Posted on November 12, 2009
Something exciting is happening in the sector, and it will benefit all of us. Our webpage has had thousands of visitors since its launch on 18 August, and our Facebook fan page has nearly 300 members. We've been talking to you at conferences and meetings, on the phone and by email. Key South African constituencies have been responding to our Letters for Lulu campaign, and over 1000 people voted on our first online poll.
Later this month we will be presenting six letters to the Honourable Minister of Arts and Culture, Lulu Xingwana. Professional organizations and institutions like SAHS and SAHA have raised concerns in their Letters for Lulu about the state of our archives, something we have underlined in our own letter. Young professionals in the sector have commented about the dearth of funding for individuals in the sector, the need to promote oral history, the importance of digitizing collections, and the need for a review of existing policies on copying materials in archives. We will hand over these letters to the Minister at the end of November. Then we will track progress in resolving these issues into 2010.
One of the issues raised in the Letters for Lulu that we received was the restriction currently placed on camera use in some of the government archives. In October we ran our first online poll to explore views on the use of cameras by researchers in archives. The poll suggested that although many people recognize the importance of regulating camera use in archives, there is a very strong desire for access to copies of archival material. Both researchers and genealogists find it extremely useful to have digital copies of archival materials, which are cheap, quick to make, and easy to transport.
As one genealogist noted on the Rootsweb email list: "The joy we receive from seeing copies of documents, concerning our fore bearers is absolutely without parallel, it would be such a shame if this avenue of family research continues to be unavailable to us. I do hope this facility will again be open to responsible researchers in the not too distant future."
The facility is not unavailable in South African archives, but regulation is not consistent even within the state sector; and permission is not always given. One young historian complained that the long application process for permission to take digital photographs had delayed her research by two months, considerably raising the cost. In other cases, researchers reported that concerns about copyright and for-profit use delayed or prevented permission being granted to photograph out-of-copyright archives. Archives outside of the state system often have problems determining whether they have the right to grant users access to copy their material.
This shows very clearly the need for a comprehensive national digitization policy in South Africa, to balance the promotion of access to material in archives with the need to protect the documents, and manage copyright and ownership issues. DAC is in the process of developing a digitization policy; this process could go alongside a concerted effort to develop professional best-practice guidelines dealing with issues such as orphan works (those whose authors are unknown or cannot be traced). In the next few months, the Archival Platform will inform both processes by asking you to identify issues that should be addressed and looking at the various options we have in resolving them.
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