Archivists Provide Information That Is

Archivists provide information that is useful as resource for use by public historians in doing their work. Archivists make that information available by collecting, preserving and processing the primary source material information they have collected .the archives created by archivists serve the general public and scholars that are dependent on them to make identification, preservation and also make the materials they have collected available. The archival profession involves practices such as the collections, appraisal, acquisition, arrangement, description, reference and preservation of the primary materials collected (Pearson, 2012).

The archival profession is a very dynamic and exciting profession that is faced with real issues. All these issues that face archival profession today are related to how the collections are created and how the archivists make the collections available once they have been collected for users and other researchers. If materials are identified as being archival materials following an appraisal process they are taken to archives by archivists and they are processed and at the end made available to be accessed by archival users.

In the archival profession the process that is used for availing and making accessible the materials is unique to each archive. Depending on the material backlogs of the different materials to be processed can be created when some aspects of the process are not considered. The two major issues facing the archival profession are the advancement of technology and the arrangement and description of the archival materials. When it comes to technology advancement the use of Born-digital materials are posing a unique issue in the archival profession.

This is because they are constantly threatened by technology obsolescence and even physical deterioration. Born-digital materials are documents that are created in a digital format and they have not been converted from another format. The management of the digital materials share similar practices like those used in managing analog materials. However the main difference between analog and the born-digital materials lies in their existence. Born-digital materials exist separately and are not joined together physically as opposed to the print or analog materials this means that the born-digital materials are ephemeral.

Their existence and management is as separate pieces that make their archival qualities and archival management to be unique from analog materials. There is emergence of different types of born-digital records. These materials range from documents that are created using word processing software and email web site content, video and audio that are digital, instant messages and art that is digitally created. The diverse archival materials have created and affected new challenges for the archival profession (Asogwa, B .E & Ezema, 2008).

Born digital documents and materials affect every aspect of the archival practice. The acquisition and processing of born-digital materials is different from the traditional archival documents this is due to the fact that their provenance is considered questionable. The born-digital materials are can easily undergo modification or get changed when they are compared to analog materials. The nature of which they are created gives room for the bringing into question of whether they are authentic and reliable. The born-digital documents also present preservation challenges to the archivists as well.

When preserving analog materials, the focus is primarily on the maintenance of physical attributes of the material on the other hand in born-digital material the main focus is the maintenance of an easy way that the archivist can access the materials. Therefore the born-digital materials will pose a challenge in the archival profession on the maintaining of the physical attribute of the materials they have collected.

In case the software or machines that are necessary for the accessing of the materials that the archivists have preserved is no longer in service or not available then they will not be able or in a position to access the materials. Since they are machine dependent, in case the hardware and software that is required to read the materials are no longer available it will mean that the materials will no longer be accessible.

The media used to store the material are seen to be less stable inherently as compared to the traditional materials. Electronic materials are prone to accidental damage since they can be accidentally deleted in a single key stroke (Hollier, (2001).The preservation of these types of archival documents is seen to pose quite a significant challenge in the archival profession since if there is no viable method of the preservation of documents then they will not be accessible and hence the materials will not be useful in any way.

In order to address the challenges that are posed by the use of bio-digital materials, archivists should ensure that they address some specific considerations. One of the things they should consider is that technology changes at rates that are relatively constant. These technological changes have a very great potential of hampering the accessibility of the born-digital materials. Therefore the archivists should take up a multilayered approach in making attempts to mitigate the issues that relate to accessibility of the material.

The archivists should work hand in hand with the creators so that they can institute specific standards that will ensure that future access of the materials is enhanced. They should also design policies and procedures that are designed specifically for the identification of those documents and also state clearly that that not all documents will be saved and this will help in the prolonging of accessibility.

The archivists should also attempt to control the materials by using metadata that is structured and also other documentation to help in the process of preservation. In addition the finding of ways that provides access to the materials even with the constant change of technology.

The issue of accessibility therefore affect every aspect of the archival processing of the born-digital materials since the main idea that underlies the whole process of archiving materials is to allow the access of these archived materials in the future (Experimental Library,2012) When it comes to the second issue that archivists face, the arrangement and description of materials what should be considered is the level of the detail and description that should be considered while arranging the materials. The processing rates of the different materials vary greatly.

The level of details and description that each collection receives has a direct effect on the ability of the archivists to process the collections that are recently found. Archivists may face challenges that may lead to eventual backlog if a collection has a more exhaustive description and hence requires more time to process it. The actual arrangement of what has been collected acts as a guide for the level of the detail and description that each collection that is made by an archivist receives.

This can be on a folder level; item level and this add the time taken for the arrangement and description of a collection. This will be a challenge for the archivists since they will use most of their time in a process that is slow when it comes to the processing of the incoming archival collections. Every aspect of the archival practice is affected by the backlogs that created in case of inconsistent arrangements and description of any new materials that have been collected.

This implies that if an archivists takes spends most of their time in processing, they will have less time for the preservation, appraisal of other materials they collected, the referencing of this materials .any new material that an archivist collects requires for them to be arranged and described in unique ways according to their contents. However in case there exists backlogs of materials that have been collected but they have not been processed it becomes a challenge.

Therefore there is the need to come up with ways that will ensure quick processing that are in line with the needs of the users and.