I'll be giving a little talk next month at the fortieth anniversary conference of the Society of Georgia Archivists, and SGA asked a few of the speakers at the conference to answer a handful of questions about archives, for publication on their blog.
I've ignored this dear blog of my own for so long, since other responsibilities and interests have eaten away my time, that I thought I should repeat these questions here, in the hope that doing so might encourage me to do a little more thinking about archives in this space. Whether this tactic works or not to motivate me, I had a good time answering these questions:
How did you become an archivist?
At some point early in adulthood, I had a couple of degrees in English clutched in my fist and no interest in making the next step and earning a PhD in the field. I found myself in need of a career, so I faced a decision that thousands of people have had to make over the course of human history: Do I become an archivist or a lexicographer? My interest in lexicography, which continues to this day, grew out of my interest in language and the magical way in which discrete sets sounds or markings could carry so much meaning. My interest in archives grew out of my early work as a genealogist, where the only valuable research—I soon came to discover—came from using actual records. Of course, both fields have an abiding focus on detail and thoroughness, which helped make my decision more difficult.
But my life experiences made my ultimate decision simple. One day in a small town in rural France, I stumbled across a critical church book, a book I didn’t know existed in a town I had not planned to visit, and that changed me. The process of finding the book was happenstance. My father and I had stopped at a church to ask directions to the next town, and the priest there suggested we look through his books. The book itself was tossed in a cabinet filled with books and papers askew, and the ink was flaking off its pages, leading me to wonder how much longer the volume would last.
I became an archivist because I decided that this field held more opportunity than lexicography did, and that proved to be a correct conclusion. But I really became an archivist because I decided that people needed something better than happenstance to find a record, because I realized that records needed to be cared for if we wanted them to last and be used into the future, and because archives is a humanistic enterprise: We keep records not for the records themselves, but for the people who need them. Although central to our imagination, records are almost ancillary to our mission because those records have value only to the degree that people need them, to the extent that the records serve humanity, in big and small ways.
So I am an archivist because I’m passionate about the interplay between the record as a continuing embodiment of humanness and the humans whose lives and work and passions can be supported by those records.
What's changed the most since you became an archivist?
I am just old enough so that my training for my MLS included only cursory coverage of electronic records. In 1988, there were still a few people at school who did not have computers of their own, and people were a little unsure about what this electronic world was going to be and how it was going to affect our lives. So although there have been many changes to the profession since I became an archivist—a greater reliance on standards, a healthy broadening of the archival profession, and clear progress towards greater professionalism—the biggest change is that huge and often sleeping giant in our midst: electronic records and our crying need to manage them well. The question of “forever,” the question of permanence haunts us deeply with electronic records, and we still feel incapable of dealing with electronic records.
And that self-doubt shows. Most of us struggle to deal with electronic records. A few hope to avoid them altogether. Many probably believe that electronic records do not have the allure, the ineffable attraction of paper records or, better yet, records on parchment—yet these all are merely signs of human activity, each filled with the same blood and life that any other record of the same type holds. If anything will define our era of archives, if anything has the greatest potential to leave our tender throats exposed to the sharp blade of criticism, it is how we address this huge necessary change in our work. This is our greatest challenge, and one that we have to be up to. We cannot lose this battle. The signs everywhere demonstrate that we are experiencing a digital sea change at this very moment. Digital photography far outstrips traditional photography. A current blockbuster best seller is selling better on Amazon.com as an e-book than in paper. And most of the recorded information in the world is born digital and often dies without ever touching paper. If we don’t teach ourselves how to manage electronic records, we will be incapable of fulfilling our broad mission to document human activity. The recorded world, the world of unique and fleeting records, the world that we are responsible for preserving, will disappear.
What's stayed the same (for better or worse)?
Even in the face of enormous change over the last twenty years, I’m sure that much has remained unchanged, but what I think about most in this regard is us. As archivists, we are sometimes too cautious for our own good. Why? Because we know that we are each an essential link in a profound chain of responsibility, and because we know that our mistakes could very well have negative consequences that will last forever. Any record lost or destroyed on our watch is likely a record that will never be seen again, so caution is our byword. But caution can take us only so far. At some point we need to be fearless, we need to take calculated risks, we need to accept (for instance) that we might fail if we try to preserve electronic records. Yet if we do nothing, we know we will fail, and we cannot guarantee failure. What we, as archivists, have to learn, even if it goes against our general nature sometimes, is how to take risks and how to advocate for necessary change in our organizations.
How did you become interested in electronic records?
As computers arrived in our lives, I became interested in them for what they could do for us, for how they could change our lives, so I experimented early with computers to figure out how they might support a different kind of writing, provide greater control over page design, and allow for the creation of kinetic poems for the screen. And this last interest made me someone interested in the knotty problems of digital preservation back in 1986. Starting back then, before I was an archivist or thinking of becoming one, I developed a plan for preserving the first significant collection of early digital poems, the Canadian poet bpNichol’s “First Screening." To ensure the preservation of these poems, I preserved, as well as I could, the original 5.25-inch diskette that held them and a backup copy I had made, I printed out the computer code, and I created a videotape of the poems playing on a screen. What I failed to do was save the code electronically, but I saved enough for a dedicated group of people to reproduce the original experience of watching these poems move on screen. I was the only archivist in this endeavor.
My interest in electronic records, you see, grew out of a personal interest in preserving digital experiences of what it is to be human. What I didn’t want to lose was that sense of what we were as humans at any point in the digital past. For some people, the digital world is somehow inhuman and soulless, but I do not see it in that way. The digital is what makes us unique as animals. The digital is simply another way in which we express ourselves. I like to tell people that digital records are those records that best represent us because they, like us, require electrical impulses to be.
