This paper examines key challenges in archival appraisal and acquisition across three interconnected discussions. The first addresses the difficulty of cataloguing large collections, arguing that volunteer labor offers a better solution than superficial processing shortcuts recommended by the "More Product, Less Process" framework. The second critiques NARA's shift toward digital records management, questioning whether the agency is acting in the public interest or its own convenience when assessing collection value. The third evaluates a peer's critique of a library science article, identifying weaknesses such as missing citations, absent direct quotations, and failure to connect findings to established selection frameworks like the six-step process outlined in archival appraisal course materials.
Archivists should try to collect records that have enduring value (Module #2: Archival Appraisal and Acquisition, n.d.). However, one problem is that value is subjective, and determining which records will have value — whether currently or in the future — is a difficult task. Not only does it require interacting with the public and gaining an understanding of what the public is likely to value, it requires knowing what records one has in the first place (Evans & Saponaro, 2012; Johnson, 2014). As the article by Somers (2017) shows, for a large library archive, there is simply not enough staff to go through all the records sufficiently. This means that indexing them is a slow process, which often leads donors and patrons to complain of delays in obtaining access to material that has been donated but not yet fully archived.
Additionally, Somers (2017) notes that archivists often take time to organize files in a more categorical way, even though one of the key concepts of archival arrangement is to maintain records in the order given to them by their creator (Archival Arrangement and Description, n.d.). In many cases, identifying the original order can be time-consuming, especially when the material obtained is disheveled — such as notes, letters, journals, and clippings. New recommendations from a paper titled "More Product, Less Process" urged librarians to move through materials more quickly: "Pointing out that as much as 80 percent of the archivists' time was spent 'refoldering,' the paper offered shortcuts that, it claimed, would make more collections available without sacrificing much in the way of intellectual accessibility" (Somers, 2017). However, these shortcuts come at the risk of losing a clear sense of what is truly in one's possession.
The problem of going through records piece by piece and labeling them in detail so that researchers can know what is on file and where it can be found is that the sheer volume of material to be catalogued is simply too great. It cannot all be reviewed thoroughly. Yet if it is not all reviewed, it is difficult to know what is actually possessed. One solution could be to use volunteers — professional or retired researchers who have experience researching and labeling records. They could be trained by library staff to do the work that libraries lack the funds and resources to do themselves.
In order for researchers to know what libraries hold and to be able to access those materials, everything must be read, sorted, and catalogued — and there is no easy or simple way to cut corners on this process. Enlisting individuals willing to donate their time for the sake of the research community is undoubtedly the best approach to addressing this issue. This is far preferable to the approach identified by Somers (2017), in which librarians do not actually read all the material they are cataloguing but merely skim it to get a general sense of its content. Such an approach could result in potentially very valuable documents being effectively "lost" within a collection, and that outcome should be avoided at all costs.
"NARA digital transition and public interest concerns"
"Weaknesses identified in a peer's article critique"
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