Comments on: Advocating for ourselves http://archivesfound.com/2008/09/22/advocating-for-ourselves/ Thinking critically about the archival impulse Fri, 30 Sep 2011 16:58:50 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 By: Archives Found » More thoughts about professionalism and archivists http://archivesfound.com/2008/09/22/advocating-for-ourselves/comment-page-1/#comment-71 Archives Found » More thoughts about professionalism and archivists Wed, 24 Sep 2008 03:51:31 +0000 http://archivesfound.com/2008/09/22/advocating-for-ourselves/#comment-71 [...] started as a response to Russell’s post on my previous musings, but I thought I’d share it here instead because it was getting a bit [...] [...] started as a response to Russell’s post on my previous musings, but I thought I’d share it here instead because it was getting a bit [...]

]]> By: Russell D. James, CA http://archivesfound.com/2008/09/22/advocating-for-ourselves/comment-page-1/#comment-67 Russell D. James, CA Tue, 23 Sep 2008 02:41:18 +0000 http://archivesfound.com/2008/09/22/advocating-for-ourselves/#comment-67 How do you suppose we could do what Mark wants us to do? Will accreditation of our professional graduate education schools do? How about promoting everyone becoming a certified archivist? Is there something else? It occurs to me that wanting to be professionals does not mean we are professionals, does it? We have to act like professionals and there are so many of us who either don't care and do their job to make money. Others want to make something happen and put the egg before the chicken. We have to establish just what it means to be a professional archivist and why that is important before we can establish an identity. Doctors have to have an MD and pass a gruesome test and do a residency and be licenses. Perhaps licensing of archivists? Lawyers have to have a JD or LL.D and pass a bar exam and they are subject to disbarment if they violate laws or ethics. Perhaps we need to have one set of ethics for our profession supported by SAA, CoSA, and NAGARA and have some sort of national body set up to "disbar" archivists? These are just some ideas that come to mind. We need to work on this, but we have to find the right page in the book for us all to be on before we can begin. How do you suppose we could do what Mark wants us to do? Will accreditation of our professional graduate education schools do? How about promoting everyone becoming a certified archivist? Is there something else?

It occurs to me that wanting to be professionals does not mean we are professionals, does it? We have to act like professionals and there are so many of us who either don’t care and do their job to make money. Others want to make something happen and put the egg before the chicken. We have to establish just what it means to be a professional archivist and why that is important before we can establish an identity. Doctors have to have an MD and pass a gruesome test and do a residency and be licenses. Perhaps licensing of archivists? Lawyers have to have a JD or LL.D and pass a bar exam and they are subject to disbarment if they violate laws or ethics. Perhaps we need to have one set of ethics for our profession supported by SAA, CoSA, and NAGARA and have some sort of national body set up to “disbar” archivists?

These are just some ideas that come to mind. We need to work on this, but we have to find the right page in the book for us all to be on before we can begin.

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