What advice do you have for new archivists or those interested in the profession?
My first bit of advice to new archivists is “Don’t limit yourself.” When I was in library school, my goal was to work eventually in literary manuscripts. And I have seen a literary manuscript or two in my career, but those opportunities to work in that particular field never materialized. Instead, work in government records did, and work with a broader records management focus but centered in an archival framework. What I have found is that this work is exciting, various, challenging, and that it has allowed me to work with hundreds, if not thousands, of people over my career. The flexibility I had, borne originally merely out of a desire to pay my bills, proved more than worth it in the end. My other bit of advice is to take pride in what we do as archivists, and by that I don’t mean that we should take pride in how we care for records (though we must do that as well). I mean that we must realize, accept, and prize that we are service workers, that we serve, every day, human beings. There is no higher calling.
archivity furthers
Wednesday, October 07, 2009
Saturday, November 08, 2008
Post-Blogging Post
Rob Jensen came to the blogging session afterwards to explain that he and others at the MARAC registration desk were reading the live blogging Arian Ravanbaksh, John LeGloahec, and I were doing at the session, even leaving a comment on one. That's live blogging.
archivity furthers
archivity furthers
Blogging Blogging: Q&A
Crowne Plaza, Room 1104, Silver Spring, Maryland
Questions about the session focus primarily on how to manage their own blogging.
Kate notes that bloggers will have to keep preservation in mind, since the service provider does not.
There was a question about whether people are addressing the issue of reuse of blog comments by the institutions with the blog.
Another asks if researcers might be worried about the reference blog, since they might be proprietary about their research and not want others to use it. Jim notes that the researcher are not told about the blog but neither are their names or research projects named.
Question: Any problem with having a blog on a collection related to a living person. Elizabeth Hull notes that they have not had such problems, even from High Morton's family.
In answer to another question, Jim notes that they are working to convert their old reference files to the new system but that this is not a priority.
archivity furthers
Questions about the session focus primarily on how to manage their own blogging.
Kate notes that bloggers will have to keep preservation in mind, since the service provider does not.
There was a question about whether people are addressing the issue of reuse of blog comments by the institutions with the blog.
Another asks if researcers might be worried about the reference blog, since they might be proprietary about their research and not want others to use it. Jim notes that the researcher are not told about the blog but neither are their names or research projects named.
Question: Any problem with having a blog on a collection related to a living person. Elizabeth Hull notes that they have not had such problems, even from High Morton's family.
In answer to another question, Jim notes that they are working to convert their old reference files to the new system but that this is not a priority.
archivity furthers
Blogging Blogging: Gerencser
Crowne Plaza, Room 1104, Silver Spring, Maryland
One blogging problem in this session I just downladed a blogging app, which works reasonably well but doesn't save drafts, so I just lost an almost complete posting because I switched to another program on the iPhone for a second. Hence no posting on Elizabeth Hull's presentation.
Jim Gerencser is nose discussing thee Dickinson College Archives and Special Collections reference blog. He is talking about how to manage data related to remote reference requests better than over the prior paper process.
There new solution was for the results of the reference transaction to be posted on the blog. One advantage of this is that a user might find their way to Dickinson College while searching for the same information. As Jim says, "Google is God nowadays." Another advantage of this blog is to allow the results of the reference event to be easily searchable by staff re-searching for the same information.
(The two laptop bloggers have been shut down by lost battery power, but I go on thumbing against the iPhone, borne forward ceaselessly into the future.)
Jim shows us the blog postings, which retain the confidentiality of the researcher. They are always careful to include proper nouns for the valuable use with search engines. Blog postings include links to finding aids and other resources and they use tags to allow a user to find all the postings on the same topic. Commenting is allowed, but they have never received a comment and don't expect much use of commenting. Interestingly, users who could not find the finding aid have found the blog. These blog entries are quite simple and to the point, reducing the language primarily to searchable essentials.
The system also tracks the specific fees charged and researcher name (although these are not posted to the blog), allowing the to run statistics, such as those identifying the general topic (genealogy, local history, etc.) of the requests. They use Drupal to manage this blog.
Refeence stories are cuatomizable, findable, searchable, linkable, taggable, and obtainable. They hope in the future to have scanned images of retrieved records included in the system, just as they currently have detailed information on location of the material.
archivity furthers
One blogging problem in this session I just downladed a blogging app, which works reasonably well but doesn't save drafts, so I just lost an almost complete posting because I switched to another program on the iPhone for a second. Hence no posting on Elizabeth Hull's presentation.
Jim Gerencser is nose discussing thee Dickinson College Archives and Special Collections reference blog. He is talking about how to manage data related to remote reference requests better than over the prior paper process.
There new solution was for the results of the reference transaction to be posted on the blog. One advantage of this is that a user might find their way to Dickinson College while searching for the same information. As Jim says, "Google is God nowadays." Another advantage of this blog is to allow the results of the reference event to be easily searchable by staff re-searching for the same information.
(The two laptop bloggers have been shut down by lost battery power, but I go on thumbing against the iPhone, borne forward ceaselessly into the future.)
Jim shows us the blog postings, which retain the confidentiality of the researcher. They are always careful to include proper nouns for the valuable use with search engines. Blog postings include links to finding aids and other resources and they use tags to allow a user to find all the postings on the same topic. Commenting is allowed, but they have never received a comment and don't expect much use of commenting. Interestingly, users who could not find the finding aid have found the blog. These blog entries are quite simple and to the point, reducing the language primarily to searchable essentials.
