Tactile Sense in Archives

Tactile sense is the sense of touch that a person feels when holding a object. In archiving that tactile sense can be very important to the archivist and the researcher. For the archivist the tactile sense can inform and convey instructions on how to handle a item. For the researcher it can invoke memories and a sense of awe over a item. When an archive switches to a digital archive this sense is lost.

When an archivist handles an item, most prefer to use cotton gloves as to PReVENT skin oils from damaging said item. While this is good practice, wearing gloves blocks the tactile sense. The fibers in the gloves can be caught on the jagged edges of paper and other items, damaging them further. It is also possible, when using gloves, to put too much pressure on an item and damage it that way. By using tactile senses this type of damage can be avoided as the archivist is able to feel the minuet details.

A researcher on the other hand is conveyed a completely different set of information and emotions. It could be as simple as the realization that a famous person use to hold the same item. By holding a item the researcher can better understand what the author was thinking or feeling when writing a piece of letter, journal, etc. It is easier to see how they wrote and what they were passionate AbOUT in a physical piece of paper than through a computer screen.

The tactile sense can provide so much more details to either archivist or researcher than a computer screen can. It is important to understand that tactile sense can be lost when transitioning to a digital archive and thus losing an important emotional connection. The future has yet to be written, so whether the tactile sense in archive will be lost has yet to be seen.