In response to Mike:

At 07:17 AM 02/12/2009, J. Michael Pemberton wrote:

>I've never seen one scintilla of evidence that readers without 
>doctoral degrees care about scholarly writing (meaning research);

As an example, 50% of the InterPARES research project 
co-investigators are professional records managers without doctoral 
degrees...they conduct original research, write about it and are 
eager to read about research findings related to their field.

>and, by the way, how many RM PhDs are there (name one)?

PhDs do not have a disciplinary identifier after the title.  If you 
are asking how many have graduated with a dissertation squarely in 
the records management field, I can name Fiorella Foscarini, Victoria 
Lemieux, and myself to start, but there are many many others.

>A peer-reviewed journal does not sui generis create academic 
>programs; it is created from programs as above that precede 
>it.  Name one other discipline without significant academic presence.

Some of the most important archival refereed journals have preceded 
the existence of academic programs in archival science, including The 
American Archivist. The Digital Forensics profession has a refereed 
journal without having an academic presence other than in very few 
isolated courses, but my guess is that it is going to have one sooner 
than RM, precisely because of that refereed journal which publishes 
the research in which its members take part.

>First, then, there must be enough existing Ph.D. professors of 
>records management.

There are many of those, who write important stuff on journals that 
records managers do not read because these journals are not a natural 
place for records managers to look into.  All the issues Blake has 
mentioned, "the creation and implementation of retention schedules,
policies, senior management support and discovery v. cloud computing, 
and social network sites", these are the issues we academic conduct 
research about in collaboration with professionals in the field, who 
contribute using their organizations as test-beds.  These are the 
issues we write about, explaining pros and contras as evidenced by 
research, and developing solutions.  We work with city 
administrators, with the police, with courts and lawyers, with 
universities, and write about successes and failures, and doing so we 
help all the practitioners.

>It is not ARMA that must create and own the peer-review journal.  It 
>might be a large supporter, but the program and journal will more 
>likely be housed in a large prestigious records management 
>department (name one). They also run the journal processes.  And 
>most peer review journals carry little or no advertising--who's 
>going to pay for this?

In areas of professional endeavors, professional associations are the 
primary driving force in educating their membership and the 
profession at large, and in fostering the development and 
communication of new knowledge through a scholarly journal.  Indeed, 
for decades, scholarly journals have been the primary means for 
professional associations to attract membership and raise their 
status and that of the profession.

Academics in professional disciplines do not write for other 
academics but for the field and professional associations are 
responsible for bringing that knowledge to the field. ARMA is a 
notable exception, not the norm. If it had a scholarly journal, 
hundreds of students in North America (because there are hundreds of 
students in RM, Mike, believe me) and thousands worldwide would 
subscribe to it (one could subscribe to a journal without being a 
member of the association or get the journal free as part of the 
membership), initially simply because its articles would be in the 
classes reading lists, and later because professionals do need to 
read about new ideas and research in their field, as Jesse mentioned, 
in order to do a better job.

Subscriptions would pay for the journal, but, as in the case of the 
ACA with Archivaria, ARMA could start with a grant from a research 
agency.  There are ways when there is the will.  ARMA is much richer 
than the ACA, SAA, SoA, etc.  It is a question of priorities, isn't 
it?  Why don't we ask the young people, those who are now in class 
preparing for a career in RM, those who are a large part of the 
potential readership? ARMA should consider that a scholarly journal 
would be a powerful membership recruitment tool for all those 
enrolled in graduate classes in RM.

Luciana

Dr. Luciana Duranti
Chair and Professor, Archival Studies
Director, The InterPARES Project www.interpares.org
Director, Digital Records Forensics Project www.digitalrecordsforensics.org
School of Library, Archival and Information Studies www.slais.ubc.ca
The University of British Columbia
The Irving K. Barber Learning Centre
Suite 470, 1961 East Mall
Vancouver, British Columbia  V6T 1Z1 CANADA
Tel: 604.822.2587
Fax: 604.822.6006
www.lucianaduranti.ca
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