The system also tracks the specific fees charged and researcher name (although these are not posted to the blog), allowing the to run statistics, such as those identifying the general topic (genealogy, local history, etc.) of the requests. They use Drupal to manage this blog.
Refeence stories are cuatomizable, findable, searchable, linkable, taggable, and obtainable. They hope in the future to have scanned images of retrieved records included in the system, just as they currently have detailed information on location of the material.
archivity furthers
Blogging Blogging: Theimer
At MARAC blogging on an iPhone about a session where Kate Theimer is mentioning me. Kate talks about types of archival blogging: processing blog, institutional news blog, and personal opinion blog. She discusses the simple technology for the blogger and the features and functionality you can choose for a blog. Her opening discusses some basics about bringing traffic to a blog: announcements elsewhere, getting on a thematic aggregator (like ArchivesBlogs), and linking to other blogs. Kate notes that she gets comments even from Europe and that she has a book deal even because of the blog. She notes that blogging is publishing, a very public venue, which a blogger need to keep in mind. She notes that some bloggers include much personal information, but that is a personal choice. Her point appears to be to advise the beginning or potential blogger about archives.
She ends by "pretending" to like the three of us (LeGloahec, Ravanbaksh, and me) because we are livebligging the session.
archivity furthers
She ends by "pretending" to like the three of us (LeGloahec, Ravanbaksh, and me) because we are livebligging the session.
archivity furthers
Thursday, September 04, 2008
Of Archives and Poetry Redux
Tom Beckett and I have continued our conversation about poetry and archives, and I've decided to post that part of our conversation in the interest of completeness:
Tom Beckett: I worked on The Difficulties for 10 years. That magazine, that project, was literally a part of daily life for 10 years. That’s a pretty substantial commitment of energy, time and money. There were a few years of figurative hangover as the intoxication of that involvement faded, as well as a subsequent sobering up to the realization that many people I’d been in touch with weren’t interested in communicating with me now that I was no longer doing a magazine.
The 1990s were rough years for me. There were financial issues, family issues. I was having problems with depression. No one seemed to be interested in my writing.
I sold my archive to Yale in November of 1997. Months before that I had been invited to lunch by Alex Gildzen and Brad Westbrook, both of whom then worked in Special Collections at Kent State University Library. They made a pitch for me to donate my papers to Kent State. I refused, saying that I would do so only if they built a larger collection around it. I knew Kent State University’s poetry holdings and knew that there was very little material by the writers most important to me. As much as I would have liked to work with Alex and Brad, the context of KSU’s library just didn’t make sense as a repository for my papers.
At one point I sent a letter to Bob Bertholf at SUNY Buffalo asking if his institution might be interested in purchasing the material and named a cash figure which was on the high side, no doubt—a feeler. I thought his response was sort of condescending, but then I always had that feeling when hearing from Dr. Bob.
Finally, I wrote to Yale and told them roughly what and how much I had. I said, and this was really low balling a figure, that they could have it all for $7500 and postage. They accepted immediately. I bought bankers boxes and shipped it all off. After I received payment I had no further interaction with Yale.
$7500 is the most money I’ve ever had one time. I used it to buy my first brand new, internet-capable, computer, some office furniture, and to settle a couple of debts.
I sold my archive because I needed the money, because I couldn’t take care of the material, and because I needed to exorcise the experience of having done The Difficulties and move on to whatever the next phase of my creative life might me. And I had a feeling that that computer, that connection to the internet, might have something to do with whatever was going to happen next.
I also sold the archive because, after years of laboring in obscurity, I felt somewhat hostage to it, and wanted it out of our household
I’m guessing, Geof, that you’re probably somewhat horrified by the way I dealt away my “archive.” I thought that Yale, with its resources and staff, would probably handle the materials responsibly. Even if they didn’t understand the context(s) within which it had been created. I also felt an emotional connection with Yale since it is the repository of Gertrude Stein’s papers.
Geof Huth: I’m not horrified at all with how you managed your papers. You actually seem to have made sound decisions the entire way. You wanted your records to live in a place that gave them some context, which is something that archivists look for all the time: records have more meaning in context with other records that were created along with them, and they have more value if maintained somewhere that includes other records that put them in historical context. The University at Buffalo’s collection would have been a reasonable home for these papers, allowing them the greater context of all the other poetry and poetry collections there. You reduced your asking price when you asked Yale, based on your response to Bertholf, and then you assured your records a home in a respected repository with a serious focus on poetry. Even Stein counts as context in this case, since so much of what she did informed the entire language poetry movement. Your asking price was probably a little low—since Yale accepted it without reviewing the records in much detail—but repositories buy very few manuscript collections, so you did well.
Dealing with one’s papers is always an emotional issue because personal papers are tied up with an individual’s identity and aspirations. These papers can document success or failure, capture the ambition of the person who created them, and tell us something about who that person was. When we surrender our papers to an archives, we do so because our lives are going in a different direction, because we are ready to relinquish part of our lives to memory, or simply because we need to make space in our homes. Our papers are the secondary embodiment of ourselves, and we treat them as we do with that in mind. When you decided to destroy some of your blogs or drafts of your poems, you did so knowing you were destroying a tiny record of yourself, a part of yourself. When you decided to sell your papers to Yale, you decided what part of your life was worth saving, from your point of view, even if you did not want to liver with that part of your life anymore. And all of it is good. We cannot judge such personal decisions from afar. We might disagree with people’s decisions about their personal papers, but we have to accept them. These decisions are, in the end, objective fact, the firm hand of reality, squeezing tight.
archivity furthers
Tom Beckett: I worked on The Difficulties for 10 years. That magazine, that project, was literally a part of daily life for 10 years. That’s a pretty substantial commitment of energy, time and money. There were a few years of figurative hangover as the intoxication of that involvement faded, as well as a subsequent sobering up to the realization that many people I’d been in touch with weren’t interested in communicating with me now that I was no longer doing a magazine.
