MANAGING CHURCH RECORDS RELATING TO INDIGENOUS COMMUNITIES AT THE ANGLICAN DIOCESE OF NATAL

Abstract

The Anglican Diocese of Natal in South Africa (hereafter the Diocese) is part of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa. It covers the western part of the KwaZulu-Natal province, west and south of the Tugela and Buffalo rivers. The Episcopal leader of the diocese is the Bishop of Natal. This study aimed to examine the current records management framework at the Archives of the Anglican Diocese of Natal (hereafter the Archives), especially with regard to records relating to indigenous laity within the Diocese. The study identified the strengths and weaknesses of this framework and recommends an effective and efficient records management protocol for the future. The study was based on a literature review and the personal experiences and observations of one of the researchers who worked at the Diocese at the time of the study. The study concludes that the Diocese does not have a clear records management programme to deliberately guide the management of indigenous related records. It recommends the need to embrace information and communication technologies (ICTs) and other innovative changes in in order to create an enabling environment to facilitate records location, accessibility, retrieval and the timely utilisation of information.The paper argues that a reconfiguration of policy and methods needs to take place in order to acknowledge the many faceted relationships that exist between indigenous peoples and records, and to recognise the rights of indigenous communities to participate in the process of decision making about records management and practices. The paper considers these issues by examining challenges that are presented in managing existing indigenous collections in church repositories in South Africa, followed by a discussion about the challenges and opportunities that exist in the digital domain for rich and diverse collections to be created that allow for multiple perspectives.