Representing the Absent: The Limits and Possibilities of Digital Memory and Preservation

Abstract

Digital preservation has significantly expanded over the past few decades, renewing old and creating new challenges related to provenance, integrity, completeness, and context in memory and preservation practices. In this paper we explore how, perhaps counterintuitively, a more extensive digital historical record offers greater opportunities to misrepresent reality. We first review a set of concepts and socio-cultural approaches to memory and preservation. We then focus on the multiplicity of digital memory and preservation practices today, examining their limits, possibilities, and tensions; specifically, we explore the challenges of decontextualized data, personal versus institutional preservation, and “outsider” digital collections that are willingly and/or forcibly excluded from official accounts. Through these discussions, we review examples of what we consider good digital memory and preservation practices that take new approaches to context and collaboration. Lastly, we explore the optimism inherent in seeking to preserve human knowledge over the long term and to make it accessible to all.

Mogućnosti i obim čuvanje digitalnih podataka i dokumenata značajno su uvećani tokom proteklih nekoliko decenija, što je obnovilo stare i otvorilo nove izazove vezane za njihovu provinijenciju, integritet, potpunost i kontekstualizaciju. U ovom radu razmatramo kako, možda kontraintuitivno, opsežni digitalni zapisi današnjice pružaju više mogućnosti za iskrivljeno predstavljanje stvarnosti. U prvom delu rada dajemo osvrt na neke od značajnih koncepata i društveno-kulturoloških pristupa temama sećanja i čuvanja podataka. Potom se fokusiramo na višeslojnost današnjih praksi vezanih za digitalno čuvanje, ispitujući njihove granice, mogućnosti, i tenzije. Konketno, analiziramo probleme dekontekstualizacije podataka, individualno nasprot institucionalnog čuvanja, te “autsajderske” digitalne kolekcije koje su dobrovoljno ili prislino isključene iz zvaničnih tokova i narativa. U tim promišljanjima analiziramo primere koji inovativnim pristupom uspešno rešavaju izazove digitalnog čuvanja. Rad završavamo osvrtom na svojevrsni optimizam inherentan nastojanjima da se ljudsko znanje dugotrajno sačuva i učini široko dostupnim.