An Individual Approach: A Case Study on Oral History Accessioning

Abstract

This article explores the convergence of traditional accessioning practices in the archives and best practices for describing and growing access to oral history. Archives traditionally focus on collective description of records, describing materials as aggregates at the collection, series, or folder levels versus item-level description. Describing materials based on their fonds or provenance preserves contextual information about their creation, and approaching description in an aggregate way further helps archivists provide more efficient access to both small and large bodies of records. However, when applied to oral history collections, the collective description approach underserves the essential and individual characteristics of oral history materials. If oral history focuses on individual experience and each oral history is governed by its own release or rights agreement, what are the implications for archival accessioning? How might archives adapt broader archival practice to focus accessioning on the individual level when it comes to oral histories? Offering a case study of oral history accessioning procedures in Special Collections and University Archives at the University of Maryland, this article looks to fill gaps in archival practice and to offer a methodology for the accessioning of oral history in a way that is both ethical and seeks to enhance access and discoverability.