15.Specialized Monographs. The archives field has begun to support the publication of volumes focused on particular archival functions, such as appraisal, or topics, such as academic archives. Over the past two decades, as well, the archives discipline has had a number of monographs published about certain aspects of its practice and theory. It is critically important for individuals to read these publications along with the basic textbooks and manuals. The nature of textbooks and manuals often works against reflecting change in archival knowledge and practice, but these specialized publications often contribute to debates within the field about needed changes and other issues, revealing that archival theory is not static but actually quite dynamic. In fact, many of these publications focus on particular areas of the profession undergoing change or needing to be changed. Some of these are directly in response to other monographs, articles, and studies.

16.The nature and value of these kinds of publications can be seen in the first of this kind in the archives field. Richard C. Berner, Archival Theory and Practice in the United States: A Historical Analysis (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1983) provided an in-depth analysis of the development to the early 1980s in the archival functions of arrangement and description, creating as well a model for viewing the development of the American archival community that remains current today (the idea of public archives and historical manuscripts traditions). Other publications examine aspects of archival arrangement and description, and they need to be read along with the Berner study. While not part of either the basic manual or archival fundamental series, Steven L. Hensen, Archives, Personal Papers, and Manuscripts: A Cataloging Manual for Archival Repositories, Historical Societies, and Manuscript Libraries, 2nd ed. (Chicago: Society of American Archivists, 1989) adds an important tool to the basic manuals on archival arrangement and description and it needs to be included on the reading list; it demonstrates the development of descriptive standards generated by computers that Berner lamented was not occurring until the 1970s. Elizabeth Black, Authority Control: A Manual for Archivists (Ottawa: Planning Committee on Descriptive Standards, Bureau of Canadian Archivists, 1991) is part of a group of publications sponsored by the Bureau of Canadian Archivists and intended to provide the foundation for a new Canadian archival descriptive standard, also emerging because of the need for the network of computers to be used in ways beneficial to the archival discipline.

17.While archival arrangement and description has generally been a primary emphasis of this profession, archival appraisal has spawned the greatest quantity of such specialized publications, reflecting the ongoing debates about the purpose, practice, and principles supporting this function. This may be because this is both the most difficult and intellectual aspect of the profession. Frank Boles, Archival Appraisal (New York: Neal-Schuman Publishers, Inc., 1991) was a pioneering effort to create a model for archival appraisal by studying how archivists think through the process of selecting records. The first chapter of this work provides a very useful review of thinking about this function through the 1980s. Joan K. Haas, Helen W. Samuels, and Barbara T. Simmons, Appraising the Records of Modern Science and Technology: A Guide (Cambridge: Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1985) represents a hybrid between manual and study, drawing on intensive investigation about the nature of scientific and technical records to develop some basic procedures for appraising these records. Lessons learned by one of these individuals went into the writing of a major re-thinking about the nature of records generated by colleges and universities. Helen W. Samuels, Varsity Letters: Documenting Modern Colleges and Universities (Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press, 1992) remains one of the most discussed and used volumes on archival appraisal. Other volumes on archival appraisal, also combining aspects of how-to manuals with more in-depth analysis of appraisal issues, include my own Documenting Localities: A Practical Model for American Archivists and Manuscripts Curators (Metuchen: Scarecrow Press, 1996) describing why archivists have traditionally been focused on localities while laying out some procedures for how to re-engineer both appraising and collecting.

18.Electronic records management has also generated substantial new writings in the form of monographs. The classic monograph on this topic is David Bearman, Electronic Evidence: Strategies for Managing Records in Contemporary Organizations (Pittsburgh: Archives and Museum Informatics, 1994), an argumentative, stimulating, and controversial set of essays on how archivists and others need to re-examine and re-think their most cherished notions on electronic records management. Bearman galvanized archivists and other records professionals into re-thinking how to work with electronic records. Another volume on this topic is Charles M. Dollar, Archival Theory and Information Technologies: The Impact of Information Technologies on Archival Principles and Methods (Macerata: University of Macerata Press, 1992), widely-recognized for being a benchmark in capturing changing perspectives of archivists on the topic of electronic records management; a newer work by Charles Dollar, Authentic Electronic Records: Strategies for Long-Term Access (Chicago: Cohassett Associates, 1999) reflects more recent research and debates and a portion of this book, with more complete description, can be viewed at consultant Rick Barry’s homepage. My own The First Generation of Electronic Records Archivists in the United States: A Study in Professionalization (Binghamton, NY: Haworth Press, Inc., 1994) is an effort to describe the substance of the same changing viewpoints from the 1960s through the 1980s, reflecting a period when electronic records were not viewed as records at all to a period when it was glibly assumed that all records programs would easily be working with such documents to a time when it became obvious that social science data archives and other methods were not sufficient. There are other basic writings on electronic records management. Records managers will also want to examine Guidelines on Best Practices for Using Electronic Information: How to Deal With Machine-Readable Data and Electronic Documents, rev. ed. (Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities, 1997), available at http://www2.echo.lu/dlm/en/gdlines.html. The Guidelines consider basic definitions, the life cycle approach, design and creation, preservation, and access and dissemination concerns. This set of best practices draws from Proceedings of the DLM-Forum on Electronic Records; Brussels, 18-20 December 1996 (Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities, 1997).

