“Worthiness” of Marketing Public Archives

Abstract

Stringent budgets have led to calls for all entities in the public sector, including national archival institutions, to justify their existence. This has seen scholars and archivists trying to market archives in order to attract more clientele. However, archives are not created for a target market, neither is their value determined by the frequency of their use. This paper therefore seeks to contest the notion of marketing archives and concludes that the marketing of archives is neither necessary nor worth pursuing as the products (the archives) do not diminish in value even if not consulted.