American Archivist

Archivists are increasingly developing workshops and courses in order to help students better understand and use archival materials. The incorporation of critical thinking skills into these instructional programs can significantly enhance them and improve the ability of students to analyze and interpret primary sources. This article first provides an introduction to critical thinking instruction and then describes how the university archivist successfully implemented critical thinking skills into a historical research methods course at Northern Michigan University.

To date, debate over graduate archival education has centered on the need for, and the nature of, the professional knowledge base to be imparted through master's education. A new emphasis on the acquisition of research skills and the conduct of research within graduate archival education at the master's and doctoral levels significantly extends this debate. Drawing on the experiences of the Archives and Preservation Management specialization at UCLA, this paper discusses issues associated with integrating research requirements and opportunities at master's and doctoral levels in graduate archival education. The paper concludes with a discussion of the need for increased pluralism in archival education.

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This paper focuses on the need for a systematic redefinition of the archival methods and tools required for building electronic recordkeeping systems. The analysis, which has been developed for archival education in Italy, is carried out through an examination of the historical evolution of the main functions for records creation (classification and the registry system) and the evaluation of their effectiveness in the newly developed and technologically advanced records systems. Special attention is given to the risks posed by new Italian and European rules on electronic records. These rules are based on the use of digital signature as the only guarantee for a record's reliability and authencity. It is argued, however, that the digital organization of the records, even if updated and improved, cannot be efficient if it ignores the traditional functional requirements for recordkeeping. 9 Cesare Paoli, Diplomatica (Florence: G.C. Sansoni, 1942) 18. 10 Alessandro Pratesi, Genesi e forme del documento medievale (Rome: Jouvence, 1979), 25.

Digital preservation training, especially continuing education, is now recognized as an essential component of an archivist's education. This paper reports on a research project that evaluated the effectiveness of continuing education experiences for increasing participants' skills in digital preservation and their ability to implement these skills in their repositories. The research project studied the impact of four workshops and five seminars in an international setting sponsored by the Electronic Resource Preservation and Access Network (ERPANET). The study findings indicate that the participants viewed the training events as successful, but that very few participants were able to implement the skills once they returned to their work environments. This paper analyzes the effectiveness of these kinds of training events and looks carefully at how they can be realistically measured.

Unpublished anthropological records contain a vast array of information about historic and contemporary human diversity as well as information on the history of anthropology and related humanistic and scientific disciplines. The rapidity of worldwide socio-cultural change renders such information irreplaceable. This article describes the efforts of the Council for the Preservation of Anthropological Records—a group of anthropologists, historians, archivists, and librarians—to ensure that this singular body of information is preserved and made accessible to present and future researchers. It ends with suggestions on how the archival community can help anthropology preserve primary cultural knowledge of the world's peoples.

The Society of American Archivists' approach to graduate archival education has changed in recent years. Guidelines for education have evolved to the point where the 1994 guidelines endorse master's programs in archival education. The SAA Strategic Plan offers strong support for graduate archival education and research, including archival education at the doctoral level. The 1994 guidelines will now be revised in light of the changes in graduate programs and archival work since they were written.

Since its founding, Baker Library has collected rare and unique materials to support the curriculum of the Harvard Business School. Today, Baker Library holds one of the preeminent collections of historical materials on business history and economic philosophy in the world. Included in the collections are manuscripts, rare books, pamphlets, broadsides, photographs, prints, trade catalogs, trade cards, and annual reports. The earliest records extend back to the banking and patronage activities of the Medici family in the fifteenth century. Harvard Business School students and faculty as well as leaders in the field have used this resource material to learn from the experiences of the past and to understand the historical development of business functions. More recently, however, the material has also been drawing ever-increasing numbers of international students and scholars from a broad range of disciplines, such as cultural anthropology, ethnic and gender studies, industrial archae...

Archivists' interest in expanding their academic clientele beyond historians has prompted them to consider the informational needs of researchers from other disciplines. Surveys of institutional users and citation studies of publications show that political scientists and public policy specialists have made little use of archival sources; but a careful analysis of political science literature reveals that changes in the discipline may be reversing its long-standing behaviorist antipathy for humanistic and historical inquiry. An understanding of these changes can inform effective archival outreach efforts to encourage research use of archives.

El Salvador's archives have been continually plagued by environmental, economic, and political hardships. The author describes the challenges that he observed firsthand during his visit to the Salyadoran archives during the week of 19-25 February 1989. He outlines the basic needs of these archives and relates examples of solutions improvised by dedicated archivists who must work with few resources.

, established an unprecedented declassification procedure designed to release quickly massive numbers of executive branch records dating back to World War II. The program encountered numerous problems, however, and subsequent executive orders pushed back deadlines and created new grounds to exempt records from its operation. Relatively few high-level records have been released and made available to the public. However, modifications to the program made by E.O. 13526 in 2009 and changes proposed by the Public Interest Declassification Board in 2012 will make important progress in reversing this situation.

The archival principle of the inalienability of public documents arose in the 1970s in response to the retreat of colonial powers after World War II. An international jurist initially advanced the concept as an argument to reclaim the archival patrimony of former countries that had been despoiled of their public records during colonial rule. Public records, he argued, are the inseparable and indivisible heritage of the country of origin, which has a perpetual right of return. In 1995, the International Council of Archives (ICA) defined the "inalienability principle" further by claiming that public records without exception can only be divested through a legislative act of the state that created them. This concept was again expanded in 2008 when the Society of American Archivists and the Association of Canadian Archivists cited the principle in jointly calling for the immediate restitution of captured Saddam-era records that had been removed from Iraq in the two Gulf Wars and the upheavals in Iraqi Kurdistan. In so doing, the associations adapted the inalienability principle in opposition to the laws of armed conflict, which permit the wartime seizure of public records and consider captured documents spoils of war. This article proposes an initial framework to reconcile the inalienability principle with international law to give it relevancy in the realm of postconflict restitution of captured records.

This article examines the history and rhetoric of administrative reform in Georgia during the Progressive Era, as it affected the operation of the State Archives. During this period, Georgia's governor, Thomas W. Hardwick (1921-1923), was part of a cadre of public officials, legislative committees, and state governors who led the charge to develop and perfect the "business management of their people's affairs." 1 As a result, organizations such as the Institute for Government Research of the Brookings Institute, the National Institute of Public Administration, and the Public Administration Service were commissioned to look into the operation and organization of federal, state, and local government. In Georgia, Hardwick hired the Chicago firm of Griffenhagen and Associates to make his case for proper efficiencies and economies in state government. In the process, the Georgia Department of Archives and History was almost swept away in the wake of Hardwick's program. In laying out this historical case study, particular attention is drawn to the larger cyclical political and social forces that, in promoting administrative reform, serve to undermine the survival of state archival agencies.

the late 1990s, and in the discussions of archives and their power structures that took place in the early 2000s. What feels "new" about these essays and approaches is the growing understanding of the agency of archivists and the professional acceptance of responsibility for that agency. This realization runs through all of the essays and speaks to our current professional climate. Because this contemporary dialogue is underscored with historical research and a firm grounding in the archival literature, this book will be welcome reading for archival professionals, educators, and students. The bibliographies that accompany the essays provide fodder for additional reading lists and research. Most important, however, is that this cohesive collection of essays, in just over 230 pages, asks us as professionals to consider how we continue to push the boundaries of archival theory into the action of archival practice.