Help:Archival material

What are archives?

An archive is: 1) an accumulation of historical records, or 2) the physical place that holds those records.

Archives collect and manage original records of notable figures, communities, and organisations. These records may come in many forms—including letters, registers, photographs, maps, and sound/video recordings—and are selected for preservation based on their cultural, historical, or evidentiary value. In other words, archives hold primary sources that can be used for research and fact-checking, among other purposes. Generally, institutions will host material on notable individuals and groups who were connected to the institution and/or material within their topical specialisations.

Many—especially professional—archives are created by official bodies (governments, education institutions, businesses). Some archives are held as private collections.

Some archives are dedicated to documenting and preserving specific community memories. Many such community archives embrace a participatory culture.

On a smaller scale, personal archiving projects often help preserve experiences and legacies at the individual and family level.

For example:

• University of Toronto Archives (the institution) holds the archives (the collection of records) of scientist, author, and educator Ursula Franklin, who taught at the University of Toronto for more than 40 years
• Archives of Traditional Music (the institution) holds audiovisual material relating to research in the academic disciplines of ethnomusicology, folklore, anthropology, linguistics, and various area studies
• Archives of Terror (the collection of records), currently held by the Paraguay Museo de la Justicia (Museum of Justice), documents the CIA-backed police brutality and state terrorism campaigns of Operation Condor
• Documenting Ferguson is a digital archive open to community contributions relating to the 2014 killing of 18-year-old Michael Brown by police officer Darren Wilson in Ferguson, Missouri

Using archival material

Can archives help me?

Archives can help when you need access to original records to better understand what happened in the past.

You may want to use archives if you want to: 1) do research that goes beyond published material on certain histories, or 2) verify published content through original sources.

For general reading or research based on published sources, books and articles may be a better first step. They are often easier to access and tend to provide more extensive context. Wikipedia is also largely built on these sources (WP:SECONDARY).

How to find the archives you need

Since different archives collect material within different areas, you will first need to figure out what archives hold the information you need.

If you are looking for archives located in a specific place:

• See: List of archives. If available, detailed sub-lists (e.g. List of archives in Canada) can be a useful starting point
• Supplement your search using search engines (e.g. DuckDuckGo, Google). For example, if you are looking for archives in Istanbul, you can search: "archives in Istanbul"
• If you come across archives that are not yet on the list of archives, help improve Wikipedia by editing the list (if you are new to editing, see: Wikipedia:FAQ/Editing, How to edit Wikipedia)

If you are looking for information on specific individuals, groups, or organisations:

• Browse relevant Wikipedia pages for external links and sidebars (Template:Archival records) that direct to archival holdings
• Look for archival links on subject coverage (e.g. profiles, biographies, news items) found on the web
• Look for archival sources cited in bibliographies (lists of books and articles about a topic)
• Consult topic specialists, who may have advice on relevant archives and their material
• Search national and regional gateways to locate holdings. These gateways contain searchable information on different sets of holdings, so it can help to try a number of options. Examples of such gateways include:
  • Archives Canada – search across Canada's 800+ archival institutions
  • Discover National Archives UK – search across the National Archives and 2,500+ other UK institutions
  • National Union Catalog of Manuscript Collections – search manuscript (hand-written documents) collections across the US
  • ArchiveGrid – search across 1,000+ archival institutions; largely draws from OCLC's WorldCat database
  • Archive Finder – search across several thousand U.S. and British archives (Note: While the search is free, simplified access to detailed description and finding aids requires payment.)
  • SNAC (Social Networks and Archival Context) - free, online resource that helps users information about persons, families, and organizations that created or are documented in historical resources (primary source documents) and their connections to one another. Users can locate archival collections and related resources held at cultural heritage institutions around the world.

How to look for things in archives

Zooming in: archival descriptions

Archives hold a lot of information, and not all of it will be relevant. Once you know broadly what you are looking for and where you are looking for it, you will need to figure out what material might be most useful.

To do this, you can refer to archival descriptions. Archives sort and describe their material so that they make sense within historical context. Archival descriptions are your guide to what is contained in the institution's holdings, how the contents are arranged, and in what ways they matter.

Since many archives now provide digital descriptions of their holdings, it is possible to do much of this research online. However, if an archive does not have a website, list collections, or host digital descriptions, you will need to contact the institution directly.

If you are contacting the institution directly—inform the archival staff of your research scope and objectives; ask them to clarify what materials are held by the institution (ask if a finding aid is available); and ask how materials can be accessed by researchers (see: Accessing archives).

Using archival descriptions

In using archival descriptions, it helps to understand by what rules and labels archival material is organised. A collection will often—but not always—be described in the form of a finding aid.

Rules for organisation

Archives are organised with respect to two principles:

• Provenance: Where something comes from. Records from a person or organisation will, under normal circumstances, not be mixed with the records of another
• Original order: As much as possible, archival material will be kept in the order by which the records were created, maintained, and/or used at their origin

While archival standards vary by country (e.g. Rules for Archival Description), they follow a broad international consensus (ISAD-G). For example, archival descriptions will always proceed from the general to the specific. We see this reflected in the levels of description, which categorise archival material similarly to how taxonomic rank groups organisms from the general to the specific.

