Records, rules and speech acts Archival principles and preservation of speech acts

Väitöskirja tarkastelee asiakirjoja ja niiden säilyttämisessä noudatettuja arkistollisia periaatteita kielitekoteorian ja John R. Searlen ajatusten valossa. Siinä osoitetaan, että asiakirjojen säilyttäminen alkuperäisessä järjestyksessä toiminnassa syntyneinä kokonaisuuksina (ns. provenienssiperiaate) saattaa säilyttää käyttäjälle tietoa asiakirjalla tehdyn kieliteon eri tasoista ja komponenteista; asiakirjan paikka arkistossa voi kertoa esimerkiksi kieliteon tekijän, aiheen, johon kieliteko liittyy tai teon illokuution (päätös, käsky, jne.). Toiseksi väitöskirjassa esitetään, että asiakirjoissa tehdyillä kieliteoilla on yhteisiä piirteitä, jotka selittävät sen, miksi tietojen säilyttäminen asiakirjojen kontekstista provenienssiperiaatteen avulla on tärkeää. Yleensä asiakirjoiksi mielletään juridisesti merkittävät tai organisaatioiden toimintaan ja prosesseihin liittyvät dokumentit. Kieliteot näissä dokumenteissa muuttavat sitä, mikä on yhteiskunnassa tai organisaation tehtäviin liittyvässä roolissa pakollista, kiellettyä, sallittua tai toivottavaa. Muutokset tapahtuvat vain jos kieliteko tehdään oikeassa kontekstissa: esimerkiksi henkilön toimesta, joka on sen tekemiseen oikeutettu, tai henkilölle, jonka tehtäviin kuuluu reagoida tiedoksi tulleeseen asiaan. Jotta voidaan arvioida, mitä seurauksia kieliteolla on ollut, tai mitä seurauksia sillä olisi pitänyt olla, käyttäjän on voitava olla selvillä kontekstista. Asiakirja voi sisältää tästä jotain tietoa, mutta asiakirjan paikka arkistossa kertoo siitä silloinkin, kun dokumentin sisältö ei siitä kerro tai se on harhaanjohtava.Archival principles, like the principle of provenance, are applied to documents in archival custody. Archival professionals see many reasons for this, but the significance of the principles and why they are applied to some documents has not been fully explicated. Despite many definitions, there is also no full agreement on what are records . The study examined archival principles and archival concepts in the light of speech act theory, J. R. Searle s theory of the construction of social reality, and some ideas in sociolinguistics and studies of organizational communication. It had three research questions: 1) in what way do archival documents (records and personal papers) differ from other documents, 2) what is achieved by following archival principles in archival work, and 3) why is it necessary to follow archival principles when archival documents are in question? The method used was theory derivation and analyses of archival documents and writings in archival literature. The study shows that the selected theoretical background was a good starting point for research. The findings suggest that documentary context preserved by archival principles tells about functional levels and context of the speech act. This may help a document user to understand and reconstruct the speech act in an archival document. In archival literature it is often stated that the importance of archival principles lies in communicating contextual information. The novelty is to show that concepts in the speech act theory and sociolinguistics can be used to analyze what information is conveyed via documentary context. This allows us to create new hypothesis about why and when applying archival principles to documents is necessary. Previously it has been noted that there is a connection between records and performatives: archetypal records (e.g. wills and court decisions) are often acts of speech in which saying makes it so . The study introduced the concept of a rule-bound speech act , which is an ideal-type of a record creating speech act. The study suggests that a common feature of rule-bound speech acts is that they have deontic