Archives and Recordkeeping

This groundbreaking text demystifies archival and recordkeeping theory and its role in modern day practice.

The book's great strength is in articulating some of the core principles and issues that shape the discipline and the impact and relevance they have for the 21st century professional.

Using an accessible approach, it outlines and explores key literature and concepts and the role they can play in practice. Leading international thinkers and practitioners from the archives and records management world, Jeannette Bastian, Alan Bell, Anne Gilliland, Rachel Hardiman, Eric Ketelaar, Jennifer Meehan and Caroline Williams, consider the concepts and ideas behind the practicalities of archives and records management to draw out their importance and relevance.

Key topics covered include:

• Concepts, roles and definitions of records and archives
• Archival appraisal
• Arrangement and description
• Ethics for archivists and records managers
• Archives, memories and identities
• The impact of philosophy on archives and records management
• Does technological change marginalize recordkeeping theory?

Readership: This is essential reading for students and educators in archives and recordkeeping and invaluable as a guide for practitioners who want to better understand and inform their day-to-day work. It is also a useful guide across related disciplines in the information sciences and humanities.

Caroline Brown is the Programme Leader and Honorary Lecturer for the archives programmes at the Centre for Archive and Information Studies, University of Dundee, where she is also Deputy Archivist. She is a Chair of Archives and Records Association (UK & Ireland’s) Conference Committee, sits on its Professional Development Committee, having formerly served as the Chair of the Education, Training and Development Committee, and is a member of the Executive Committee for ARA Scotland. She is a sits on the Section Bureau of the International Council on Archives Section on Archival Education and is active in ICA/SUV . She is an Arts and Humanities Research Council Peer Review College and Panel Member and has written and spoken on a range of archival and recordkeeping issues. Recent publications include an article on memory in Archival Science and two editions of Archival Science for which she was guest editor.