Paul
I used to work in the Old Bailey and your question about classification
reminds me of those lawyers that insisted a witness replied either Yes or
No to a question that could not be answered so simply. I therefore do not
think my response will win your lollipop.
Classification is simply grouping things systematically. The latter
element is the bit that is usually missing in records management
classifications I have seen. Aristotle talked about classes or categories:
“…a category was like [a] container with things either inside or outside
the container…the properties the things inside the container had in common
were what defined the category” (Taylor. ‘The organisation of
information’). Bowker & Starr talking about classification in its
broadest sense described it as “…a set of boxes (metaphorical or literal)
into which things can be put to do some kind of work – bureaucratic or
knowledge production…”.
Various people of the past twenty years have suggested that records
managers have misunderstood and misused the term classification and I
think that was right and is still in part right. Much older US and UK
literature seems to have used the word to describe filing order.
Two of the classic principles of classification are firstly that each
scheme (or at least each level in a hierarchical scheme) should be based
on a single classificatory principle, such as classification by size, and
secondly that the classes should be mutually exclusive. These elements are
frequently missing and the schemes fail to add value.
Stuart Orr
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