This post is part of the Intergenerational Conversations series.

Review of F. Gerald Ham, “The Archival Edge,” American Archivist 38, no. 1 (1975): 5–13, https://doi.org/10.17723/aarc.38.1.7400r86481128424.

By Liz Bedford, Independent Archivist, Archive Worthy [PDF Full Text] | [PDF Article + Full Text]

In 1974, F. Gerald Ham addressed the Society of American Archivists (SAA) in his presidential address, opening with the following statement:

Our most important and intellectually demanding task as archivists is to make an informed selection of information that will provide the future with a representative record of human experience in our time. (p. 5)

Immediately evident is Ham’s charge that the archival community was insufficiently achieving (or even striving for) this end. He urges archivists to reconsider the status quo; question seemingly logical, sufficient methods of archival practice; and recognize the effect their intellectual neglect was having on their mission. Pointing out that critics had labeled archivists as inadequate and passive, Ham warns that without drastic change, the record being created would eternally distort human history.

Among the list of critics Ham references is the historian Howard Zinn, whose 1970 speech to SAA addressed the passive oversight or intentionality of maintaining records of privileged members of society, while records of community members living under poor conditions were being neglected and forever forgotten. Zinn challenged archivists to “compile a whole new world of documentary material about the lives, desires and needs of ordinary people.”[1] In 1971, Sam Bass Warner Jr., a historian who paved the way for recognizing the disparities of urban life, echoed Zinn’s sentiment with his call to “abandon the pursuit of the classic subjects of American history,” begging for archives to be more “useful” by focusing on current issues of the time.[2] Compounding the problem, as historian and archivist Gould P. Colman argued in the American Archivist “Forum,” was the “politicization of our profession,” the effect of which was “skewing the study of culture” by focusing on government papers and completely ignoring personal and individual institutions, such as the family.[3] Essentially, archiving an unreasonable amount of easily accessible documents, competition between institutions in acquiring collections, and collecting (expensive) oral histories from already well-documented groups was creating disproportionate results that were not reflective of the intrinsic individuality of human experience. Building on these critiques, Ham asserts that archivists are irresponsible and lazy if they fail to actively pursue more obscure records within unrepresented communities. He bluntly challenges archivists’ modus operandi, stating that “the real cause for concern is that there doesn’t seem to be any concern”(p. 7).

Ham blames archivists and their “obsession” with the “nuts and bolts” aspect of the profession (p. 7). This narrow focus of custodial record keepers, he believes, enables the archivist to evade any ethical and active responsibilities. Ham shamelessly identifies Bernard Amtmann, a Canadian bookseller, as either arrogant or ignorant, based on his statement that the evaluation of material “must surely be the responsibility of the historian” in his article (during the same year) in Canadian Archivist (p. 7). Ham ensures that his disagreement is known, while he acknowledges that Amtmann’s comment accurately echoed other archivists of their era. When delving into the roots of the issue, Ham repeatedly uses the word “force” to describe imminent shifts that would enact change in the archival field whether voluntary or not. The five developments that would “force” this change were “institutionalization, bulk, missing data, vulnerable records, and technology” (p. 10). What he saw on the horizon was a vision more familiar to the archival landscape today. He describes specialized archives that would offer well-defined parameters and exhaustive documentation, interconnectedness within state archival networks, and emerging models for urban documentation.

Finally, Ham offers realistic strategies in a five-part list that serve as a starting place for real change to occur. Of utmost importance, he insists, is changing attitudes and shedding old habits. He calls on archivists to propose flexible acquisition strategy guidance and form relationships between institutions to identify collection gaps, contribute to new writings so that no one makes solitary decisions, and reallocate funds to document less documented events, people, and communities. Ham ends with a final plea for archivists not to abandon the intellect that the field and its mission requires so that they may “hold up a mirror for mankind” (p. 13). If archivists do not change their perspective, he defeatedly ponders, “then I do not know what it is we are doing that is all that important” (p. 13).

