{"id":554,"date":"2010-09-18T21:59:00","date_gmt":"2010-09-18T21:59:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/library\/2010\/09\/18\/restoring-calm-cooperating-archives-libraries-and-museums\/"},"modified":"2018-07-18T21:30:07","modified_gmt":"2018-07-18T21:30:07","slug":"restoring-calm-cooperating-archives-libraries-and-museums","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/library\/2010\/09\/18\/restoring-calm-cooperating-archives-libraries-and-museums\/","title":{"rendered":"Restoring CALM (Cooperating Archives, Libraries and Museums)"},"content":{"rendered":"

I am attending a conference this week titled \u201c<\/span>Yours Mine and Ours: Leadership Through Collaboration<\/span><\/a>\u201d. Specifically, the topic is convergence of archive, library and museum collections, a trend that seems to have been developing over the past decade.
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\u201cWe have no term in routine use which includes libraries, archives and museums\u201d bemoaned <\/span>Lorcan Dempsey<\/span><\/a>, when he headed the UK Office of Library Networking(UKOLN) in 1999. In the UKOLN quarterly, <\/span>Ariadne<\/span><\/a>, Dempsey argued that such a term was needed as all three types of \u201cmemory institutions\u201d faced the new challenges of representing their collections to researchers through the internet and of preserving digitized and born-digital objects electronically.<\/p>\n

When he headed the <\/span>US Institute of Museum & Library Services<\/span><\/a> a few years later, <\/span>Robert S. Martin<\/span><\/a> agreed that \u201c[w]hen we move from the physical to the digital world, the distinctions between text and image, object and artifact appear to diminish.\u201d Recognizing this, in 2003 the American professional organizations for Archives (SAA), Libraries (ALA) and Museums (AAM) created a joint committee (CALM) in which common concerns could be discussed.<\/p>\n

Speaking at the International Federation of Library Associations (IFLA) Conference that year, Martin reminded his audience that \u201c[h]istorically the distinctions between and among libraries, museums and archives have not always been so sharp and clear.\u201d Before industrial printing increased the volume of printed books exponentially and the bureaucratization of industry and government resulted in systematic record-keeping, \u201cthere was little practical differentiation.\u201d Museums, archives and libraries all preserved unique and valuable documents from the past for the benefit of present and future generations.<\/p>\n

When the British Museum (BM) was opened in 1759, it made available \u201cfor publick use to all posterity\u201d collections divided into three types which later generations would recognize as library, archive, and museum. \u201cKeepers\u201d of \u201cPrinted Books,\u201d \u201cManuscripts,\u201d and \u201cNatural and Artificial Productions\u201d reported to the BM\u2019s director, known as the \u201cPrincipal Librarian.\u201d In the British Empire\u2019s premiere collecting institution, library, archive and museum materials remained under one roof for the next two centuries.<\/p>\n

After industrialization, librarians became preoccupied with selecting, collecting and loaning mass-produced books; archivists with culling the most significant documentation from the mass of records kept by institutions and individuals; while curators focused on preserving scientific specimens, art objects and images, and making selections from them for occasional or permanent exhibition. The twentieth century was a period of divergence of the archival, library and museum professions. By the century\u2019s end the British Library was moving the last of its collections out of the venerable BM, representative of the breaking up of comprehensive collecting institutions throughout the world.<\/p>\n

If the twentieth century was one of divergence, however, the twenty-first seems to be leaning toward convergence. In 2004, Canada created a single repository, <\/span>Library & Archives Canada<\/span><\/a>, which included the former Dominion Archives, National Library and National Portrait Gallery. Other Canadian institutions, such as the <\/span>University of Calgary<\/span><\/a> followed suit. The Canadian model, \u201cCommon Administration\u201d is just one of three to be considered in this week\u2019s conference.<\/p>\n

Another model is \u201cCommon Interest\u201d an example of which is the <\/span>Biodiversity Heritage Library<\/span><\/a>, a collaborative between a dozen major natural science collections in the US and UK. The third model is \u201cCommon Values\u201d, exemplified by the UK Collections Trust\u2019s <\/span>CultureGrid<\/span><\/a>, a comprehensive catalog of British collections which will feed into the European Commission\u2019s <\/span>Europeana<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I am attending a conference this week titled \u201cYours Mine and Ours: Leadership Through Collaboration\u201d. Specifically, the topic is convergence of archive, library and museum collections, a trend that seems to have been developing over the past decade.\u201cWe have no Continue reading Restoring CALM (Cooperating Archives, Libraries and Museums)<\/span>→<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1227,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/library\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/554"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/library\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/library\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/library\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1227"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/library\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=554"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/library\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/554\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1415,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/library\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/554\/revisions\/1415"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/library\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=554"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/library\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=554"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/library\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=554"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}