Library Trends

When Library Trends devoted its first issue to preservation (Tauber, 1956), the state-of-the-art term was conservation, and the articles dealt with binding, treatments, stack maintenance, and "discarding" (weeding). The focus was almost entirely on libraries, except for an article by Hummel and Barrow on treatment for library and archival material (Hummel & Barrow, 1956). The next Library Trends issue devoted to preservation was published twenty-five years later (Lundeen, 1981), and although conservation was still the preferred term, the range of topics was broader. To binding and treatment were added new areas: administration, education, paper chemistry, disaster preparedness and prevention, microforms, and the conservation and preservation of sound recording and photographic collections. The focus was still squarely on libraries, with little mention of archives. This 1981 issue does, however, show the first signs of an interest in international collaboration and some cross-fertilization of ideas in Buchanan's article on disaster prevention (Buchanan, 1981).

In the last twenty-five years, "preservation" scholarship has evolved to a dual pursuit: the idea that we need to preserve and the theoretical issues concerning preservation—what to save, how to save it, and how such decisions are made. Also, preservation is now equated with history and memory, thus cultural heritage preservation is currently a subject of considerable interest to a wide range of stakeholders. It is increasingly being perceived that the issues of the archives, library, art, and historic preservation fields have much in common, certainly more than was apparent in the past, and each field can learn from the others. Some of these issues emerge from the attempt to define from varying perspectives the concepts of cultural property ownership that were developed in colonial times; from the expropriation of cultural heritage for political and ideological aims; from changing understandings about intellectual property rights in an [End Page 1] increasingly globalized environment; and from the changing techniques now available to cultural heritage preservation, most notably the impacts of digital culture. Even our vocabulary has shifted; until relatively recently we used the term cultural patrimony, itself an artifact of colonialist thinking. We are also questioning more closely than ever before the reasons we should preserve cultural heritage, what it is that we are trying to preserve, and what value society places on preservation, issues explored in Abby Smith's paper. Heather MacNeil and Bonnie Mak use lessons from the archives field to describe precisely the concept of authenticity and articulate its importance to current preservation activities, especially in a digital context. Annemaree Lloyd explores significance, a concept that originates in historic preservation (also referred to as the built heritage field) and is increasingly being applied to other fields. Anna Catalani provides a perspective on authenticity from the museum field. Paul Eggert draws comparisons between textual editors and conservators to throw light on concepts of the work that assist preservation thinking.

The ongoing challenge to protecting collections from civil unrest and natural disasters also brings cultural heritage institutions together. Michèle Cloonan considers an expanded definition of preservation, noting how the "custodial storehouse" model is disrupted and assumptions about preservation challenged in periods and at points of stress. András Riedlmayer examines how preservation is redefined in times of war or under regimes where books and other records are intentionally destroyed.

The basis of cultural heritage preservation is a desire to save the past while making the past accessible and usable. With the exception of a small number of "iconic" objects, such as the Domesday Book, The Book of Kells, or the American Declaration of Independence, which only under extraordinary circumstances can be handled, preservationists seek to make original items available to users. (Special collections departments and museums might urge patrons to use surrogates first, to cut down on wear and tear to fragile originals.) In historic preservation, which focuses primarily on the built environment, structures are often lived-in multi-use spaces.

In addition to the preservation of physical objects, we must preserve digital information. Deborah Woodyard-Robinson (Woodyard-Robinson, 2005) recently devoted a Library Trends issue to digital preservation, with a particular emphasis on current practices. In this issue the contributors...