Having spent much of my career trying to establish and reinforce the
distinction between the terms 'archives' and 'records', which receives
attention in all my books, I am now in the curious position of having done a
U-turn. I no longer think we can sustain the terminological distinction -
largely because the romanic languages do not have the corresponding terms.
Still, the logical distinction remains and we should be conscious of it.
However the most important primary principles is one of provenance. The
definition of archives/records does not depend (never has) on physical forms
(written, typed etc) but upon having, or not having, formed part of a
transaction. Curiously, many archivists, including some senior ones, don't
seem to have absorbed this.
Michael Cook, RMSA
Senior Research Fellow, LUCAS, University of Liverpool
Tel & Fax 0151 625 6512
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