ARCHIVE & RECORDS MANAGEMENT

GLOSSARY OF TERMS (ABBREVIATED)

**ACCESS**

> n\. \~ 1. The ability to locate relevant information through the use
> of catalogs, indexes, finding aids, or other tools. -- 2. The
> permission
>
> to locate and retrieve information for use (consultation or reference)
>
> within legally established restrictions of privacy, confidentiality,
>
> and security clearance. -- 3. COMPUTING · The physical processes
>
> of retrieving information from storage media.

**ACCESS POLICY**

> n\. \~ Principles or procedures that control the conditions under
> which individuals have the permission and ability to consult a
> repositoryʹs holdings.

**ACCESSIBILITY**

n\. \~ 1. The characteristic of being easily reached or used with a

> minimum of barriers. -- 2. The ability to locate relevant information
>
> through the use of catalogs, indexes, finding aids, or other tools. --
> 3. The permission to locate and retrieve information use (consultation
> or reference) within legally established restrictions of privacy,
> confidentiality, and security clearance; access.

**ACCESSION**

> n\. \~ 1. Materials physically and legally transferred to a repository
> as a unit at a single time; an acquisition.
>
> v\. \~ 2. To take legal and physical custody of a group of records or
> other materials and to formally document their receipt. -- 3. To
> document the transfer of records or materials in a register, database,
> or other log of the repositoryʹs holdings.

**ACQUISITION POLICY**

> n\. \~ An official statement issued by an archives or manuscript
> repository identifying the kinds of materials it accepts and the
> conditions or terms which affect their acquisition. It serves as a
> basic document for the guidance of archival staff and organizations
> and persons interested in donating their records or papers.

**APPRAISAL**

> n\. \~ 1. The process of determining if materials have sufficient
> value to be accessioned into a repository. -- 2. The process of
> determining the length of time records should be retained, based on
> legal requirements and on their current and potential usefulness. --
> 3. Determining the market value of an item; monetary appraisal.

**ARCHIVAL VALUE**

> n\. \~ The on-going usefulness or significance of records, based on
> the administrative, legal, fiscal, evidential, or historical
> information they contain, justifying their continued preservation.

**ARCHIVES**

> n., -- also **archive** \~ 1. Materials created or received by a
> person, family, or organization, public or private, in the conduct of
> their affairs and preserved because of the enduring value contained in
> the information they contain or as evidence of the functions and
> responsibilities of their creator, especially those materials
> maintained using the principles of provenance, original order, and
> collective control; permanent records. -- 2. The division within an
> organization responsible for maintaining the organizationʹs records of
> enduring value. -- 3. An organization which collects the
>
> archives of individuals, families, or other organizations; a
> collecting
>
> repository. -- 4. The professional discipline of administering such
> collections and organizations. -- 5. The building (or portion thereof)
> housing archival collections. -- 6. A published collection of
> scholarly papers, especially as a periodical.

**ARRANGEMENT**

n\. \~ 1. The process of organizing materials with respect to their

> provenance and original order, to protect their context and to achieve
> physical or intellectual control over the materials. -- 2. The
> organization and sequence of items within a collection.

**DEACCESSIONING**

n\. \~ The process by which an archives, museum, or library permanently

> removes accessioned materials from its holdings.

**DESCRIPTION**

> n\. \~ 1. The process of creating a finding aid or other access tools
> that allows individuals to browse a surrogate of the collection to
> facilitate access and to improve security by creating a record of the
> collection and by minimizing the amount of handling of the original
> materials. -- 2. RECORDS MANAGEMENT · A written account of the
> physical characteristics, informational content, and functional
> purpose of a records series or system.

**DISPOSITION**

> n., -- also **final disposition** \~ 1. Materialsʹ final destruction
> or transfer to an archives as determined by their appraisal. -- 2.
> DIPLOMATICS · That portion of a record that expresses the will or
> judgment of the author.

**FINDING AIDS**

n\. \~ 1. A tool that provides access to a collection of records. -- 2.
A

> description of records that gives the repository physical and
> intellectual control over the materials and that assists users to gain
> access to and understand the materials.

**FONDS**

> n\. \~ The entire body of records of an organization, family, or
> individual that have been created and accumulated as the result of an
> organic process reflecting the functions of the creator.

**GENERAL RECORDS SCHEDULE**

> n., -- also **common records schedule**, **comprehensive records
> schedule**, **general schedule** \~ A list of records series commonly
> found in many divisions within an organization, indicating their
> respective retention periods and other instructions for the
> disposition of those records.

**INTELLECTUAL CONTROL**

> n\. \~ The creation of tools such as catalogs, finding aids, or other
> guides that enable researchers to locate relevant materials relevant
> to their interests.

**INTRINSIC VALUE**

> n\. \~ The usefulness or significance of an item derived from its
> physical or associational qualities, inherent in its original form and
> generally independent of its content, that are integral to its
> material nature and would be lost in reproduction.

**INVENTORY**

> n\. \~ 1. A finding aid that includes, at a minimum, a list of the
> series in a collection. -- 2. RECORDS MANAGEMENT · The process of
> surveying the records in an office, typically at the series level.