The 1990s were rough years for me. There were financial issues, family issues. I was having problems with depression. No one seemed to be interested in my writing.
I sold my archive to Yale in November of 1997. Months before that I had been invited to lunch by Alex Gildzen and Brad Westbrook, both of whom then worked in Special Collections at Kent State University Library. They made a pitch for me to donate my papers to Kent State. I refused, saying that I would do so only if they built a larger collection around it. I knew Kent State University’s poetry holdings and knew that there was very little material by the writers most important to me. As much as I would have liked to work with Alex and Brad, the context of KSU’s library just didn’t make sense as a repository for my papers.
At one point I sent a letter to Bob Bertholf at SUNY Buffalo asking if his institution might be interested in purchasing the material and named a cash figure which was on the high side, no doubt—a feeler. I thought his response was sort of condescending, but then I always had that feeling when hearing from Dr. Bob.
Finally, I wrote to Yale and told them roughly what and how much I had. I said, and this was really low balling a figure, that they could have it all for $7500 and postage. They accepted immediately. I bought bankers boxes and shipped it all off. After I received payment I had no further interaction with Yale.
$7500 is the most money I’ve ever had one time. I used it to buy my first brand new, internet-capable, computer, some office furniture, and to settle a couple of debts.
I sold my archive because I needed the money, because I couldn’t take care of the material, and because I needed to exorcise the experience of having done The Difficulties and move on to whatever the next phase of my creative life might me. And I had a feeling that that computer, that connection to the internet, might have something to do with whatever was going to happen next.
I also sold the archive because, after years of laboring in obscurity, I felt somewhat hostage to it, and wanted it out of our household
I’m guessing, Geof, that you’re probably somewhat horrified by the way I dealt away my “archive.” I thought that Yale, with its resources and staff, would probably handle the materials responsibly. Even if they didn’t understand the context(s) within which it had been created. I also felt an emotional connection with Yale since it is the repository of Gertrude Stein’s papers.
Geof Huth: I’m not horrified at all with how you managed your papers. You actually seem to have made sound decisions the entire way. You wanted your records to live in a place that gave them some context, which is something that archivists look for all the time: records have more meaning in context with other records that were created along with them, and they have more value if maintained somewhere that includes other records that put them in historical context. The University at Buffalo’s collection would have been a reasonable home for these papers, allowing them the greater context of all the other poetry and poetry collections there. You reduced your asking price when you asked Yale, based on your response to Bertholf, and then you assured your records a home in a respected repository with a serious focus on poetry. Even Stein counts as context in this case, since so much of what she did informed the entire language poetry movement. Your asking price was probably a little low—since Yale accepted it without reviewing the records in much detail—but repositories buy very few manuscript collections, so you did well.
Dealing with one’s papers is always an emotional issue because personal papers are tied up with an individual’s identity and aspirations. These papers can document success or failure, capture the ambition of the person who created them, and tell us something about who that person was. When we surrender our papers to an archives, we do so because our lives are going in a different direction, because we are ready to relinquish part of our lives to memory, or simply because we need to make space in our homes. Our papers are the secondary embodiment of ourselves, and we treat them as we do with that in mind. When you decided to destroy some of your blogs or drafts of your poems, you did so knowing you were destroying a tiny record of yourself, a part of yourself. When you decided to sell your papers to Yale, you decided what part of your life was worth saving, from your point of view, even if you did not want to liver with that part of your life anymore. And all of it is good. We cannot judge such personal decisions from afar. We might disagree with people’s decisions about their personal papers, but we have to accept them. These decisions are, in the end, objective fact, the firm hand of reality, squeezing tight.
archivity furthers
Wednesday, September 03, 2008
Of Archives and Poetry
As I approach the night when I'll begin to recall again the events of SAA 2009, I have decided to post a few words I've posted elsewhere, words that intermix two strands of my life (archives and poetry), and words that begin to examine a layperson's experiences with archives and archivists:
Today, Tom Beckett posted his response to my last question I sent him in our yearlong interview of each other. What follows below is my answer to his request: “Talk, if you would Geof, about the importance of archives to you, personally.”
The reason I am interested in archives is because, without them, what happens is what you say has happened to you: “That history has pretty much faded from the front of my brain.” Archives are concrete and permanent systems of memory, the best (though imperfect) replacements for the memories of human beings, which fade over time and disappear with the death of the memory’s host.
I used to care nothing for archives. Instead, I was interested in perfection. So as I moved from place to place, I would discard almost everything I made at the place I was leaving. When you move from continent to continent, there’s a great desire within you to reduce your life to its essentials, so every time I moved I would destroy whatever writings or art of mine I thought unimportant. I destroyed my failed retelling of “The Three Little Pigs” (which I wrote during my few weeks in second grade in Millbrae, California), my school records from Ontario, the commonplace books and school newspaper articles I wrote in Bolivia, the humorous stories I wrote in Ghana, my diaries from Tennessee. Each of these I came to find unnecessary because the writing was no longer as good as I had wanted it to be, or the work was already done and needed no memorialization. I regret all those destructions because I’ve lost those memories, and those records. I’m left with fragmented recollections that but murmur a past I want to hear clearly.
