their departments more accessible. (AEF) AAAA:c**A*****A**A****.AAAA**---A************************************* * * Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made * * from the original document. *********************************************************************** U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION Office of Educational Research and Improvement EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC) This document has been reproduced as received from the person or organization originating it. Minor changes have been made to improve reproduction quality. o Points of view or opinions stated in this document do not necessarily represent official OERI position or policy. "PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE THIS ARCHIVISTS IN CYBERSPACE MATERIAL HAS BEEN GRANTED BY Michele L. Fagan Presented by Michele Fagan, May 17, 1996 NLA College and University Section Meeting TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC)." Concordia College, Seward, NE of the rest and all librarians the like Just World investigating the archivists have been world, impact on potential usefulness, and its Wide Web, its their own profession. basically another form Web the of Since is purpose of an archives, communication, and the primary or a religious order, a college, a is in whether it important preserve is to corporation, multinational on the evolving communications and other documentation emerging parent the institution, history the of acquisitions for natural source technology of is a received archivists the past archivists. the In after the events long traditionally paper, records, the Web and With the advent of covered in them. e- more aggressive to be much archivists now need mail, soon as almost as catching electronic 'records about Otherwise the archivist will not get they are created. BEST COPY AVAILABLE 118 2 anything.1 Stated bluntly but accurately, if archivists do not keep ahead they will simply become roadkill on the information highway.2 Just as digital communications is changing the way archivist perceive their acquisition duties, these new formats also are altering the nature how of organizations or individuals conduct their lives. Recording change has always been part of an archivist's duties. When hand-written or typed papers were the basic components preserved of information, the documents may have contained the final decisions, not discussions the and compromises took that place beforehand. Often those matters were verbally worked and not out written down. E-mail and the Web have captured more of the immediacy and dynamism involved in decision making because people will now e-mail where in past they would the have telephoned. There should be nothing ephemeral about digital communications as far as the archivist is concerned.3 will discuss two areas digital of I communications; first, my own role in the support and 1. Laurie B. Crum. "Digital Evolution: Changing roles and Challenges Archivists for in the Age Global Networking." of Archival Issues 20 (no. 1 1995):51. Anne Gilliland-Swetland. "Digital. 2. Communications: Documentary Opportunities Not To Be Missed." Archival Issues 20 (no. 1 1995): 39. Anne Gilliland-Swetland. "Digital Communications," 40. 3. 3 119 3 Nebraska-Lincoln University management the of of other archives and the uses second, and homepage, of homepages departments have made special collection as they attempt to contact their audience. university archivist entail my duties as Part of campus academic contact for and a central acting as other organizations, student administrative units, Credit Union or the university-related groups like the Alumni Association, and individual faculty members, all I get a web page to the UNL homepage. wanting to link decide or servers registered, these various providers and answer any basic what the optimum links should be, others them direct on to Then in questions. I on this same project. Information Services working also encourage departments, colleges and other units to In order to present a good image on put up homepages. much University needs have as Internet, the to the out there as information about itself it can. useful superior students and The potential attracting for faculty is growing all the time. the framework Services provides and Information University's providers, of the some support but 'each Administration of Business College from an the to maintain their individual faculty own member, 4 120 4 homepages.4 of the major problems we have discovered in One working with providers who maintain their own homepages is occasional In the early stages lack of continuity. of developing the University's homepage, people working on the project realized that student groups might cause problem continuously maintaining by not their a organization's homepage as the composition of the group When This has proved changed. true. to the be original builder and maintainer of the organization's page graduated or left the group, knowledge about the password procedures for updating material and have On occasion so has knowledge disappeared. about the page's very existence. We encouraged have organizations to make the upkeep of the homepage part of one of the officer's duties, but this can only be a suggestion, not a qualification. As it turns out, we did not realize that academic and administrative units be as subject to the would same changes in personnel. A staff member, student union for example, the at offered build one department. her Her to for supervisor had no idea how to do this himself, but it great idea, and sounded like a he gave his approval. Illustration 1, "The Federal Model," was borrowed from 4. DeeAnn Allison, ASO, UNL Libraries. This