Appraising Content for Value in the New World: Establishing Expedient Documentary Presence

This essay explores a phenomenon familiar to archivists: the seamless moment of time and space within the remembering process when communities become aware of and must confront the fragility of public memory and make decisions about the management and preservation of their information resources. This decision point has recently been called the documentary moment. The authors' exploration of this concept focuses on the theories, strategies, methodologies, and processes formerly employed and now emerging at Library and Archives Canada (LAC) to facilitate the disposition of government's information resources. They also examine the challenges presented by the digital age on the documentary moment and whether corresponding philosophical or methodological changes to current institutional strategies, including macro-appraisal, are required.