So what should you think about The Difficulties Archive? (though I’m surprised to see Yale use the work “Archive” to describe this collection. We would usually call this “The Difficulties, Records” or, maybe “The Difficulties, Archives,” but we almost never use “Archive” in this manner). You should think that it is a privilege to have someone think enough of your creation (The Difficulties and the community it supported) to accept the responsibility to preserve it and make it accessible. You should be pleased that these records will endure past your time on this planet and continue to document an important sliver of American poetic history. You should be happy that the Beinecke, one of the most prestigious archives in the country, has identified your records as being valuable enough to include in its Collection of American Literature. You should understand that, whether you were paid for this collection or not, you received from this attention some little taste of immortality.
After checking online for this collection I discovered that the “Difficulties Archive, ca. 1977-1997” consists of ten boxes of materials, including correspondence, production files, manuscripts, and copies of the magazine and other printed materials. The accession number for this collection (19971120-a) appears to indicate that this collection arrived on 20 November 2007 and was cataloged five days later. The preliminary catalog record for this collection notes the names of five correspondents: Bob Gregory, Jessica Grim, Ted Pearson, Jane Somerville, and John Wellman. This I found a little strange, since my choice for correspondents to highlight—based on fame and length of correspondence—would be Bruce Andrews, Charles Bernstein, David Bromige, Robert Creeley, Lyn Hejinian, Susan Howe, Leslie Scalapino, and Ron Silliman. It seems that the person doing the preliminary box and folder list didn’t know much about late twentieth-century American poetry, since the list includes mention of Larry Eigder and Pete Gavick, among other unknowns.
I was surprised to find a listing for “‘Geoff Huth’ poetry journals and papers pertaining to them.” I seem to have slipped, even if often slightly misspelled, into archives all across the country. It is as if I’m a virus slowly spreading, preparing to become an epidemic.
And that is the purpose of archives: to keep the virus of art, history, information alive, to infect the brains of our successors with knowledge otherwise unknowable.
Tom, so far during this interview you’ve merely mentioned your work on The Difficulties, yet this was a signature creation in your career in poetry—to which I personally would add your blogging (which transformed your writing and persona), Vanishing Points of Resemblance, and your selected poems, Unprotected Texts. Tell me more about working on The Difficulties. Why did you begin it? How did you get started? What were the joys and frustrations of that work? What did you see as the project that it was? What did this experience do for you personally? And why did you bring it to a close?
Also, tell me about the archives you created. What was in it? Why didn’t you destroy it as you have periodically destroyed “manuscripts, notebooks, computer files, blogs”? How were you contacted about your archives? And what was that experience of working with archivists like? As an archivist, I’m quite interested in knowing how an archivist worked with someone I assume knew little about the world of archives beforehand.
archivity furthers
Today, Tom Beckett posted his response to my last question I sent him in our yearlong interview of each other. What follows below is my answer to his request: “Talk, if you would Geof, about the importance of archives to you, personally.”
The reason I am interested in archives is because, without them, what happens is what you say has happened to you: “That history has pretty much faded from the front of my brain.” Archives are concrete and permanent systems of memory, the best (though imperfect) replacements for the memories of human beings, which fade over time and disappear with the death of the memory’s host.
I used to care nothing for archives. Instead, I was interested in perfection. So as I moved from place to place, I would discard almost everything I made at the place I was leaving. When you move from continent to continent, there’s a great desire within you to reduce your life to its essentials, so every time I moved I would destroy whatever writings or art of mine I thought unimportant. I destroyed my failed retelling of “The Three Little Pigs” (which I wrote during my few weeks in second grade in Millbrae, California), my school records from Ontario, the commonplace books and school newspaper articles I wrote in Bolivia, the humorous stories I wrote in Ghana, my diaries from Tennessee. Each of these I came to find unnecessary because the writing was no longer as good as I had wanted it to be, or the work was already done and needed no memorialization. I regret all those destructions because I’ve lost those memories, and those records. I’m left with fragmented recollections that but murmur a past I want to hear clearly.
So what should you think about The Difficulties Archive? (though I’m surprised to see Yale use the work “Archive” to describe this collection. We would usually call this “The Difficulties, Records” or, maybe “The Difficulties, Archives,” but we almost never use “Archive” in this manner). You should think that it is a privilege to have someone think enough of your creation (The Difficulties and the community it supported) to accept the responsibility to preserve it and make it accessible. You should be pleased that these records will endure past your time on this planet and continue to document an important sliver of American poetic history. You should be happy that the Beinecke, one of the most prestigious archives in the country, has identified your records as being valuable enough to include in its Collection of American Literature. You should understand that, whether you were paid for this collection or not, you received from this attention some little taste of immortality.
After checking online for this collection I discovered that the “Difficulties Archive, ca. 1977-1997” consists of ten boxes of materials, including correspondence, production files, manuscripts, and copies of the magazine and other printed materials. The accession number for this collection (19971120-a) appears to indicate that this collection arrived on 20 November 2007 and was cataloged five days later. The preliminary catalog record for this collection notes the names of five correspondents: Bob Gregory, Jessica Grim, Ted Pearson, Jane Somerville, and John Wellman. This I found a little strange, since my choice for correspondents to highlight—based on fame and length of correspondence—would be Bruce Andrews, Charles Bernstein, David Bromige, Robert Creeley, Lyn Hejinian, Susan Howe, Leslie Scalapino, and Ron Silliman. It seems that the person doing the preliminary box and folder list didn’t know much about late twentieth-century American poetry, since the list includes mention of Larry Eigder and Pete Gavick, among other unknowns.