Levels of description

Levels of arrangement in a fonds

At the highest level of description, a group of records from the same source is called a fonds (/fõː/)—or in some cases, "record group" or "papers". For example, the archival collection of Roxana Ng's records is called "Roxana Ng fonds".

Going from the general to the specific, a fonds may be subdivided into series and subseries. Each series or subseries is broken down into files then into items. The item is the lowest level of description. Not all fonds have all subdivisions. A fonds may have more or fewer subdivisions depending on how varied its materials are.

These levels of description are abstract groupings based on functions or themes. For example, Roxana Ng fonds includes the following series, among others:

• Series 1: Personal life and career
• Series 2: Correspondence
• Series 4: Teaching and course
• Series 9: Research
• Series 10: Conferences
• Series 12: Groups
• Series 14: Born-digital records

Items—grouped and listed under the corresponding series/subseries/file—are physically stored at the archival institution in boxes and folders (inside boxes). Items of the same grouping may be stored across a number of folders or boxes to support the quantity and size of material. For example, material on Roxana Ng's conference activities (Series 12) are stored in "B2014-0005/034(05) - /038(06)", or in boxes 034 (folder 05 and up) to 038 (up to folder 06).

Finding aid

A finding aid is a text document that comprehensively describes the contents of a collection, often alongside contextual, historical information. You can use a finding aid to understand a collection (fonds/record group/papers) in its entirety, to see the relationships between its component parts, and to figure out which portions of the collection will be most useful to you.

Note that while all archival holdings will be described in some way, and while the archival institution will try to provide a finding aid for most collections, not all collections will have finding aids. But where available, many finding aids are now directly available online. If a finding aid exists but cannot be found online, the archival institution may still provide digital copies upon request.

A finding aid contains some variation of the following:

• Basic description: Information about the collection's creator; physical dimensions of the collection in the archive; collection date range
• Biographical sketch/Historical note: Background information on the person or organisation who created the records, or on the history of the collection itself
• Scope and content: General overview of the collection's provenance, records, and date ranges
• Content list: Breakdown of the collection's materials down to the box and folder level

A finding aid will list any restrictions on access or use, the language of materials, and copyright information, as corresponds to the level of description (fonds, series, etc.). It will also include instructions for citation.

A number of annotated finding aids are available for reference:

• Annotated finding aid (digital)
• Annotated finding aid (traditional)

Accessing archives

You can consult archival staff on what options are available for access. To do this, get in touch with the institution by email or phone. You can inform the archival staff of your research scope and objectives, and request advice on accessing the parts of collections that you are interested in.

Since archives hold original (and often irreplaceable) records, archival material is most reliably accessed at the institution that holds them, during in-person visits. Before visiting in person, it is strongly advised that you contact the archives to schedule a visit. This will allow archival staff to arrange for the material you need (sometimes stored off-site) to be available for viewing. You should also review the institution's guidelines on using materials at the archives, as well as use and reproduction policies.

In some cases, the institution may also help you remotely access material upon request—through a cross-institution lending service, by mail, or digitally. Some collections in high demand may also have been digitised for broader access.

Further reading

• Using Archives: A Practical Guide for Researchers – a web-archived guide (2012) from Library and Archives Canada
• Using Archives: A Guide to Effective Research (HTML) – a guide by Laura Schmidt (2016) from Society of American Archivists (PDF)
• Hill, Michael R. Archival Strategies and Techniques. Newbury Park, CA: Sage Publications, 1993 (available for free through Internet Archive)

Using archival material as a source on Wikipedia

What to avoid

Archival material are generally primary sources. Individual items in an archive should not be directly cited on Wikipedia if they require contextual interpretation (WP:PRIMARY).

As an exception, one may cite the section of a finding aid that lists or describes an item that is self-evident of some fact. For example, a 1923 Nobel Prize medal inscribed to Frederick Banting makes self-evident the fact that the Nobel Prize was awarded to him in 1923. If a secondary source is available to support the same fact, cite alongside the secondary source.

What to use

Finding aids commonly contain narrative portions that give context to the archival material in question. These are compiled by topic specialists based on historical research, and may cover some variation or combination of a biographical/organisational sketch (of the subject of the fonds) and a historical note (on the process of archival creation itself).

These narrative portions are secondary sources that aid the user of the fonds. Therefore, they can be normally cited on Wikipedia (WP:SECONDARY).

How to cite

See also: Wikipedia:Citing sources

When citing, specify the cited section of the finding aid. Where possible, point the URL to a stable link (permalink) that presents the finding aid in a standardised, digital format (example). Uploaded scans or PDFs (example) often change over time, leading to broken links.

External links

• Archives FAQs and Facts – blog series by Peel Art Gallery, Museum and Archives
• Elements of a Finding Aid + Annotated Finding Aid – guide by Purdue University Libraries
• Archives Unboxed and Revealed: A Guide to Understanding Archives – web exhibit by Archives of Ontario
• Personal (Digital) Archiving – guide by the Library of Congress