Ham’s tone of urgency in the address suggests that these issues were maddening to him personally. The address’s title, “The Archival Edge,” is inspired by a Kurt Vonnegut novel, Player Piano, in which one of the minor characters fears regaining his sanity through psychiatric treatment. Deemed the “real hero” of the novel by Ham, the “chronically malcontent boozer” Ed Finnerty wants to stay on the “edge” of life instead of being pulled back to the “center.” He claims, “Out on the edge you see all kinds of things you can’t see from the center. . . . Big, undreamed-of things—the people on the edge see them first.”[4] Through this metaphor, Ham reasserts the first step in his strategy for change, while he acknowledges that it puts archivists in a more “exposed position” (p. 13). He asks archivists to step away from the tedium of their routine, to question what they have been trained to do, and operate from a more vulnerable perspective. The speech itself is a proclamation of solidarity to be brave and bold in making changes that will accomplish the archivist’s mission, i.e., to speak up about underrepresented groups, to question the amount of time spent on further documentation of the same experiences, and to become an advocate for filling crucial gaps in the archives.

As a fledgling graduate with an MSIS, I have little practical experience, but I can appreciate with deep gratitude Ham’s call for change. The tedium of the custodial responsibilities required to accomplish our mission is not what called me to pursue this line of work. In fact, those aspects cause a sense of anxiety for me personally, and an overwhelming sense of “not enough time in a lifetime” surfaces when I first encounter a new project. I wonder, perhaps, if this same feeling may have caused archivists of the 1970s to shut down and keep their nose to the grindstone. The overwhelming task of the job, along with the social prejudices (based around sex and social status) they faced and repeated verbal commentary that they were simply record-keepers, might have driven them to apathy in vocalizing their concerns. I find it hard to envision a landscape of inactive archivists, so my instinct is to give our predecessors the benefit of the doubt. What appealed to me about the archival field was the honor of caring for historical, information-filled documents (in the broadest sense of the term); keeping them safe; uncovering treasures; researching provenance; and providing future humanity with an understanding of who we are now. Capturing dynamic attitudes, factual events, and changing perceptions for posterity while helping connect individual experiences to community stories is what I anticipate my participation in this field will look like.

As chance would have it, I read this presidential address after having read two progressive books concerning archives and archival practice: Archive Everything: Mapping the Everyday by Gabriella Giannachi,[5] a professor of performance and new media at the University of Exeter; and Archiving Cultures: Heritage, Community and the Making of Records and Memory by Jeannette A. Bastian,[6] professor emerita at the School of Library and Information Science, Simmons University. I am still learning and devouring the scholarship of the present moment, while staying abreast of old and new ideas, but I would describe myself as a broadly thinking, all-encompassing, archive-everything archivist with a strong interest in individual and personal archives. While I understand such aspirations of including everything in the archives are impossible to achieve, if it is our mission to capture—and thus place importance on—our collective human experience, that includes individuals and not just government entities or some small collection of entities/individuals who are deemed worthy. In pondering philosophy, human relationships to material objects, and the need to categorize things, the interaction of the archivist and what is being archived is most curious to me, as that action in itself is a personal one. I believe the connectivity to this process is parallel to a form of art. I take the documentation of what will represent our “mosaic” in a very complex and dutiful light. Both aforementioned books are aligned with this total archives strategy and were refreshing to read knowing that there are others in the archives community who aspire to achieve the same goal. With my vision of what I hope to accomplish in my career along with my experience thus far, reading Ham’s address prompted me to pursue more information to understand where the issues described in his speech began and determine whether we are making progress in a more positive, active direction.

I turned to “All Shook Up”: The Archival Legacy of Terry Cook, a posthumous publication of the self-titled, esteemed archivist’s and scholar’s most influential articles, a book that’s been on my shelf for some time, and, admittedly was purchased due to the Elvis and rock-n-roll reference.[7] Much like in Ham’s address, Cook’s articles convey his frustration both internally with archival professionals as well as externally with historians, who persistently failed to acknowledge archivists’ scholarly contribution. In his 2009 essay, “The Archive(s) Is a Foreign Country: Historians, Archivists, and the Changing Archival Landscape,” Cook describes the archivist-historian relationship as a failure, proving that these issues still lingered in the ethos thirty-five years after Ham gave his address. On a positive note, Cook describes a more active archivist who is taking on the role of appraisal with intention. While shifts have been made, however, Cook suggests that archivists still have a long way to go to avoid getting bogged down or stuck in new guidelines, procedures, or rules to follow. He posits the question, what if—with all the changes in the archival landscape stemming from technology, expectations from the participating public, and unheard voices—strict adherence to old habits put archivists “increasingly out of contact with reality?”[8] Cook’s articles, especially as selected over the course of his career, were useful in understanding the frustrations of the archival landscape from Ham’s speech in 1974 through the end of Cook’s career in 2013.