I was surprised to find a listing for “‘Geoff Huth’ poetry journals and papers pertaining to them.” I seem to have slipped, even if often slightly misspelled, into archives all across the country. It is as if I’m a virus slowly spreading, preparing to become an epidemic.
And that is the purpose of archives: to keep the virus of art, history, information alive, to infect the brains of our successors with knowledge otherwise unknowable.
Tom, so far during this interview you’ve merely mentioned your work on The Difficulties, yet this was a signature creation in your career in poetry—to which I personally would add your blogging (which transformed your writing and persona), Vanishing Points of Resemblance, and your selected poems, Unprotected Texts. Tell me more about working on The Difficulties. Why did you begin it? How did you get started? What were the joys and frustrations of that work? What did you see as the project that it was? What did this experience do for you personally? And why did you bring it to a close?
Also, tell me about the archives you created. What was in it? Why didn’t you destroy it as you have periodically destroyed “manuscripts, notebooks, computer files, blogs”? How were you contacted about your archives? And what was that experience of working with archivists like? As an archivist, I’m quite interested in knowing how an archivist worked with someone I assume knew little about the world of archives beforehand.
archivity furthers
Friday, August 29, 2008
SAA 2008: Day 3
InterContinental Mark Hopkins, Room 625, San Francisco, California
Once again, I must demure. There is no way for me to catch up tonight, or to give any adequate review of the day's events. Not yet.
But let me give just a few thoughts on Mark Greene's presidential address. First, great introduction. I wrote down some of Dennis Meissner's roast-like introduction to Mark Greene, and I'll report on some of his choice comments soon enough.
Second, Mark Greene focused as we might have expected he would: on a preliminary assessment of a values statement for archivists. His style of writing and reading aloud is a bit heavy (including numerous quotations from the literature), but his main points about our values were generally sound. I have quibbles, and I'll get to those, and I would have included some different values, and this initial attempt of his is a bit rough. But what Mark did was present what some of the main issues are for us, and on the way he pointed out how we have failed in our quest to be who we are, something I notice frequently enough. Many of his points were ones I've thought of myself, so I had quite a large amount of agreement with what he said, and made an effort to congratulate him after the speech. Rightly so, the speech received a hearty round of applause.
More on all of this once I have the time.
archivity furthers
Once again, I must demure. There is no way for me to catch up tonight, or to give any adequate review of the day's events. Not yet.
But let me give just a few thoughts on Mark Greene's presidential address. First, great introduction. I wrote down some of Dennis Meissner's roast-like introduction to Mark Greene, and I'll report on some of his choice comments soon enough.
Second, Mark Greene focused as we might have expected he would: on a preliminary assessment of a values statement for archivists. His style of writing and reading aloud is a bit heavy (including numerous quotations from the literature), but his main points about our values were generally sound. I have quibbles, and I'll get to those, and I would have included some different values, and this initial attempt of his is a bit rough. But what Mark did was present what some of the main issues are for us, and on the way he pointed out how we have failed in our quest to be who we are, something I notice frequently enough. Many of his points were ones I've thought of myself, so I had quite a large amount of agreement with what he said, and made an effort to congratulate him after the speech. Rightly so, the speech received a hearty round of applause.
More on all of this once I have the time.
archivity furthers
Thursday, August 28, 2008
SAA 2008: Day 2
InterContinental Mark Hopkins San Francisco, San Francisco, California
Too many activities tonight to allow me time to recall my day, but I'll start catching up tomorrow.
archivity furthers
Too many activities tonight to allow me time to recall my day, but I'll start catching up tomorrow.
archivity furthers
SAA, Day Two
Intercontinental Mark Hopkins Nob Hill, Room 625, One Nob Hill, 999 California Street, San Francisco, California
I moved to San Francisco today from my base in Burlingame. The Society of American Archivists' conference begins with some vehemence today, so I chose this as the day to move into town. My major role today, and my only official one, was to make the SAA 2009 Program Committee's announcements in a couple of meetings.
Local Government Records Roundtable
The first meeting where I gave my shpiel was the Local Government Records Roundtable. The message was simple, and I tried to encourage the local government archivists to think of sending in session proposals, since there will be a bit of a focus on government archives, considering that this will be a joint meeting with the Council of State Archivists (CoSA).
I attend this roundtable meeting every year, and I am always struck by how many non-local-government archivists, such as myself, are in the audience. A major role in my job is providing support to local government records programs across the state of New York, so I have an abiding interest in local government archives. And there are other archivists from State Archives that show up at these meetings for precisely the same reason as mine. What is interesting about this is that we almost outnumber the local government archivists, and this is a yearly occurrence. Also, there were a number of local government archivists from nearby, as often happens. Many local government archivists have trouble finding funding to attend a conference across the state, but are able to attend conferences nearby. But this leads to a weaker sense of belonging and a small pool of local government archivists to serve SAA. From my point of view, this is a problem in need of a solution.
Records Management Roundtable
The Local Government Roundtable ended early, so I attended the last have of the Records Management Roundtable (again, records management is a big part of my job responsibilities). Outside the session room, I met Russell James, who heads up this roundtable and had done much to energize the group. It is remarkable what one person with drive and passion can do, and Russell is one such person.
