Trust & Technology Project: Research Methodology

There are 3 components to the research approach:

User needs analysis
Modelling Indigenous community-oriented archival services
Using information technology to build trusted archival systems

1. User Needs Analysis
This phase of the research involves extensively exploring the needs of Indigenous communities in relation to access to oral memory. The researchers will employ an interpretivist approach using qualitative methods to deal with multiple realities; we seek to understand the viewpoints and meanings of a range of Indigenous communities and people, who are users, or potential users, of archival services.

Research participants will be selected to represent the major categories of people relevant to the research. There are many dispersed Indigenous groups in Victoria (28 co-operatives), which are not necessarily homogeneous within themselves. It will be necessary to represent each of these co-operatives in the research sample, as well as people who are not part of a co-operative. We will also include people with different life experiences, ages, genders, and socio-economic circumstances.

The fieldwork will involve:

Individual interviews with 30 individuals. Interviewees will be recruited through groups such as the Koorie Heritage Trust Inc., the Victorian Koorie Records Taskforce, and AIATSIS (Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies).
Focus groups of 6-8 people, to include about 60 people overall.

The combination of individual interviews and focus groups minimises the weaknesses and maximises the strengths of these two different styles of data collection.

2. Modelling Indigenous community-oriented archival services

The key aims of this component of the research are:

To explore the extent to which existing archival services meet the needs of Indigenous people for access to oral memory, and
Modelling alternative Indigenous community-oriented archival services.

The investigation of existing models and institutional perspectives will be conducted using a case study methodology, and by analysing literary warrants, including existing protocols and memoranda of understanding. Conceptual models of archival services and functional requirements for building a prototype of an archival system to handle oral memory will be developed based on the outcomes of the user needs analysis and the case studies of existing practice. The modelling will address issues relating to ownership, custody, control, access rights, and authenticity, using grounded theory approaches. The specification of functional requirements will relate to preservation, archival description (metadata), authenticity and access.

3. Using information technology to build trusted archival systems

This component of the research will apply archival techniques and technological solutions to build a prototype of an archival system that meets the needs of Indigenous people, and will also demonstrate how archival services to Indigenous communities could be improved. The archival techniques and technology will relate to storage and access formats, culturally sensitive metadata schema, authenticity requirements for representing oral memory, and customised access through user-friendly interfaces.

To validate the developed archival models, the project will produce a pilot implementation of a trusted archival system for oral memory built around these models, using metadata modelling and user-centred prototyping methods. The key steps in the development of the archival models will be:

Identifying the most suitable mode for preserving representations of oral memory and selecting appropriate data formats for the long term preservation of this mode;
Identifying archival metadata to describe and control records of oral memory;
Discovering mechanisms to store, find, and retrieve records of oral memories;
Locating mechanisms to ensure the authenticity of records of oral memory;
Developing mechanisms for providing Indigenous communities with the ability to control access to records of their oral memories. This will include consideration of how control is passed between members of the community, both in a planned and unplanned fashion.

An action research method will then be used to test the system and obtain feedback from potential users. The process will be used to ensure the instantiation of the social and technical aspects into a working prototype.

Research Component/Phase	Expected Delivery Date

User Needs Analysis
	Analysis of problem, fieldwork design	Jan - Feb 2004
	Piloting of interview schedule	Jan - Feb 2004
	Fieldwork 1 – 30 individual interviews	Mar - May 2004
	Preliminary data analysis	May - Jun 2004
	Fieldwork 2 – 30 more individual interviews	Jun - Sep 2004
	Data analysis and interpretation	Oct - Nov 2004
	Transcription of Interviews	Ongoing
	Fieldwork 3 – further interviews and focus groups in Indigenous organisations	Nov 2004 - Mar 2005
	Data analysis, interpretation and communication of results	Apr - Jun 2005

Modelling Indigenous Archives Services
	Review of literature which addresses issues of authenticity, ownership, intellectual property, custody, control and access in relation to oral memory, Indigenous records and communities	Aug 2004, ongoing
	Case studies and literary warrant analysis relating to existing models of Indigenous archives services e.g. the Ara Irititja Archival Project (2002), the Koorie Family History Service Archiving Project	Oct 2004 - Jun 2005
	Investigation of how well government and other archival services, as they are presently constituted, meet the needs of Indigenous people for access to archival records and oral memory by investigating current services, protocols and procedures, institutional perspectives, and the views of current Indigenous users	Oct 2004 - Jun 2005
	Analysis of outcomes of user needs analysis to determine requirements for provision of archives services	Apr - Jun 2005
	Exploration of implications of findings relating to concepts of authenticity, intellectual property, ownership, control and access	Apr - Jun 2005
	On the basis of all of the above: - Development of conceptual models of Indigenous archives services; - Specification of functional requirements for an archival system to capture and provide access to representations of oral memory, including culturally sensitive metadata requirements and user friendly interfaces	Jul 2005 - Mar 2006

System Prototyping
	Evaluation and selection of storage and access modes for oral memory and long term data format	Jan - Jun 2005
	Technological investigation of system functionality, including: - discovery of mechanisms to store, find, and retrieve records of oral memories; - location of mechanisms to ensure the authenticity of records of oral memory; - development of mechanisms for providing Indigenous communities with the ability to control access to records of their oral memories	Jul - Dec 2005
	Iterative development of metadata	Jan – June 2006
	Building and evaluation of the prototype	Jan – Dec 2006

Publication and dissemination of results	From Jul 2004

Literary Warrants - sources, written and otherwise, which inform and 'warrant' the management of archives and provision of archival services.