model has been shown by several Information Service staff members. I n o t t i s i t i t v n a i n o h r o c t t i n r s A g e u n n l y i o l d t c I i i s v s r o r e e r v p t i s n i a y n U n t i i a n e u h m r T o m f n o i c s n n r i e a E : t t L n l y a i e p a A e i m f o p 1 o p : . A i d g s n s c e o o V i l l l a t i A o a a t a r m b Y C i M t P L c O n a C S a E n B p o i i c t a i t r n e " d a r e e h F n c t e a r h a P T 122 5 Unfortunately the staff member took all her experience with her when she took another position and now no one to maintain else in area knows unit's how the the homepage. Despite the problems inherent in keeping track of I have discovered that working with the providers, all homepage benefits other duties my UNL an the as I now contact many more people across campus archivist. vise-versa than would if I normally and I was just The UNL homepage after their inactive files. gives me opportunity to make people an excellent aware of my department's existence. After discussing the homepage, words about the other work in I can easily say a few Archives and our interest in saving a department's the paper files of potential historic value. older Since part of my responsibility is checking the links to all homepages, and obviously seeing that one is no the violating US copyright university policy, laws or I also have the chance to download any information that might be changed but does have historical significance. Presently people and who college maintain university websites involved over debate are in a whether homepages should strictly informational be or public opinion is My own sites relations sites. 8 123 6 that each homepage has elements of both and should be used for both purposes. A number university of archives and special collections departments have developed homepages that link to the parent library. At this point, however, many of these sites provide little more information than can be found in the traditional paper brochures. these For places the site primarily public is a relations A tool. few departments have turned their pages into truly informational sites, allowing keyword searching and putting the researcher one step away from the actual documents. A selection of visual aids can take us on a short tour of some of these special collections sites within university homepages. We can creatively see used public relations sites that give some degree of access the manuscript to holdings, and pages that put the researcher in touch with the inventories of manuscript collections. At this time the UNL University Archives/Special Collections Department just has the informational site on the UNL Libraries homepage. We hope to provide more in-depth coverage about our holdings as soon as we can. Already the UNL original catalogers have placed some record level descriptions several of significant collections like the Mari Sandoz Papers, or the Bernice 9 124 7 Willa Cather into Research Collection on the Slote A number of other libraries' online catalog and OCLC. departments have similar collections done special helps This things last few years. over to the manuscripts but new publicize the existence the of technology gives us the chance to move a step closer to putting researcher-and document in touch. reproduced parts University Brown has its if Manuscripts on its homepage. Useful printed Guide to admission phone numbers, information about hours, collections are addressed, requirements and major but variety of material the site only hints about the rich available there.5 charming homepage for Yale University has a the whole University, at least in my estimation, because it the rare books designers visited that the suggests strong statement about also seems to make a area. It Working through importance of scholarship there. the Library and Beinecke Yale's website to the its the collection, we discover that the Beinecke has archival printed guide. online version of its also produced an helpful but it is not searchable by keyword, Access is Brown University hppt://www.brown.edu. The site is 5. Transparencies of portions of the Brown University site and other these were shown homepages All of during the presentation. Records Administration sites, except Archives and the National for reproduced copyright under cannot are one, and be publication. 125: 8 course, its immediacy is lost and almost as soon of , as it was published in 1994.6 University California Southern The Special of Collections Department imaginative has an very and public-relations oriented website, although it is not useful researchers searching for material on for With specific topic. digital imaging the Department display its beautiful reading room, but the viewer can is informed that the library's online system lists only the manuscripts collections available. some The of has to depend on user in-house finding aids and staff members for access to its Library holdings. USC's Showcase, part of the USC Libraries homepage, does give Special Collections Department with other the along areas further opportunities to show off some of its materials. Past and current exhibits in the Department of Special Collections can be viewed with considerable completeness over the Web. Focusing in on the current exhibit, Goddesses and Patriarchs, we can learn more about the pieces on display, see pictures of them, and find out about the artists who created these works. A complete _inventory of each exhibit is available online. Exhibits produced over the past several years are http://www.yale.edu is the UR1 for the Yale University 6. The Beinecke Library is homepage. http://www.yale.edu/beinecke/brblhome. 11

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