Records continuum model: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 20:02, 12 February 2021

Revision as of 16:43, 16 July 2021

Line 5:

==Description==

The RCM is an abstract conceptual model that helps to understand and explore recordkeeping activities (as interaction) in relation to multiple contexts over space and time ([[spacetime]]).<ref name="McK2001">{{cite journal |last=McKemmish |first=S. |year=2001 |title=Placing records continuum theory and practice |journal=Archival Science |volume=1 |issue=4 |pages=333–359 |doi=10.1007/BF02438901 }}</ref> Recordkeeping activities span a time period encompassing multiple action structures within recordkeeping, including ''contemporary recordkeeping, regulatory recordkeeping, and historical recordkeeping.''. Through policies, systems, organizations, processes, laws, and social mandates, archivists and recordkeepers are able to appraise records in a manner which accounts for the record from the time period prior to its creation to its use in current recordkeeping practices.<ref name="upward1" /> In a continuum, recordkeeping processes, such as adding [[metadata]], ''fix'' documents, to enable them to be managed as contextual evidence.<ref name="McK2001" /> Records deemed as having continuing value are retained and managed as ''historical recordkeeping'' via the context of provenance, however, records which have no archival value are destroyed once they lose their administrative value.<ref>{{cite news |last=O'Shea |first=Greg |last2=Roberts |first2=David |type=Pdf |title=Living in a Digital World: Recognizing the Electronic and Post-custodial Realities |work=Archives and Manuscripts |date=1996 }}</ref> The implication of an RCM approach to archiving is that systems and processes establish records as both current and archival at the point of creation.<ref name="curtin">{{cite web|url=http://john.curtin.edu.au/society/australia/ |title=404 |accessdate=2015-10-01 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20141013123845/http://john.curtin.edu.au/society/australia/ |archivedate=2014-10-13 }}</ref>

The RCM can be visualized as a series of 4 concentric rings, or dimensions; ''Document Creation'', ''Records Capture'', ''The Organization of Corporate and Personal Memory'' and ''The Pluralization of Collective Memory'' intersecting with a set of crossed axes; transactionality, evidentiality, recordkeeping and identity.<ref name="upward1" /> Each axis is labelled with a description of the activity or interaction that occurs at that intersection. ''Create'', ''Capture'', ''Organize'' and ''Pluralize'', as the dimensions are referred to in short, represent recordkeeping activities that occur within spacetime. Activities that occur in these dimensions across the axes are explained in the table below:<ref name="elis"/><ref>The information in the table is drawn from {{cite book |last=Upward |first=F. |year=2005 |chapter=The Records Continuum |editor1-first=S. |editor1-last=McKemmish |editor2-first=M. |editor2-last=Piggott |editor3-first=B. |editor3-last=Reed |editor4-first=F. |editor4-last=Upward |title=Archives: Recordkeeping in Society |pages=197–222 |place=Wagga Wagga, NSW |publisher=Centre for Information Studies }}</ref>