Arranging and Describing Photographs

Certificate Eligibility:

A&D

Credits:

0.75 CEU, 5 ARC

Length:

1 day

Format:

In-Person

Max Attendees:

Tier:

Tactical and Strategic

ACE Category:

Arrangement and Description

Description:

This two-day online course will introduce techniques for effectively processing, arranging, and describing collections of photographs, both analogue and digital. You’ll explore practical solutions to improve organization and access to collections with photographic materials and learn more about the ways in which archival description has adapted to the unique challenges presented by digital resources. Activities are designed to help develop your visual literacy skills, devise practical solutions to processing and digitizing large collections, and to help you become comfortable with the common metadata standards and controlled vocabularies that help to facilitate access.

Registrants of this course may purchase Photographs: Archival Care and Management at a discounted rate of $24.99 (Nonmember) / $19.99 (SAA Member). The ebook is available from the SAA bookstore as a PDF and epub or via Amazon Kindle (nonmember pricing only).

Learning Outcomes:

Develop processing plans and guidelines to arrange and describe photographs

Apply principles of arrangement to photographic materials

Use visual literacy skills to improve description and accessibility of image collections

Understand the essential elements of common descriptive metadata standards

Provide subject access to digital collections using controlled vocabularies and authorized headings

Who Should Attend:

Archivists who are new to managing photographs, photo specialists who are new to processing, new archives professionals and graduate students in archival programs who have little or no experience in the arrangement and description of photographs.

What You Should Already Know:

Participants should have basic archival training and a working knowledge of the fundamental principles of processing, arrangement and description pertaining to text-based collections.

A&D Core Competency:

1. Arrangement: Understand the process of organizing materials with respect to their provenance and original order to protect their context and facilitate access.

2. Description: Analyze and describe details about the attributes of a record or collection of records to facilitate identification, management, and understanding of the work.

3. Descriptive Standards: Apply rules and practices that codify the content of information used to represent archival materials in discovery tools according to published structural guidelines.

4. Management: Demonstrate ability to manage physical and intellectual control over archival materials.

5. Discovery: Create tools to facilitate access and disseminate descriptive records of archival materials.

6. Ethics: Convey transparency of actions taken during arrangement and description and respect privacy, confidentiality, and cultural sensitivity of archival materials.

7. Risk Management: Analyze threats and implement measures to minimize ethical and institutional risks.

Instructor(s):

Elizabeth Knazook

Host a Course:

Interested in hosting a course? Visit our Host a Course page for information on what is required and how to apply!

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