What is the difference between libraries and archives

Document Type: Article. Length: words. Lexile Measure: L. Translate Article. Set Interface Language. Decrease font size. Increase font size. Display options. Default More Most. Tags: archives , primary sources , research. Libraries usually purchase items but some libraries also receive donations from private individuals. Archivists with broad knowledge of documentary heritage and their organization's mandate and collecting policy select archival material.

Librarians with specialized knowledge of their subject areas and knowledge of their organization's mandate and collecting policy select library material. Material is usually selected in accordance with archives acquisition policies and institutional mandates. Material is usually selected in accordance with library collections policies and institutional mandates.

Librarians organize collections without concern for how the creator s of the material organize their records. The intellectual order of a collection is presented in the finding aid.

A group of material is described on a number of different levels within the collection or fonds e. Descriptions of each part of a collection are linked together into a "multi-level" archival description, or finding aid. Types of Materials: Archives can hold both published and unpublished materials, and those materials can be in any format. Some examples are manuscripts, letters, photographs, moving image and sound materials, artwork, books, diaries, artifacts, and the digital equivalents of all of these things.

Materials in an archives are often unique, specialized, or rare objects, meaning very few of them exist in the world, or they are the only ones of their kind. Access to Materials: Since materials in archival collections are unique, the people archivists in charge of caring for those materials strive to preserve them for use today, and for future generations of researchers.

Archives have specific guidelines for how people may use collections which will be discussed later in this guide to protect the materials from physical damage and theft, keeping them and their content accessible for posterity.