“Archivists and historians usually consider archives as repositories of historical sources and the archivist as a neutral custodian. Sociologists and anthropologists see “the archive” also as a system of collecting, categorizing, and exploiting memories. Archivists are hesitantly acknowledging their role in shaping memories. I advocate that archival fonds, archival documents, archival institutions, and archival systems contain tacit narratives which must be deconstructed in order to understand the meanings of archives.
[…]Every interaction, intervention, interrogation, and interpretation by creator, user, and archivist is an activitation of the record. The archive is an infinite activation of the record. Each activation leaves fingerprints which are attributes to the archive’s infinite meaning.”
Eric Ketelaar. 2001. “Tacit Narratives: The Meanings of Archives.” Archival Science 1(137), 131–141.