Appendix A - Society of American Archivists

In my teaching, in reviewing the work of interns, and even in reviewing the workof archivists who have been practicing for several years, I find violations ofthe above.I have seen many titles (usually for sub-collection aggregations) that adhere tothe letter of DACS rules, but fail to meet one or more of the above criteria.Most troubling for me are inaccurate, biased, or inauthentic titles.Examples:Inaccurate: "Records of the Student Web Resources Office, 1969-1980" (when thatoffice did not exist during the time the records were created, it was called theStudent Publications Office).Ambiguous: "Jane Smith Miscellenea, 1880-1922" (for a scrapbook, postcards,letters, and ephemera of an individual's alumni activities, it should be calledsomething like Jane Smith Simmons College alumna materials, 1880-1922)Inauthentic (by which I mean a skewed title or a misrepresentation that is notquite "wrong" but also not quite "right"): Photographs of Houses, 1922 (forconstruction progress photographs that also include photographs of completedbuilding)Biased: "Sexist letters" (when this is the opinion of the archivist rather than adesignation of the letters assigned by the originator)Concision can be at odds with the above, but it would prevent the creation oftitles that are more like scope notes, e.g. : "Letters between John Q. Smith andhis wife about feeding the cows, raising chickens, planting corn, and thechildren's health"Name: Kate BowersAffiliation: Harvard University / Simmons College Graduate School of Library andInformation Science / TS-DACSE-mail: kate_bowers@harvard.eduPhone:Official Comment? No----------------------------------------DACS REFERENCE:2.3 Title----------------------------------------BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF CHANGE:2.3.2Remove? AACR2 reference?Action: DACS Revision Page 33 of 158 0113-II-A-DACS