Archives are repositories of memory, providing reliable evidence for examining the past. The four types of memory – personal, collective, historical, and archival – interact in complex and sometimes baffling ways to enable one to understand the past and to draw lessons from it. Archival memory is a social construct reflecting power relationships in society. Archivists and manuscripts curators play the important role of mediator in selecting records for preservation and providing research access to such collections. By recognizing and overcoming the bias toward records of powerful groups in society, archivists can provide a more balanced perspective on the past, and enable future generations to examine and evaluate the activities and contributions of all voices in one’s culture. Archives thus serve an important role in identifying and preserving the documentation that forms one’s historical memory.

Archives and memory

Preserving digital information: Report of the task force on archiving of digital information

In this article, we explore the long-term preservation implications of application programming interfaces (APIs) which govern access to data extracted from social media platforms. We begin by introducing the preservation problems that arise when APIs are the primary way to extract data from platforms, and how tensions fit with existing models of archives and digital repository development. We then define a range of possible types of API users motivated to access social media data from platforms and consider how these users relate to principles of digital preservation. We discuss how platforms’ policies and terms of service govern the set of possibilities for access using these APIs and how the current access regime permits persistent problems for archivists who seek to provide access to collections of social media data. We conclude by surveying emerging models for access to social media data archives found in the USA, including community driven not-for-profit community archives, university research repositories, and early industry–academic partnerships with platforms. Given the important role these platforms occupy in capturing and reflecting our digital culture, we argue that archivists and memory workers should apply a platform perspective when confronting the rich problem space that social platforms and their APIs present for the possibilities of social media data archives, asserting their role as “developer stewards” in preserving culturally significant data from social media platforms.

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Social media data archives in an API-driven world

Acknowledgements Introduction: Choteo – A Cuban Humor Chapter 1: Reformation and Transformation? Social Choteo after Machado’s Republic 1.

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Choteo Cubano: Humor as a Critical Tool in Twentieth-Century Cuban Theater

Introduction. The study describes the conditions for long-term preservation of the content of the institutional repositories of Swedish higher education institutions based on an investigation of ho ...

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Institutional repositories as infrastructures for long-term preservation

Whether overseeing institutional repositories, digital library collections, or digital preservation services, repository managers often establish file format policies intended to extend the longevity of collections under their care. While concerted efforts have been made in the library community to encourage common standards, digital preservation policies regularly vary from one digital library service to another. In the interest of gaining a broad view of contemporary digital preservation practice in North American research libraries, this paper presents the findings of a study of file format policies at Association of Research Libraries (ARL) member institutions. It is intended to present the digital preservation community with an assessment of the level of trust currently placed in common file formats in digital library collections and institutional repositories. Beginning with a summary of file format research to date, the authors describe the research methodology they used to collect and analyze data from the file format policies of ARL Library repositories and digital library services. The paper concludes with a presentation and analysis of findings that explore levels of confidence placed in image, text, audio, video, tabular data, software application, presentation, geospatial, and computer program file formats. The data show that file format policies have evolved little beyond the document and image digitization standards of traditional library reformatting programs, and that current approaches to file format policymaking must evolve to meet the challenges of research libraries' expanding digital repository services.

Digital Preservation File Format Policies of ARL Member Libraries: An Analysis

Overly Honest Data Repository Development

The Medusa digital preservation service at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign provides a storage environment for digital content selected for long-term retention by content managers and producers affiliated with the Library in order to ensure its enduring access and use. This paper reports on Medusa development, with emphasis on the research processes that informed key decisions related to its design, the central role of PREMIS metadata in its architecture, and future directions of integrating PREMIS management into a Fedora repository architecture. In so doing, it describes a strategy of digital preservation content management that draws strength from the creation and management of comprehensive PREMIS preservation metadata records.

https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/bitstream/handle/2142/45232/p49.pdf?sequence=2

Medusa at the university of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign: a digital preservation service based on PREMIS

The Cuban Theater Digital Archive (http://cubantheater. org) is a unique digital collection of Cuban theater resources established by Dr. Lillian Manzor at the University of Miami. Working at the intersection of humanities and digital media, its purpose is threefold: it is a resource for teaching, learning, and research; a digital repository for important Cuban theatrical materials little known outside the island; and a forum to foster scholarly communication in this field. This paper presents a theoretical overview of CTDA’s design and development, its technical infrastructure, and its role in research, teaching and learning.

Kyle R. Rimkus

Papers

Digital Preservation File Format Policies of ARL Member Libraries: An Analysis

Overly Honest Data Repository Development

Medusa at the university of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign: a digital preservation service based on PREMIS

Cuban Theater Digital Archive: A Multimodal Platform for Theater Documentation and Research

HathiTrust Ingest of Locally Managed Content: A Case Study from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign