Archivists and librarians play a critical role in preserving and making accessible cultural resources, but there is now an uncertainty as to whether their traditional expertise is sufficient when dealing with digital resources. A particular focus of concern is the authenticity of these resources. This article looks at how the concept of authenticity has been constructed in traditional environments, and specifically by philosophers, art conservators, textual critics, judges, and legislators. It is organized around three broad definitions of authenticity: authentic as true to oneself; authentic as original; and authentic as trustworthy statement of fact.The examination of these definitions of authenticity and their interpretation in different contexts suggests that authenticity is best understood as a social construction that has been put into place to achieve a particular aim. Its structures and goals vary from one field to the next and from one age to another. The article concludes that digital resources are comparable to traditional cultural resources such as art works, literary texts, and business records; they are in a continuous state of becoming and their authenticity is contingent and changeable.
This study proposes an archaeology as a means of exploring the practices by which digitally encoded resources are generated, circulated, and received. The discussion grapples with the ambiguous relationship between digitizations and their exemplars in the wellknown database, Early English Books Online (EEBO), and suggests ways in which digitizations might be analyzed as witnesses of current perceptions about the past and used accordingly in scholarly research. The article therefore offers a critical reading of EEBO and its digitizations as part of a broader effort to investigate the role of digitally encoded resources in the transmission of ideas and the production of cultural heritage.The proliferation of digitized materials for both popular and scholarly audiences has stimulated widespread interest in the relationship between these new materials and the documents, books, and artefacts that they represent. Although investigations of digital reproductions have highlighted the notion of remediation, what has not yet been considered in detail is the ontological rift that separates digitizations from their exemplars, the ramifications of such a rift, and how we might embark on productive and critical interpretations of the digitized sources.1 Debates continue to be waged about the appropriate treatment of digital materials in libraries and archives, 2 but we can in the meantime deepen our understanding of these entities by exploring their role in the production of knowledge. To this end, the present study is conceived as an archaeology that excavates for consideration the discursive practices by which digitizations are produced, circulated, and received. This particular conception of archaeology was popularized by Michel Foucault (1972) as a means of critical analysis, and will prove useful in making visible the scope and approach of the examination at hand. L.M.J. Delaissé advocated in 1976 similarly for an archaeology of medieval manuscripts that would be "the first step in any research based on manuscripts." He went on to explain that the method "guarantees that we are in possession of all the material facts revealing the life of these books and vital for understanding their contents" (p. 81). Just as Delaissé hoped that his archaeology would develop into a robust and well-rounded history of the medieval book, so too does the following study propose an archaeology that lays the foundation for a future history of the digitization. The article will therefore perform an excavation of a particular project in digitization, introducing for discussion the constitution of that project, how we might interpret the conditions in which its digitizations circulate, and how we might approach similar initiatives as sites of critical analysis.
This article explores how material form influences the communication of information in books across technological divides. Using the creative project, Book Unbound, as a starting point, the article explores forms of the book that are not tied uniquely to the codex. Furthermore, by discussing the familiar codex in relation to its digital counterparts, the article examines how materiality continues to be used to communicate, persuade readers and shape the process of meaning-making.
This forum highlights conversations at the intersection of design methods and social studies of technology. By highlighting a diversity of perspectives on design interventions and programs, we aim to forge new connections between HCI design and communication, science and technology studies, and media studies scholarship. --- Daniela Rosner, Editor
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