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Microfilm
As one
who often introduces undergraduates to primary research, I'm inclined to smile
at the characterization of microfilm making research incredibly tedious. Most
research involves a fair amount of tedium. Personally, I'll take microfilm of
newspapers over hand-written (scribbled) sermons. Yes, there is a certain thrill
handling an original but when faced with going through dozens of folders to find
one or two pertinent letters, the novelty fades a bit.
Further, in my collection having our college
newspapers on microfilm makes it much easier to make photocopies. The bound
originals are large and cumbersome. It's too easy to damage them trying to get
the right section on the copier. And outside my immediate collection, the fact
the my library can purchase microfilm collections of women's diaries,
pamphlet collections, etc., means that our students can do a wider range of
research. They would never have the resources to travel to all the places the
materials are housed and the originals could never withstand the usage if it was
possible. Any tedium is clearly offset by the increased
access.
As
Peter says, we need to consider the materials and the purposes for microfilming
or digitizing. One size does not fit all.
Jan Blodgett
jablodgett@davidson.edu
College Archivist and Records Management
Coordinator
Davidson College,
Davidson, NC