consequences. Different conceptions of record differ when it comes to the significance and duration of deontic consequences and nature of the rules making them possible. Strong sense records create new institutional facts and/or have otherwise long-term, objective consequences for the society (e.g. change the ownership of a real estate, nominate a new president, or assign a husband s status and obligations to a person). An act in a weaker sense record, on the other hand, has only temporary and local importance: for instance, it may determine, what is the next step in the organizational process, who should take it, or signify the fulfillment of personal obligations (if the person was obliged to make the speech act). Rule-environment governing the rule-bound speech acts may vary. In some cases, there may be many kinds of rules (what roles there are, who may make a speech act, what is made by it, what are the consequences of the speech act), in other cases only some. Also the degree to which the rules are explicit, formalized, sanctioned, and accepted may vary. In the case of strong sense records, rules tend to be very formal and explicit, breaking them is rigorously sanctioned, and it is hard to question the validity or existence of the rules because they are published as laws. In creation of weaker sense records the rules may be less explicit and formal, they have only limited validity (e.g. inside an organization), questioning them may be possible, and breaking mildly sanctioned or even tolerated. This makes drawing a line between records and nonrecords difficult. The concept of a rule-bound speech act explains why additional information about the context and functional levels of the speech act may be required. What kind of act there is and what outcome it should (or should not) have does not depend alone on the linguistic expression in a document but on the factors exterior to it. Identification of the context and functional levels in the speech act becomes important, because there may be no proper illocution (e.g. decision or command ) unless the act is executed by a right person and takes place in the proper context and at the right moment of time. The act may have deontic consequences only when it is addressed to a certain person or institution. The perlocutionary act may be something required by the rules or, on the contrary, something that should not have happened. One act may also have different consequences for the different professional groups in an organization. Archives, records, and archival activities can be looked at from many perspectives, most of which cannot be easily combined with the speech act theory. Nor can all the information carried by documentary context be analyzed in the light of it. Although the speech act theory proved to be a good starting point for the study, it has limited applicability when documents are viewed from another domain (e.g. as evidence of events that have taken place in another time and place), which is customary in archival studies. The reasons for applying archival principles to personal papers remained unclear, but the study suggests new ideas for examining it. The findings give new conceptual tools for analyzing archival documents, concepts, and practices. Connection of records to legal sphere, different conceptions of recordness, difficulties of defining records in practice, the necessity of applying archival principles to archival documents, some arguments used to defend archival principles, the need to preserve the original appearance of records, and partially concepts used in connection of records (transaction, accountability, reliability) appear as different aspects of the same issues: that archives deal with rule-bound speech acts and archival principles help to keep functional levels and context of speech acts recognizable

