Describing the digital: the archival cataloguing of born-digital personal papers

摘要

Practitioners can draw upon a body of literature on various aspects of managing digital archives. However, one area where guidance is lacking is cataloguing. The characteristics of digital material have brought into question basic cataloguing practices. This article considers the treatment of the cataloguing of digital material in the archival literature. It focuses on discussions of the implications for descriptive standards of digital records, and considers the solutions proposed in the literature or adopted by practitioners.Through tracing discussions of cataloguing through the literature, this article surveys how current descriptive practice has been applied to digital material. Locating these discussions within a wider context of technological change, affecting not only archival material but also the environment within which it is used, the article explores the profession's response to the demands of digital material and identifies areas for further research.