I did miss most of this roundtable meeting, but I arrived in the middle a presentation by my friend David George Shongo, who was talking about the archives and records management program he had developed for the Seneca Nation over the past five years. David's stories about his accomplishments with this program are always interesting because they highlight both the continuing problems of the archivist and the lone arranger, but with a little dollop of added interest because of the cultural issues added to that. For instance, for reasons I cannot completely recall, many of the records of the nation are located in two spots, in duplicate--not to serve as vital records backup but to address concerns of different members in the tribe for access to the records.
When I entered the room, David was talking about fingerprints, about how most of us see our fingerprints but think nothing of them, but that he sees his fingerprints and realizes that the creator filled him with human energy and as that energy surged through his body it swirled around in his fingertips and served as a record of that embodiment of life force. He explained that that is why our hands, our most creative physical parts, are so important: because they can make things, because they are the center of our energy.
I see David in New York, but also at conferences. Last year, at SAA, I was standing with him while Elizabeth Adkins was talking about the need for diversity in the profession. I looked around the room and noted that (from my vantage point) I could see only white people except for him, and we talked about that for a bit. We saw it as an issue, as something to work on, and David gave me a copy of the "Protocols for Native American Archival Materials" to read. This past May, I saw David at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Archives Conference in Chautauqua, New York, and he opened the meeting. Outfitted in traditional Seneca dress, he opened the meeting with a few words in English and many in Seneca. Although probably no-one in the audience could understand him, it was a powerful reminder of the cultural heritage of New York, one little seen but not at all disappeared.
David went on to explain how his operation worked, always interspersing his explanation about access and other archival activities with interesting additions, a Seneca flavor. He noted that he sometimes sings a song in Seneca to help himself find documents that have gone missing--though he also noted that he rarely has to sing that song. He noted that most of his work is focused on paper records, but that his executive body wants him to scan everything--until they learn of the price of doing that. But he noted that the tribe sees itself as always doing everything from the creator. He calls his transfer documentation the "crossing over the fire" (for reasons I didn't catch, but again this is a reference of cultural significance to the Seneca.
Finally, David's talk was about culture, and of importance to all of us. He referred to himself as "a caretaker of old words and old customs." Note the second part of that phrase. He noted how he, a person of the MTV generation, must learn to balance cultures: the native with the Western. And he noted that he has found it important to see the different departments he works with as different clans and to take the individual cultures of those clans into account while working with them.
Lone Arrangers Roundtable
I spent only a little time with the Lone Arrangers Roundtable today, and most of what I did was make a call for session proposals for next year. Once again, I made particular note of how they could fit their proposals into the theme for the conference, "Sustainable Archives." From what I could see of this group, they are being quite ably led, and I was happy to see how most of the meeting was dedicated to small group activities--real taking among real people. After this meeting, a number of them went out to dinner together, which seems like a great idea for other roundtables to emulate.
Baseball at AT&T Park
Next, I went to baseball. This was complicated by my having to find my tickets (still in the possession of Nancy Melley) and my father (taking the train in from Burlingame). I had never been to AT&T Park before, even though I was born 15 miles south of here. I had been to Candlestick Park, though not in many years. I have to say that I loved this park. It's right on the water, with a great view of the Bay Bridge and the bay itself. It is fairly spacious inside with a promenade along the edge of the stadium that leadsfrom first base to center field.
Those of us in attendance tonight were there because of the beneficence of John LeGloahec, a joyful NARtian, who has been organizing trips to ballgames during SAA meetings for many years. John could not be with us tonight, but he was missed. And for him I present this picture that welcomes his own "JAL Tours" (though I can't remember was JAL stands for).
One of the traditions of these tours is the handing out of awards, which gets longer every year. This year, I received only one award. Not a great showing. Without John in attendance, Scott took over the honors.
Everyone in attendance had a great time at the ballpark, and the crab sandwiches behind centerfield were great. Get the Crazy Crab Sandwich, if you have to choose between the two options.
archivity furthers
I moved to San Francisco today from my base in Burlingame. The Society of American Archivists' conference begins with some vehemence today, so I chose this as the day to move into town. My major role today, and my only official one, was to make the SAA 2009 Program Committee's announcements in a couple of meetings.
Local Government Records Roundtable
The first meeting where I gave my shpiel was the Local Government Records Roundtable. The message was simple, and I tried to encourage the local government archivists to think of sending in session proposals, since there will be a bit of a focus on government archives, considering that this will be a joint meeting with the Council of State Archivists (CoSA).
I attend this roundtable meeting every year, and I am always struck by how many non-local-government archivists, such as myself, are in the audience. A major role in my job is providing support to local government records programs across the state of New York, so I have an abiding interest in local government archives. And there are other archivists from State Archives that show up at these meetings for precisely the same reason as mine. What is interesting about this is that we almost outnumber the local government archivists, and this is a yearly occurrence. Also, there were a number of local government archivists from nearby, as often happens. Many local government archivists have trouble finding funding to attend a conference across the state, but are able to attend conferences nearby. But this leads to a weaker sense of belonging and a small pool of local government archivists to serve SAA. From my point of view, this is a problem in need of a solution.
Records Management Roundtable
The Local Government Roundtable ended early, so I attended the last have of the Records Management Roundtable (again, records management is a big part of my job responsibilities). Outside the session room, I met Russell James, who heads up this roundtable and had done much to energize the group. It is remarkable what one person with drive and passion can do, and Russell is one such person.
