Archival Methods

From the Preface:

"The first four essays address the four fundamental activities involved in the management of the physical record: selecting an appropriate record from the great volume of evidence, preserving that record against time, describing the record that has been retained, and providing for access and use. Of each of these activities I ask whether our present methods are adequate and if not, how they can be adjusted within the practical limitations which cultural repositories face. Throughout, my audience is the professional, but I do not mean simply those who work in repositories called archives. I include here museum curators, librarians and others whose efforts are devoted to preserving cultural memory and making it available to future generations, and who frequently are also responsible for archival materials.

Chapter five explores an idea relevant to the changes in methodology proposed in the first four chapters. Intelligent artifices are presented as a tool for expanding intellectual control, and consequently, access and use. Chapter six returns to the themes in the introduction to consider the role of the archivist and the nature of the archival endeavor, and to propose new views of both based on the ideas in the intervening chapters."