Picking Our Text: Archival Description, Authenticity, and the Archivist as Editor

A number of recent archival initiatives have asserted a relationship between archival description and authenticity. This article establishes a preliminary foundation for understanding the nature of that relationship by reviewing the literature relating to archival description and authenticity, comparing the authenticating function of archival description with that of textual criticism, and identifying three lines of research inquiry that present themselves in light of that comparison.