FIELD TRIP!!!

I talked to David Grinnell, Chief Archivist at the Heinz History Center. We are scheduled for a tour on February 13th starting at 5:00 PM. We need a loose estimate of how many people will be in attendance. So if people could start RSVP-ing (Tim, can we perhaps get this out in a group email?) that would be wonderful. The museum is located in the Strip District on Smallman Street, which is just a block over from Penn Ave. It is in between 11th and 12th Street. The address is 1212 Smallman Street, Pittsburgh PA. If you use Google Maps it gives directions for using public transportation.

Thanks

Justin

Proposals for Poster/Paper Presentations

As we discussed at the last (1/14/09) meeting, proposals for poster and paper presentations at the SAA Conference this August are due at the end of January. We'd like to use the comments of this space as a forum for discussion before we meet again next Wednesday to finalize a definite proposal (or potentially proposals if there is enough interest). This is just an informal brainstorming space, no need to come up with an abstract, just kick around some ideas.

First SAA Meeting of 2009

Happy New Year All, better late than never I suppose.
We'll be having an general body SAASC meeting this Wednesday, January 14th at 3 o'clock in room 501 of the IS building. We plan to keep the meeting to 40-45 minutes, and one of the things we'd like to do is break up into small groups/sub committees to discuss separate ideas.

One of the small groups will discuss potential presentation/session ideas for the SAA conference in Austin coming up in August. Proposals for student groups are due at the end of January, and we'd need to get a feel for who is interested and what other ideas they might have about potential topics.

Another point we'd like to deal with in small groups is potential field-trip spots. We already have two in the works and we'll announce those on Wednesday but we would like to hear what other places would be of interest.

Outside of that there will also be an opportunity to discuss any other potential activities and also form small groups exploring those as well.

Cheers and see you Wednesday.

To describe at the item level or not to describe at the item level, is that the question?

Last monday was a strangely bookended day for me and the rest of you who have the "hat-trick" Intro to Archives, Intro to Technology, and Intro to Preseveration. In the morning, Dr. Callery and Dr. Cox drove home the message: "forget about item-level archival description," while Joel Blanco-Rivera in Preservation talked about archival digitization, which, he points out, requires that same much-maligned "item-level description." What is an archivist to do?

I haven't figured it out, but, based on a brief conversation with Dr. Tomer and some internet searching, here are some thoughts on the issue:
1) each side is probably looking at different literature, and probably have different ideas of "archives" in mind when they make their predictions or warnings
2) while not everything that is in traditional, physical media form will be digitized (especially with current technology), more and more - Joel said 93% - of information is being "born-digital", which is more available for item-level description through metadata schemes, etc.
3) new technology, such as this , this , or this represent the constantly advancing field of digital scanning, which should remind us that we don't know exactly what the future holds for the technology (while we should avoid the allure of futurism and technological determinism).
4) supply and demand: as online access to library and archival holdings increases, digitization and the loved/hated item-level description will happen where there is demand for it, consider the large amount of photographic material already available online because of the interest in photography supported by sites like Flickr - ex: Library of Congress.  

Meet & Greet :)

Hi all--

Just a friendly reminder that we will be getting together this evening for a very causal and informal and relaxing evening at The Library, a bar and restaurant. The address is:

2302 East Carson Street in the Southside. Thanks Google Maps.

We will be gathering around 8pm, but feel free to stop by earlier or later--it should be a great time!
Also, bring friends, spouses, significant others--as long as they are over 21!

Here is some more info about The Library.


If you have ANY questions, please email saa.at.pitt@gmail.com

Hope to see you there!

FREE BOOK!

I'm not sure if this was announced to us all and I simply missed it, but it exciting and worth repeating nonetheless:

The University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill has made a digital version of the 1922 edition of A Manual of Archive Administration, Including the Problems of War Archives and Archive Making by Sir Hilary Jenkinson available for free download. Check it out here.

Let's go bowling!!

Hey everyone, I'm trying to get a sense of how many SAAers are interested in the idea of a bowling night during the first week of December. We will be partnering with SCALA and are going to try to involve local librarians and archivists (in a very casual way) so the event will have a networking element to it in addition to being a lot of fun. So, comment to this post, or send me an email (hbb8[at]pitt[dot]edu) if you're interested. Thanks!!