Abstract
Defining community archives has been described as difficult in academic literature because of the wide range of activities the organizations do and who they represent, leading to a lack of an agreed-upon definition in the field. Until now, a comparison between how community archivists describe themselves and academic definitions of community archiving has not been undertaken. This paper explores the definitions of community archives given by practitioners in their digital community archives and compares them with academic literature. Using both qualitative thematic coding and quantitative word frequency counts, this study found Flinn (2007) and Flinn et al. (2009) definitions are commonly used in academic literature and highlights themes in practitioner definitions, like futurity and access, that provide insight into the values and goals of practitioners. The results indicate areas of improvement for community archives academics who hope to accurately portray community archives work and further highlight the importance of working with and supporting community archivists. Without the inclusion of practitioner definitions, descriptions, and ideas, academic literature about community archives is disconnected from the field, barring the creation of new ideas and methods.
Recommended Citation
Bibeault, Britney
(2025)
"Community Defining Archives: A comparative view of community archives definitions,"
Journal of Contemporary Archival Studies: Vol. 12, Article 11.
Available at:
https://elischolar.library.yale.edu/jcas/vol12/iss1/11