**LIFECYCLE OF RECORDS**

n\. \~ The control of records from creation through disposition.

**NONRECORD**

> n\. \~ 1. Materials not considered to fall within the definition of an
> official record. -- 2. Copies, duplicates, or publications that are
> kept for purposes of personal reference or convenience. -- 3.
> Materials that do not appear on a records retention schedule and that
> may be destroyed without authorization.

**OFFICIAL RECORD**

n\. \~ 1. A record created by, received by, sanctioned by, or proceeding

> from an officer acting in an official capacity. -- 2. A complete,
> final, and authorized copy of a record, especially the copy bearing an
> original signature or seal.

**PERMANENCE**

n\. \~ The inherent stability of material that allows it to resist
degradation

> over time.

**PHYSICAL CONTROL**

> n\. \~ The function of tracking the storage of records to ensure that
> they can be located.

**PRESERVATION**

> n\. \~ 1. The process of protecting materials from deterioration or
> damage; the non-invasive treatment of fragile documents. -- 2. To keep
> from harm, injury, decay, or destruction. -- 3. LAW · An order issued
> by a court designed to prevent the spoliation of materials potentially
> relevant to litigation and subject to discovery.
>
> v\. \~ 4. To keep for some period of time; to set aside for future
> use. -- 5. CONSERVATION · To take action to prevent deterioration or
> loss.

**PRIMARY VALUE**

> n\. \~ The value of records derived from the original use that caused
> them to be created.

**PROCESSING**

> n\. \~ 1. The arrangement, description, and housing archival materials
> for storage and use by patrons. -- 2. The steps taken to make the
> latent image on exposed photographic or microfilm materials visible;
> see archival processing. -- 3. COMPUTING · The machine execution of
> instructions in a computer program.

**PROVENANCE**

n., -- **provenancial**, adj. \~ 1. The origin or source of something.
-- 2.

> Information regarding the origins and custody of an item or
> collection.

Provenance is a fundamental principle of archives, referring to the

> individual, family, or organization which created or received the
> items in a collection. The **principle of provenance** or the
> ***respect des fonds*** dictates that records of different origins
> (provenance) be kept separate to preserve their context.

**PURGE / PURGING**

n\. \~ The process of pulling and disposing of unwanted materials.

**RECORD**

> n\. \~ 1. A written or printed work of a legal or official nature that
> may be used as evidence or proof; a document. -- 2. Data or
> information that has been fixed on some medium; that has content,
> context, and structure; and that is used as an extension of human
> memory or to demonstrate accountability. -- 3. Data or information in
> a fixed form that is created or received in the course of individual
> or institutional activity and set aside (preserved) as evidence of
> that activity for future reference. -- 4. An instrument filed for
> public notice (constructive notice); see recordation. -- 5. AUDIO · A
> phonograph record. -- 6. COMPUTING · A collection of related fields
> treated as a unit, such as a row in a relational database table.-- 7.
> DESCRIPTION · An entry describing a work in a catalog; a catalog
> record.

**RECORD COPY**

n., -- also **copy of record**, **official copy**, **principal copy** \~
The single

> copy of a document, often the original, that is designated as the
> official copy for reference and preservation.

**RECORDS CENTER**

n\. \~ A facility used for low-cost storage of inactive and semicurrent

> records before those records are destroyed or transferred to an
> archives.

**RECORDS / RETENTION SCHEDULE**

> n\. \~ A document that identifies and describes an organizationʹs
> records, usually at the series level, provides instructions for the
> disposition of records throughout their lifecycle.

**RECORDS SURVEY**

> n\. \~ The process of gathering basic information about an
> organizationʹs records, including their quantity, form, location,
> physical condition, storage facilities, rate of accumulation, and
> associated business processes.

**REPLEVIN**

> n\. \~ An action to recover property that has been improperly or
> illegally taken.

**RESPECT FOR ORIGINAL ORDER**

> n\. \~ The organization and sequence of records established by the
> recordʹs creator.

**RETENTION PERIOD**

> n., -- also **disposition standard** \~ The length of time records
> should be kept in a certain location or form for administrative,
> legal, fiscal, historical, or other purposes.

**REVERSIBILITY**

n\. \~ PRESERVATION · The ability to undo a treatment, returning the

> object to the condition before treatment.

**SECONDARY VALUE**

> n\. \~ The usefulness or significance of records based on uses other
> than the purpose for which they were originally created.

**TEMPORARY RECORD**

> n\. \~ A record of ephemeral value that can be destroyed immediately
> or after a specified time period.

**TRANSFER**

> n\. \~ RECORDS · The process of moving records as part of their
> scheduled disposition, especially from an office to a records center,
> or from a records center to an archives.

**VITAL RECORD**

> n\. \~ 1. Records that document significant life events, including
> births, deaths, marriages, divorces, and public health matters; vital
> statistics. -- 2. Emergency-operation records immediately necessary to
> begin recovery of operations after a disaster, and
> rights-and-interests records necessary to protect the assets,
> obligations, and resources of the organization, as well as its
> employees and customers or citizens; essential records.

Source: "A Glossary of Archival and Records Terminology," Society of
American Archivists 2004.