Most striking to me in Ham’s address is the lack of recognition of written text and other forms of documentation as a privilege of select groups for much of human history. The calls made by Zinn and Warner, and repeated by Ham, identified gaps in representation that would result in cultural erasure of groups who primarily communicate orally or through another medium than the written word. The integrity of archives and of archivists hinges upon recognizing such injustices and taking action to decide how to capture these voices. In Archiving Cultures, Bastian masterfully defines and advocates collection of a variety of tangible and intangible forms of communication, including performances and memory records, to document moments in time. Adding these records to the archives as another layer supporting the diversity of the human record is an exciting prospect, albeit overwhelming in today’s technologically advanced environment. Image and video capture of events, performances, and oral histories are so easily taken and stored, easier than ever before. Having encountered archives that are solely paper and document based, my reaction to them is that they feel empty as if they have no soul, but other media breathe life into records and add an immediacy to them. Staying forever flexible to our changing world, if we have the opportunity to capture intangible human elements, shouldn’t we pursue it? Wouldn’t that support our mission? Isn’t it our duty—as archivists? Bastian’s 2023 publication date indicates that this may still seem like a radical idea in our current culture, but as in Ham’s call for change, recognition is the first step in embracing a new idea. I presume Ham would applaud Bastian for her vulnerability in standing out on the edge, just like Vonnegut’s character, Finnerty.

To fill the identified gaps in representation, Ham suggests taking matters into our own hands. He echoes Warner’s suggestion that we must become modern “historical reporter[s]” collecting information about “the day to day decisions of lower echelon leaders and of the activities and attitudes of ordinary men and women” (p. 9). Technology and the internet have allowed people to speak and let their voices be heard. Through crowd-sourced websites, community archives, and individually created (by professionals and citizens) online archives, people can share their own stories whether those stories have been told before or have been repressed by the societies they live in. This is a counter to the archivist as curator and gatekeeper, and it is an exciting development. Just as Ham stated that we will be forced to be active as archivists, humans now have more access to the multitude of voices all around us, and to neglect them would be immoral. Archivists, both professional and citizen archivists, have created movements based around their research and storytelling abilities that highlight and lift up unheard voices and are adding them to the human story. In Cook’s 2013 article in Archival Science, he echoes the same sentiment that Ham did when he predicts that archivists will be forced to adapt to changes in the societal landscape whether they chose to or not. Cook asks (in regard to community archives), “is the archival profession ready for such a re-imagining of its purpose?”[9] and follows with archival educator Rand Jimerson’s 2010 quote from his review of Community Archives: The Shaping of Memory: “we had better get ready. Changes have already come, and more are on the way. If archivists do not engage these discourses and movements, we will lose yet another opportunity to make positive contributions to society.”[10]

Ham’s dedication of our mission still rings true, although for me there is a feeling of bewilderment at what that looks like in the Imagination Age and the artificial intelligence (AI) era. We already live in a time when our shared human experience is more documented than ever, and whether we are ready for it or not, AI will rapidly be developing a new enmeshed layer of human experience. So, how do archivists adjust our approach to the current environment? The abundance and proliferation of information available for capture today is both exciting and overwhelming, which sounds familiar. The 1970s version of this is the “bulk” Ham refers to in his address. He calls it “utopian” to believe that we would ever be able to manage preserving everything of value (p. 9), so we must understand that when we choose one thing, something else is excluded.