Records, rules and speech acts Archival principles and preservation of speech acts

Väitöskirja tarkastelee asiakirjoja ja niiden säilyttämisessä noudatettuja arkistollisia periaatteita kielitekoteorian ja John R. Searlen ajatusten valossa. Siinä osoitetaan, että asiakirjojen säilyttäminen alkuperäisessä järjestyksessä toiminnassa syntyneinä kokonaisuuksina (ns. provenienssiperiaate) saattaa säilyttää käyttäjälle tietoa asiakirjalla tehdyn kieliteon eri tasoista ja komponenteista; asiakirjan paikka arkistossa voi kertoa esimerkiksi kieliteon tekijän, aiheen, johon kieliteko liittyy tai teon illokuution (päätös, käsky, jne.). Toiseksi väitöskirjassa esitetään, että asiakirjoissa tehdyillä kieliteoilla on yhteisiä piirteitä, jotka selittävät sen, miksi tietojen säilyttäminen asiakirjojen kontekstista provenienssiperiaatteen avulla on tärkeää. Yleensä asiakirjoiksi mielletään juridisesti merkittävät tai organisaatioiden toimintaan ja prosesseihin liittyvät dokumentit. Kieliteot näissä dokumenteissa muuttavat sitä, mikä on yhteiskunnassa tai organisaation tehtäviin liittyvässä roolissa pakollista, kiellettyä, sallittua tai toivottavaa. Muutokset tapahtuvat vain jos kieliteko tehdään oikeassa kontekstissa: esimerkiksi henkilön toimesta, joka on sen tekemiseen oikeutettu, tai henkilölle, jonka tehtäviin kuuluu reagoida tiedoksi tulleeseen asiaan. Jotta voidaan arvioida, mitä seurauksia kieliteolla on ollut, tai mitä seurauksia sillä olisi pitänyt olla, käyttäjän on voitava olla selvillä kontekstista. Asiakirja voi sisältää tästä jotain tietoa, mutta asiakirjan paikka arkistossa kertoo siitä silloinkin, kun dokumentin sisältö ei siitä kerro tai se on harhaanjohtava.Archival principles, like the principle of provenance, are applied to documents in archival custody. Archival professionals see many reasons for this, but the significance of the principles and why they are applied to some documents has not been fully explicated. Despite many definitions, there is also no full agreement on what are records . The study examined archival principles and archival concepts in the light of speech act theory, J. R. Searle s theory of the construction of social reality, and some ideas in sociolinguistics and studies of organizational communication. It had three research questions: 1) in what way do archival documents (records and personal papers) differ from other documents, 2) what is achieved by following archival principles in archival work, and 3) why is it necessary to follow archival principles when archival documents are in question? The method used was theory derivation and analyses of archival documents and writings in archival literature. The study shows that the selected theoretical background was a good starting point for research. The findings suggest that documentary context preserved by archival principles tells about functional levels and context of the speech act. This may help a document user to understand and reconstruct the speech act in an archival document. In archival literature it is often stated that the importance of archival principles lies in communicating contextual information. The novelty is to show that concepts in the speech act theory and sociolinguistics can be used to analyze what information is conveyed via documentary context. This allows us to create new hypothesis about why and when applying archival principles to documents is necessary. Previously it has been noted that there is a connection between records and performatives: archetypal records (e.g. wills and court decisions) are often acts of speech in which saying makes it so . The study introduced the concept of a rule-bound speech act , which is an ideal-type of a record creating speech act. The study suggests that a common feature of rule-bound speech acts is that they have deontic consequences. Different conceptions of record differ when it comes to the significance and duration of deontic consequences and nature of the rules making them possible. Strong sense records create new institutional facts and/or have otherwise long-term, objective consequences for the society (e.g. change the ownership of a real estate, nominate a new president, or assign a husband s status and obligations to a person). An act in a weaker sense record, on the other hand, has only temporary and local importance: for instance, it may determine, what is the next step in the organizational process, who should take it, or signify the fulfillment of personal obligations (if the person was obliged to make the speech act). Rule-environment governing the rule-bound speech acts may vary. In some cases, there may be many kinds of rules (what roles there are, who may make a speech act, what is made by it, what are the consequences of the speech act), in other cases only some. Also the degree to which the rules are explicit, formalized, sanctioned, and accepted may vary. In the case of strong sense records, rules tend to be very formal and explicit, breaking them is rigorously sanctioned, and it is hard to question the validity or existence of the rules because they are published as laws. In creation of weaker sense records the rules may be less explicit and formal, they have only limited validity (e.g. inside an organization), questioning them may be possible, and breaking mildly sanctioned or even tolerated. This makes drawing a line between records and nonrecords difficult. The concept of a rule-bound speech act explains why additional information about the context and functional levels of the speech act may be required. What kind of act there is and what outcome it should (or should not) have does not depend alone on the linguistic expression in a document but on the factors exterior to it. Identification of the context and functional levels in the speech act becomes important, because there may be no proper illocution (e.g. decision or command ) unless the act is executed by a right person and takes place in the proper context and at the right moment of time. The act may have deontic consequences only when it is addressed to a certain person or institution. The perlocutionary act may be something required by the rules or, on the contrary, something that should not have happened. One act may also have different consequences for the different professional groups in an organization. Archives, records, and archival activities can be looked at from many perspectives, most of which cannot be easily combined with the speech act theory. Nor can all the information carried by documentary context be analyzed in the light of it. Although the speech act theory proved to be a good starting point for the study, it has limited applicability when documents are viewed from another domain (e.g. as evidence of events that have taken place in another time and place), which is customary in archival studies. The reasons for applying archival principles to personal papers remained unclear, but the study suggests new ideas for examining it. The findings give new conceptual tools for analyzing archival documents, concepts, and practices. Connection of records to legal sphere, different conceptions of recordness, difficulties of defining records in practice, the necessity of applying archival principles to archival documents, some arguments used to defend archival principles, the need to preserve the original appearance of records, and partially concepts used in connection of records (transaction, accountability, reliability) appear as different aspects of the same issues: that archives deal with rule-bound speech acts and archival principles help to keep functional levels and context of speech acts recognizable

