Doctoral candidate Rhiannon Bettivia successfully defended her dissertation, "Encoding Power: The Scripting of Archival Structures in Digital Spaces using the Open Archival Information System (OAIS) Reference Model," at GSLIS on April 28.
Her committee includes Jerome McDonough (chair and research director; associate professor, GSLIS); Kevin Hamilton (professor, School of Art and Design); Anita Say Chan (assistant professor, Department of Media and Cinema Studies); and Kari Kraus (associate professor, information studies and english, University of Maryland).
Abstract: The Open Archival Information System (OAIS) Reference Model is a cornerstone of the evolving discipline of digital preservation. It undergirds many of the systems that are used in daily practice in organizations engaging in digital preservation, and directly or indirectly influences commercial and open source tools, as well as administrative and personnel functions. Yet it also undergirds the field of digital preservation more generally as its design and revisions have taken place concurrent and in partnership with the growth of the profession into one that has boundaries, curricula, and standards of practice. There is closure around OAIS: it is ever assumed as background or foundational knowledge in new endeavors. It is a black box. Given the pervasiveness of OAIS, this research examines the values scripted into the sociotechnical object it represents. Using discourse analysis, this research traces the power relationships that arise as a result of the discourses that OAIS produces. It also explores the effects on professional practice that occur because of the discourses OAIS brings with it from its scientific origins and archive-informed terminology. The dissertation investigates terms like “designated community” and “significant properties” in order to lay bare the imperial tendencies scripted within OAIS as well as to expose the resistive and recuperative potential of this technology.
Bettivia’s research is in the area of digital preservation with a particular focus on film, games, and time-based media art. Her work looks at documenting context for media objects and documenting properties that are not intrinsic to an object's code but still essential to long-term understanding. She looks critically at the development of new archival practice to examine social and political implications of digital preservation tools.
At GSLIS, Bettivia has taught courses on digital preservation; libraries, information, and society; and metadata. She holds a master’s degree in education from Pace University and a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from Columbia University.