Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gxg78 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T18:43:56.968Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Computer Technology and the Source Materials of Social Science History

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 January 2016

Jerome M. Clubb
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

In his 1978 Presidential Address to this Association, Allan Bogue urged us to direct our attention to problems associated with the use and development of computer-readable source material (Bogue, 1979). My remarks are in a similar vein. They are limited, however, to only one of the categories of source material that Bogue discussed: information that is originally recorded and stored in computer-readable form. In this area problems have become substantially larger and more pressing than they seemed in 1978, although possible means to their amelioration are now also becoming more apparent. The problems concern, in the first place, the rapidly growing volume of potential source material that is recorded and stored in computer-readable form; and, in the second place, the danger that much of this material will not be preserved or that it will be preserved only in forms that sacrifice its central and crucial advantage of manipulability.

Type
Research Article
Information
Social Science History , Volume 10 , Issue 2 , Summer 1986 , pp. 97 - 114
Copyright
Copyright © Social Science History Association 1986 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Bogue, A. G. (1979) “Data dilemmas: quantitative data and the Social Science History Association.” Social Science History 3: 204–226.Google Scholar
Bui, D. N. C. (1984) “The videodisk: technology, applications, and some implications for archives.” The American Archivist 47 (Fall): 418–427.Google Scholar
Cecil, J. S. and Griffin, E. (1985) “The role of legal policies in data sharing,” in Fienberg, S. E., Martin, M. E., and Straf, M. L. (eds.) Sharing Research Data. Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press: 148–198.Google Scholar
Committee on the Records of Government (1985) Report. Council on Library Research.Google Scholar
Computerworld (1983) 12 September: 166.Google Scholar
Dollar, C. M. (1980a) “Problems and procedures for preservation of and dissemination of computer-readable data,” in Clubb, J. M. and Scheuch, E. K. (eds.) Historical Social Research: The Use of Historical Process Produced Data. Stuttgart, Germany: Klett-Cotta: 457–476.Google Scholar
Dollar, C. M. (1980b) “Machine-readable records of the federal government and the National Archives,” in Geda, C. L., Austin, E. W., and Blouin, F. X. Jr. (eds.) Archivists and Machine-Readable Records. Chicago: Society of American Archivists: 79–88.Google Scholar
Herschler, D. H. and Slaney, W. Z. (1982) “The ‘paperless office’: a case study of the State Department’s Foreign Affairs Information System.” The American Archivist 45 (Spring): 142–154.Google Scholar
Hofferbert, R. I. (1980) “Confidentiality, privacy, and social science data archives: special problems of policy analysis,” in Geda, C. L., Austin, E. W., and Blouin, F. X. Jr. (eds.) Archivists and Machine-Readable Records. Chicago: Society of American Archivists: 217–229.Google Scholar
Kessner, R. M. (1984–1985) “Automated information management: is there a role for the archivist in the office of the future?” Archivaria 19 (Winter): 162–172.Google Scholar
Paul, K. D. and Coe, J. A. L. (1985) Records Management Handbook for United States Senators and Their Repositories. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office.Google Scholar
Rowe, J. S. (1980) “Privacy legislation: implications for archives,” in Geda, C. L., Austin, E. W., and Blouin, F. X. Jr. (eds.) Archivists and Machine-Readable Records. Chicago: Society of American Archivists: 193–202.Google Scholar
U.S. Bureau of the Census (1985) Census Catalog and Guide. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office.Google Scholar
U.S. Congress, House, Subcommittee on Census and Population (1982) Hearing on Impact of Budget Cuts on Federal Statistical Programs. 16 March, 97th Congress, 2nd Sess. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office.Google Scholar
U.S. National Archives and Records Service (1984a) Technology assessment report: speech pattern recognition, optical character recognition, digital raster scanning. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Service.Google Scholar
U.S. National Archives and Records Service (1984b) Subcommittee C of the Committee on Preservation. Strategic technology considerations relative to the preservation and storage of human and machine readable records. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Service.Google Scholar
U.S. National Technical Information Service (1985) Directory of Computerized Data Files. Washington, D.C.: United States Department of Commerce.Google Scholar
Volz, R. A. (1980) “Computer-based mass storage technology,” in Geda, C. L., Austin, E. W., and Blouin, F. X. Jr. (eds.) Archivists and Machine-Readable Records. Chicago: Society of American Archivists: 158–179.Google Scholar
Westin, A. E. and Baker, M. A. (1972) Databanks in a Free Society: Computers, Record-Keeping and Privacy, A Project of the Computer Science and Engineering Board of the National Academy of Sciences. New York: Quadrangle/New York Times Book Co.Google Scholar