2017 Dodds Prize Winner

It is my great pleasure to announce that Alyssa Hamer has been awarded the Dodds Prize for 2017 for her paper "Ethics of Archival Practice: New Considerations in the Digital Age." Alyssa graduated this past year with MAS and MLIS degrees from UBC, and her paper was submitted by Luciana Duranti.

Instituted in 2011, the Dodds Prize recognizes superior research and writing on an archival topic by a student enrolled in a Master's level archival studies program at a Canadian university. The award honours Gordon Dodds (1941-2010) who was the first President of the ACA, and Archivaria's longest-serving general editor. The submissions received for the 2016/17 academic year were reviewed by an adjudication committee consisting of Amy Marshall Furness (Archivaria Exhibition Review Editor / Art Gallery of Ontario), Braden Cannon (Provincial Archives of Alberta), Rebecka Sheffield (ACA Board designate / Simmons College), and Raymond Frogner (National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation).  I would like to thank the adjudication committee for their service.

The paper will be published in the Spring 2018 issue of Archivaria and the award will be formally presented at the ACA Conference in Edmonton next June.  The citation reads:

"This paper stands out for its critical, practical and constructive approach to the matter of archival ethics, revealing the inadequacy of current ethical codes, in a digital environment, to provide guidance for archivists in carrying out fundamental aspects of their work. The paper persuasively exposes the deficiencies of existing ethical standards with reference to real examples of challenging ethical situations that have faced archivists. In particular, the author's recognition of the ethical responsibilities related to working with minority communities and the ethical duty to preserve records that tell a plurality of perspectives should be applicable to both digital and paper-based records. The author's call for renewal and strengthening of professional ethics is particularly relevant to Canadian archivists now, as the ACA undertakes the revision of its own code of ethics."

Congratulations, Alyssa, on your excellent work!

Jeremy Heil
Managing Editor, Archivaria