Archives and Manuscripts Final Thoughts-Personal Reflection

Archives and Manuscripts has been an eye-opening and fun class. I have really enjoyed the discussions, class sections, and coursework. This course was eye-opening because it pains me to admit, that I had a narrow view of what archivists do. My impression of them was simple and really only surface-level. I would often think about wanting to be an archivist and assuming that they just handled special collections. Now I know that there is so much more lurking below the title of Archivist. They are complex gatekeepers that facilitate the safety and security of knowledge. I did not know that they do not deal with collections on an item level and instead examine collections as a whole. On top of caring for collections, they must be discerning as to what is archived. They handle records after they have fulfilled their main purpose and make sure they would bring value to the institute collecting them. I also did not know the great deal at which they interact with researchers. That surprised me quite a bit. I did not think that they dealt with each other at all. I thought that once an item was archived, that was it. It was locked away. A part of me knew that researchers need collections to study but I just hadn’t thought about them in this way. But of course, there is a whole process for accessing records. The interactions between archivists and researchers, led me to reflect on a favorite series of mine, A Discovery of Witches. In the books (and TV Show) A Discovery of Witches, the main character Diana studies ancient texts and spends a lot of time in the Bodleian library. I found myself thinking about this a lot and realizing that there would have been a lot more safeguards up at the real Bodleian Library. The archivist on staff would have spent a lot of time talking with Diana about the books she wants to see. There would have been interviews and exit interviews. There is no way a book would have been misplaced as well. In the show, it looks as if almost anyone can come and go in the library. When in reality these collections would have been much more securely guarded. I do appreciate how the character Diana does handle the books with a cradle and seemingly wants to keep them safe as well. I watched a YouTube about the TV show set design and the set creators had to meticulously recreate the Bodleian library room, as the real library would not allow numerous guests, not to mention a television crew.

A Discovery of Witches Set Design

Something else I learned was how to really look at a record and how to understand what constitutes a collection. I am not talking about physically looking at a record, but instead really understanding the meaning behind it. Records are our life. They are pieces of the puzzle that make up our collective history. These records are not a group of rare books, but a collection of moments that make up something bigger. These moments contain information about real life. This sounds a bit ‘out there’ but records keep track of events and those events will end up being part of our history. Archivists are needed to keep these records in order, so we may look back at them. I didn’t really understand how important archivists were to keeping records accurate and authentic. This made me think a lot about my scrapbooks. I have about two scrapbooks per year since 2003. Together they are a detailed photographic record of my life. Anyone could look at them and see events that happened and how I have grown. It is debatable if they are a true collection, however within the pictures are show tickets, cards, receipts, and other miscellaneous items. They showcase a big section of history and could be considered a personal record. I can see now that if there was a museum dedicated to me, they would be valuable, but right now they are only relevant to me. If CSUCI, the college I attended, wanted examples of life on campus, there are a few scrapbooks that would be of value to them. Their archivist would want those scrapbooks but not the rest of them.

I previously stated that I always thought about being an archivist, but now I am not so sure. I think I like looking at the details of each record and would like to know more about preservation and conservation. I may want to be more involved than organizing a collection and overseeing its archival. I think I would enjoy figuring out if a collection item needs help. Making repairs and being able to save a damaged record would be satisfying. Archival work is still very appealing to me, so I will need to further my professional knowledge to really figure out what avenue suits me. However, now that I know what archivists do, I will be able to weed through job openings with more confidence. I can say that I know what is expected out of an archival role and could spot job openings that may be spreading the position too thin. Truly understanding what archivists do will only give me the upper hand when looking for jobs. On the other hand, if I chose another career path, say a librarian, I could use knowledge from this course to help me interact with archivists on staff. I would know how I can help them with incoming collections or deal with researchers who come in with questions. I will know if someone will need to talk to the archivist or if I could help them out instead.

This course really taught me a lot! I love that we got to take a dive into the world of an archivist and I feel that I understand them a lot better. It’s a complex role that I look forward to learning even more about down the road. Something I would have liked to talk more about in class is possibly the history of archives. The first section covered a bit about early archives however, I have always enjoyed history. I would have also enjoyed going over specifics with manuscripts, but that might fall more into a preservation or conservation course. In truth, this course could have been much longer and still had plenty to go over. There are so many different aspects of archives!

PS. If you like archives and cats, this is for you.

The main cat photo is from a fun article I found from the New York Historical Society. HERE