Menneisyys on johdanto: arkistoajattelu vuodesta 1898 ja sen uusi paradigma

Artikkelissa analysoidaan arkistoajattelua vuoden 1898 hollantilaiskäsikirjan jälkeen. Siinä ehdotetaan, että on syntymässä uudenlainen paradigma. Tärkeimpiä eurooppalaisia,amerikkalaisia ja australialaisia ajattelijoita tarkastellaan heidän aikaansa ja kontekstiaan vasten. Huomio on kirjoittajissa, jotka ovat tunnistaneet muutokset aikansa asiakirjoissa,arkistonmuodostajissa, asiakirjajärjestelmissä ja asiakirjojen käytössä. Lisäksi he ovat nähneet yhteiskunnallisten, kulttuuristen, teknologisten ja filosofisten suuntausten vaikutuksen arkistoteoriaan ja -käytäntöihin. Alan diskurssi muodostuu tästä. Siinä on erotettavissa viisi teemaa. Jos kansakuntien ja yksilöiden historia halutaan säilyttää, perinteiset arkistoperiaatteet on muotoiltava uudelleen niin, että huomio on prosesseissa asiakirjojen sijaan.Teos on Pekka Henttosen suomennos Terry Cookin artikkelista “What is past is prologue: a history of archival ideas since 1898 and the future paradigm shift”, joka ilmestyi kanadalaisessa Archivaria-lehdessä v. 1997 (nro 43, s. 17–63). Artikkelista on muitakin versioita, mutta Cook itse pitää Archivarian tekstiä lopullisena ja auktoritatiivisena

Geographical patterns in the radial growth response of Norway spruce provenances to climatic variation

201

Utilizing prior information in environmental inventory design - experiences from forest inventories

201

Connecting potential frost damage events identified from meteorological records to radial growth variation in Norway spruce and Scots pine

The aim of this study was to examine if temperature conditions potentially causing frost damage have an effect on radial growth in Norway spruce and Scots pine in Finland. We hypothesized that frost damage occurs and reduces radial growth after (1) extreme cold winter temperatures, (2) frost hardiness levels insufficient to minimum temperatures, and (3) the lack of insulating snow cover during freezing temperatures, resulting in increased frost and decreased temperatures in soil. Meteorological records were used to define variables describing the conditions of each hypothesis and a dynamic frost hardiness model was used to find events of insufficient frost hardiness levels. As frost damage is likely to occur only under exceptional conditions, we used generalized extreme value distributions to describe the frost variables. Our results did not show strong connections between radial growth and the frost damage events. However, significant growth reductions were found at some Norway spruce sites after events insufficient frost hardiness levels, and alternatively, after winters with high frost sum of snowless days. Scots pine did not show significant growth reductions associated with any of the studied variables. Thus, radial growth in Norway spruce may be more sensitive to future changes in winter conditions. Our results demonstrate that considering only temperature is unlikely to be sufficient in studying winter temperature effects on tree growth. Instead, understanding the effects of changing temperature and snow conditions in relation to tree physiology and phenology is needed.201

High-resolution topographical information improves tree-level storm damage models

Storms cause major forest disturbances in Europe. The aim of this study was to model tree-level storm damage probability based on the properties of a tree and its environment and to examine whether fine-scale topographic information is connected to the damage probability. We used data documenting effects of two autumn storms on over 17 000 trees on permanent Finnish National Forest Inventory plots. The first storm was associated with wet snowfall that damaged trees, while exceptionally strong winds and gusts characterized the second storm. During the storms, soils were unfrozen and deciduous trees were without leaves. Generalized linear mixed models were used to study how topographical variables calculated from digital elevation models (DEM) with resolutions of 2 and 10 m (TOPO2 and TOPO10, respectively) were related to damage probability, in addition to variable groups for tree (TREE) and stand (STAND) characteristics. We compared models containing different variable groups with Akaike information criteria. The best model contained the variable groups TREE, STAND, and TOPO2. Increase in slope steepness calculated from the high-resolution DEM decreased tree-level damage probability significantly in the model. This suggests that the local topography affects the tree-level damage probability and that high-resolution topographical data improves the tree-level damage probability models.Peer reviewe