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Describing Archives: A Content Standard

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Recommend increased use of archival authorities beyond the main creator(s)

faithc opened this issue · comments

Principle 1. Archival description expresses professional ethics and values.

Currently, DACS only places an emphasis on creating archival authorities for the main creator(s) of a collection. In addition to the problematic nature of the principle of provenance--see for example, (https://medium.com/on-archivy/radtech-meets-radarch-towards-a-new-principle-for-archives-and-archival-description-568f133e4325)-- for enhanced discoverability and access, archivists should highlight and create authority records for multiple creators and those documented in collections, especially individuals and groups from historically underrepresented communities.

I expect that this will require a

  • Minor change to DACS

Link(s) to any relevant part(s) of DACS

Chapter 9 Archival Authority Records
2.6 Name of Creator(s) (Required, If Known)

I wonder whether this is really a minor change / small ask in terms of implementation. My feeling is that it might require how archivists are trained--I don't believe NACO training is currently a routine part of archives curricula.

I didn't think this work would necessarily involve the creation of NACO records, but your general point is something to consider.