Provost's Lecture Series FY09-10 The Future of the Past, the Future of the Present: The Historical Record in the Digital Age

Provost's Lecture Series FY09-10
The Future of the Past, the Future of the Present:  The Historical Record in the Digital Age

We reside in the age of the archive. Our ability to capture text, video, audio, and electronic communications is unprecedented. This new power has also raised questions about security, privacy, relevance, access, selection, cost, and long-term preservation. In the digital environment, everything is saved yet little is preserved. Whose archives are saved and why? Who benefits and how? Are there important facts that escape the seemingly all-encompassing capacity of such archival processes? How can these holdings be efficiently searched and put to scholarly, public and other kinds of use without endangering values such as privacy, accuracy of the historical record, and others? The speakers of the Provost's series, drawn from different areas of the humanities and other disciplines, will explore questions concerning performance, memory, genealogy, power, and the definition, boundaries, and viability of the archive itself in an age of rapid electronic change.

Are We Losing Our Memory?  The View from the National Archives 
Monday, March 22, 2010, 5-6:30 p.m.
Sociology-Psychology Building, room 130 
David S. Ferriero 
Archivist of the United States 
National Archives and Records Administration 

The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) is the independent agency of the U.S. Government responsible for the records of all the agencies of the government.  NARA works with each agency to create records retention and disposal schedules, provides training in and oversight of agency procedures regarding their records, and ultimately retains  2-3% of those records as permanent historical records.  The shift to electronic records systems, extensive use of electronic mail, and the emerging uses of social media herald a paradigm shift in the work of the government, the definition of "records", and NARA's responsibilities.  As Archivist of the United States, David S. Ferriero is responsible for managing this paradigm shift and will share his agency's strategies and challenges in creating the records program of the future. 

All lectures are open to the Duke and local communities and are free of charge
http://www.provost.duke.edu/speaker_series/index.html