19.These monographs need to be supplemented with continually appearing reports providing interesting views on electronic records management and the continuing quest for standards, policies, and solutions. CENSA, the Collaborative Electronic Notebook Systems Association, issued a report at the end of December 1999 entitled “Titanic 2020.” The report argues that current information technology is not taking into account the need to maintain records over the long-term, suggesting that within ten years the number of records produced may be doubling every sixty minutes. The report worries about the short-term mentality in designing new systems. The report argues that this problem is far greater, more expensive, and laden with serious implications that the Y2K bug. Another useful report on a web site is that of the proceedings of the "Preservation and Access for Electronic University Records" conference, hosted by Arizona State University in October 1999, and with presentations by “archivists, technology professionals, attorneys, university registrars and librarians from ten universities across the nation.” The topics included records management for electronic courseware, metadata, collaborative enterprise system design issues and web page preservation, and the presentations are available at http://www.asu.edu/it/events/ecure/. The presentations include many bibliographic references and links to other Web sites. The self-reported conference highlights are “Emerging issues such as how to manage: Research data as institutional records; Distance education learning materials; Web-based documents; Electronic theses and dissertations,” and presentations on other issues such as “Access to electronic records and personal privacy; Ownership of electronic data, course materials, university records; Short- and long-term retention and records management; The state and federal regulatory environment; Case studies to learn from successes and build challenges; and Legal and ethical issues.” Another report, Guideline for Managing E-mail (Prairie Village, Kansas: ARMA International, 2000) brings together a lot of useful information about the elements needed in setting organizational policies for electronic mail. The publication is a commonsense approach to electronic mail issues, with advice such as “The e-mail policy should be developed within the larger context of the organization’s records management structure” (p. 1) and “Each organization’s e-mail policy will reflect its own culture and the legal and regulatory framework within which it operates” (p. 3). The report defines electronic mail, describes organizational environment issues, examines the creation and use of electronic mail, looks at the matter of managing electronic mail, and considers its disposition. Some appendices are included on the topics of electronic mail and litigation and as evidence, along with a bibliography and glossary. However, the report includes this statement: “The lack of commercial off-the-shelf technology and the expense of custom-developed solutions, however, may make electronic preservation of large volumes of e-mail records impractical at the present time. For many organizations, preserving e-mail records will require printing the e-mail messages to and then preserving the paper or microfilming the printed copies” (p. 15). This is the fatal flaw to this report, suggesting the problem still facing records professionals concerned with electronic mail and other electronic records. There is a considerable body of literature and viewpoints suggesting that too much is lost in printing out electronic mail.

20.Some of these specialized monographs have teetered uneasily between being research studies and manuals for improving practice. Some, as the ones about electronic records management, must be supplemented by conference reports and other publications. This is, of course, one of the age-old tensions in the archives field, and it could be considered a distinctive mark of this field’s literature rather than an issue for debate. Philip C. Brooks, Research in Archives: The Use of Unpublished Primary Sources (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1969), besides being one of the oldest specialized studies in the field, represents an effort to describe how researchers need to approach archives; today, however, it is probably read more by archivists than those outside the field. Heather MacNeil, Without Consent: The Ethics of Disclosing Personal Information in Public Archives (Metuchen, N.J.: Scarecrow Press, 1992) is an analysis of the problems of determining how to provide access to records possessing personal information, considering changing notions of research and evolving records systems. Without Consent builds to a set of recommendations about how to allow research in such records. A traditional approach to archival reference can be found in Frank G. Burke, Research and the Manuscript Tradition (Lanham, Md.: The Scarecrow Press, and Chicago: The Society of American Archivists, 1997) describing the nature of evidence in archives and historical manuscripts, the evolution of archival finding aids, the acquisition and appraisal of historical manuscripts and archives, the nature of technology uses in and challenges to the archival community, issues concerning archival arrangement and description, the use and misuse of deeds of gift, security and access approaches in archival repositories, legal and ethical dilemmas, and changes in personal communications in our modern electronic age and the implications for archivists and researchers. We can add to this genre of writing, William Maher, The Management of College and University Archives (Metuchen, N.J.: Scarecrow Press, 1992). His volume is both a basic “how-to” manage academic archives, as well as a serious effort in bringing together a considerable amount of information about the nature of these archival programs. The Maher volume is also one of the testiest writings on the relationship of theory to practice, taking the viewpoint that most archival theory is useless for practical purposes.

21.There are some works, sometimes bringing together previously published materials that strive less to make practical solutions and more simply to analyze and document the nature of the archival profession and its work. My American Archival Analysis: The Recent Development of the Archival Profession in the United States (Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press, 1990) is one such example, seeking to explain the ferment of change characterizing the American archival profession in the 1970’s and 1980’s. Another example of a repackaging of previously published materials is Luciana Duranti, Diplomatics: New Uses for an Old Science (Lanham, MD: Society of American Archivists and Association of Canadian Archivists in association with Scarecrow Press, 1998), bringing together one of the most important series of articles on archival theory published in the past two decades. Duranti’s description of the Renaissance science of diplomatics has been used and re-used in the discussions about the definition of the record, comprehending recordkeeping systems, and managing electronic records. There are other essays and writings on diplomatics, but Duranti’s effort is directed right at the implications for modern archival work even though it represents an extremely rigid view of archival theory. For Duranti, diplomatics is the core of both older and modern archival science, and, in her opinion, there can be no wavering from this basic supposition. Many others hold more liberal views, or discount her view altogether. Regardless, Duranti’s book and other writings make for stimulating reading.