Beyond controversy: Appraising websites and social media in the university archives

Bethany Anderson, University of VirginiaJuly 2, 2019ICA-SUV conference, Dundee, Scotland

The University of Virginia (UVA)

Photos courtesy of the Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library, University of Virginia

Academical village

Image from the Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs: Print Collection, The New York Public Library. "University of Virginia." New York Public Library Digital Collections. Accessed June 27, 2018. http://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/510d47d9-7b8a-a3d9-e040-e00a18064a99.

https://at.virginia.edu/2XbOecv

Interrogating UVA’s history

Websites and social media can help us shift the emphasis from capturing documentation about people to documentation by people

The university and controversy

http://sullivan.lib.virginia.edu/

https://archives.library.illinois.edu/social-media-archives/salaita-reference-index/

Universities and controversies

Archivists should “...become active participants in the creation, analysis, and selection of the documentary record.” - Helen Willa Samuels (Varsity Letters, 1992)

Collecting Student Organization Websites and Social Media

Macro-appraisal and functional analysis

“The objective is to capture the full richness of provenance information—the structures, processes, and activities of organizations—and to make routine the inferential process which permits one to locate information which has been or is being created by organizational activities.” (David Bearman and Richard H. Lytle, “The Power of the Principle of Provenance,” Archivaria (1985-86))

What functions/activities document the university?

Which perspectives are not represented?

Seven Functions from Varsity Letters

Promote culture

Convey knowledge

Confer credentials

Foster socialization

Provide public service

Conduct research

Sustain the institution

Promote cultureUVA Athletics

Honor Committee

UVA Twitter account

What would functions/activities as documented from the bottom up look like?

Advocating diversity

Advocating for pay equity

Holding the university accountable for its actions

Participating in larger societal and political dialogues

Others?

#fightforsixteen/Living Wage campaign: Advocating for pay equity/holding university accountable

#voicesandvisibility/UVA Charge: Advocating diversity (women in STEM)

Extinction club Facebook page: participating in larger societal and political dialogues

A university is also a “health care provider, entertainment center, sports business, start-up incubator, sustainability coordinator, and industrial and government research center, not to mention a food service, and employment agency…” Chad Wellmon (Organizing Enlightenment, 2015)

The University

Advocating diversity

Advocating for pay equity

Holding the university

accountable

Participating is societal/political

dialogues

View from the Bottom up

(These are subject to be fluid and change over time)

Thank you!

Bethany Andersonbga3d@virginia.edu

Select ReferencesBantin, Philip. “Strategies for Managing Electronic Records: A New Archival Paradigm? An Affirmation of our Archival Traditions?” Archival Issues 23 (1998): 17-34.

Bearman, David and Richard H. Lytle. “The Power of the Principle of Provenance.” Archivaria (1985-86): 14-27.

Cook, Terry. “Macro-appraisal and Functional Analysis: Documenting Governance rather than Government.” Journal of the Society of Archivists 25 (2004): 8.

Harrower, Natalie and Bahareh Rahmanzadeh Heravi, “How to Archive and Event: Reflections on the Social Repository of Ireland,” New Review of Information Networking 20 (2015): 104-116.

Lamoree, Karen M. “Documenting the Difficult or Collecting the Controversial.” Archival Issues (1995): 149-154.

Samuels, Helen. Varsity Letters: Documenting Modern Colleges and Universities. Chicago, IL: Society of American Archivists, 1992.

Wellmon, Chad. Organizing Enlightenment. Baltimore, MD.: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2015.