So, where do we stand now? Funding and jobs are few and far between for archivists, which begs the question, why in a world of information overload are we not in high demand? How do we drive advocacy and compensation for our skills? Is there a public confusion of our true potential? Certainly, many institutions, governments, scholars, historians, and educators value the need for and use of the archives, but in my experience, most of the general public seems very confused about the profession. Is their perception of archives important? I think so! There is already a mystique, a curiosity, and an interest in the roles of archivists, but I think the perception of archivists’ function still conjures up the same outdated “dusty boxes in a basement” image. Absent the rebranding of what an archivist does, I fear the confusion, lack of awareness, and befuddlement about the exciting things that go into our jobs may continue. Social media and creative archivists have helped crack open the doors to the archives, but I think we could use more of that public interactivity, more celebrating and lifting up of our own voices (not only within our own community of archivists, but in a public forum). There are countless examples of this happening today: archivists who have written their own books from within their own institutions, discovered lost items in the archives and followed up with research on the item to be able to tell its story, development of online digital archives to create advocacy for an underrepresented group, etc. Many archivists I have encountered today are taking on a massive job that involves (in addition to the custodial) creative thinking, assessment and planning, and identification of not only gaps but potential interesting stories that documents tell that have been hidden for some time. . . on top of their full-time day job. And they have a real passion for doing just that. I believe that little opportunities to educate people about what an archivist’s duties entail would be a valuable pursuit, such as proposing updates to widely used dictionaries. The Merriam-Webster’s definition of an “archivist” as “a person who has the job of collecting and storing the materials in an archive,” while true, doesn’t fully encompass the duties that define what an archivist does.[11] The definition is more accurate on the SAA website and includes archivists’ myriad responsibilities along with an explanation of what each task entails: assessment, collecting, arrangement and description, preservation, and providing access to records.[12] However, I expect the SAA website is mainly used by information professionals.

Contemplating how future archives will be defined and considering expanding mindsets and use of technology, it will be interesting to see the boundaries continue to be pushed regarding what is considered and accepted as an official archives. I am endlessly fascinated by individual or personal archives and exploring the collections of human experience records that people contain within their own home. The vast array of valuable information that can be added to the human story by collecting information from any given individual interested in contributing is invigorating to me, and it will be interesting to see the space that opens up to makes sense of it. Academic institutions, museums, government, and corporate archives are invaluable, but without paying homage to the majority of the population, how can records truly represent our human experience?

In conclusion, to bring Ham’s Vonnegut reference full circle, maybe Ham’s vision has slowly morphed into the center. Maybe now, standing at the edge, we can see even more potential to bring more of the human experience into the records—maybe we can justify and integrate non-professionals’ input into the realm of official records. My belief in the process of archiving as an art is supported by Ham’s proclamation of the vulnerable stance an archivist must take in shaping the archives to enact positive change in the world. As with art, archives are a form of an evidentiary record that will reflect our human existence and within that realm there are endless possibilities for capturing the spirit of our times. Who knew in 1974 that things would look the way they do now? Imagine what records will look like in our world fifty years from now. My expectation is that we will adapt as we always have and we will continue to stay active and adjust practice and theory as the changes come. There will always be just enough people willing to stand on the edge with Ham and shake things up like Elvis and Cook.

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[1] Howard Zinn, “The Archivist and Radical Reform,” unpublished manuscript, pp. 12–13, 18, as quoted in Ham, p. 5.

[2] Sam Bass Warner Jr., “The Shame of the Cities: Public Records of the Metropolis,” unpublished manuscript, 1971, pp. 2, 3, as quoted in Ham, p. 6.

[3] Gould P. Colman, “The Forum: Communications from Members,” American Archivist 35, nos. 3–4 (July/October 1972): 483–85, as quoted in Ham, p. 6.

[4] Tim Hildenbrand, “Two or Three Things I Know About Kurt Vonnegut’s Imagination,” in The Vonnegut Statement, Jerome Klinkowitz and John Somer (eds.) (New York: Delacorte, 1973), p. 121, as quoted in Ham, p. 13.

[5] Gabriella Giannachi, Archive Everything: Mapping the Everyday (MIT Press, 2023).

[6] Jeannette A. Bastian, Archiving Cultures: Heritage, Community and the Making of Records and Memory (Taylor & Francis, 2023).

[7] Tom Nesmith, Greg Bak, and Joan M. Schwartz (eds.), “All Shook Up”: The Archival Legacy of Terry Cook (Association of Canadian Archivists and Society of American Archivists, 2020).

[8] Cook, “The Archive(s) Is a Foreign Country,” in “All Shook Up”, 426.

[9] Cook, “Evidence, Memory, Identity, and Community: Four Shifting Archival Paradigms,” in “All Shook Up”, 466.

[10] Randall C. Jimerson, Review of Community Archives: The Shaping of Memory, ed. Jeannette A. Bastian and Ben Alexander, American Archivist 73, no. 2 (2010): 690, as quoted in Cook, “Evidence, Memory, Identity, and Community: Four Shifting Archival Paradigms,” in “All Shook Up”, 466.

[11] Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, s.v. “archivist,” accessed June 15, 2024, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/archivist.

[12] Society of American Archivists, “What Are Archives?,” accessed August 28, 2024, https://www2.archivists.org/about-archives.