I did miss most of this roundtable meeting, but I arrived in the middle a presentation by my friend David George Shongo, who was talking about the archives and records management program he had developed for the Seneca Nation over the past five years. David's stories about his accomplishments with this program are always interesting because they highlight both the continuing problems of the archivist and the lone arranger, but with a little dollop of added interest because of the cultural issues added to that. For instance, for reasons I cannot completely recall, many of the records of the nation are located in two spots, in duplicate--not to serve as vital records backup but to address concerns of different members in the tribe for access to the records.
When I entered the room, David was talking about fingerprints, about how most of us see our fingerprints but think nothing of them, but that he sees his fingerprints and realizes that the creator filled him with human energy and as that energy surged through his body it swirled around in his fingertips and served as a record of that embodiment of life force. He explained that that is why our hands, our most creative physical parts, are so important: because they can make things, because they are the center of our energy.
I see David in New York, but also at conferences. Last year, at SAA, I was standing with him while Elizabeth Adkins was talking about the need for diversity in the profession. I looked around the room and noted that (from my vantage point) I could see only white people except for him, and we talked about that for a bit. We saw it as an issue, as something to work on, and David gave me a copy of the "Protocols for Native American Archival Materials" to read. This past May, I saw David at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Archives Conference in Chautauqua, New York, and he opened the meeting. Outfitted in traditional Seneca dress, he opened the meeting with a few words in English and many in Seneca. Although probably no-one in the audience could understand him, it was a powerful reminder of the cultural heritage of New York, one little seen but not at all disappeared.
David went on to explain how his operation worked, always interspersing his explanation about access and other archival activities with interesting additions, a Seneca flavor. He noted that he sometimes sings a song in Seneca to help himself find documents that have gone missing--though he also noted that he rarely has to sing that song. He noted that most of his work is focused on paper records, but that his executive body wants him to scan everything--until they learn of the price of doing that. But he noted that the tribe sees itself as always doing everything from the creator. He calls his transfer documentation the "crossing over the fire" (for reasons I didn't catch, but again this is a reference of cultural significance to the Seneca.
Finally, David's talk was about culture, and of importance to all of us. He referred to himself as "a caretaker of old words and old customs." Note the second part of that phrase. He noted how he, a person of the MTV generation, must learn to balance cultures: the native with the Western. And he noted that he has found it important to see the different departments he works with as different clans and to take the individual cultures of those clans into account while working with them.
Lone Arrangers Roundtable
I spent only a little time with the Lone Arrangers Roundtable today, and most of what I did was make a call for session proposals for next year. Once again, I made particular note of how they could fit their proposals into the theme for the conference, "Sustainable Archives." From what I could see of this group, they are being quite ably led, and I was happy to see how most of the meeting was dedicated to small group activities--real taking among real people. After this meeting, a number of them went out to dinner together, which seems like a great idea for other roundtables to emulate.
Baseball at AT&T Park
Next, I went to baseball. This was complicated by my having to find my tickets (still in the possession of Nancy Melley) and my father (taking the train in from Burlingame). I had never been to AT&T Park before, even though I was born 15 miles south of here. I had been to Candlestick Park, though not in many years. I have to say that I loved this park. It's right on the water, with a great view of the Bay Bridge and the bay itself. It is fairly spacious inside with a promenade along the edge of the stadium that leadsfrom first base to center field.
Those of us in attendance tonight were there because of the beneficence of John LeGloahec, a joyful NARtian, who has been organizing trips to ballgames during SAA meetings for many years. John could not be with us tonight, but he was missed. And for him I present this picture that welcomes his own "JAL Tours" (though I can't remember was JAL stands for).
One of the traditions of these tours is the handing out of awards, which gets longer every year. This year, I received only one award. Not a great showing. Without John in attendance, Scott took over the honors.
Everyone in attendance had a great time at the ballpark, and the crab sandwiches behind centerfield were great. Get the Crazy Crab Sandwich, if you have to choose between the two options.
archivity furthers
Tuesday, July 01, 2008
The End of June and Everything After
The Great Dane Pub & Brewing Company, Dane County Regional Airport, Madison, Wisconsin
A sidetrip to West Lima, Wisconsin, has kept me in Wisconsin for a few days longer than everyone else who participated in the Archives Leadership Institute, but the effects of the institute continue. Tom Hyry sent me his greetings, along with the sign above that greeted him on his return to work. The now onymous commenter Erik Nordberg also sent word. Rosemary Pleva Flynn noted that I switched two people's names around in the caption of one of the photos I posted, so I will correct that soon. Donna McCrea sent me a couple of emails from Montana, supported my idea for the third word of our leadership institute "motto." (I'm tentatively going with "Extensibility Nimbility Intertwingularity.") And Jane Pearlmutter informed all of us that she has set up an online space for us in Learn@UW, her university's online courseware.
That last bit is most important, but so are all the connections we've made. As a group, we have felt a responsibility to make something more out of this opportunity. Our ultimate goal is not ourselves individually but all of us collectively, the profession as a whole. We have no set plans, but we need to continue our thinking together and figure out what of value we as a concentrated group of archivists might do for the profession. We do this not because we see ourselves as a chosen people, but because we have been privileged by this opportunity and this privilege requires a giving back. We seem, at least, to believe that together, even though our ideas do not always move in one unified direction. As our process of considering what we can valuably do carries forward, I'll make some notes about that progress, though I'll also keep in mind the needs we might have to consider ideas in private until we believe we've refined them sufficiently for a wider public. It may certainly be that we never do anything flashy, that we merely codify ways in which we as individuals can give a little back to the profession.
And now that I post my motto for this blog, I wonder if "archivity" might need to be part of our motto.
archivity furthers
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