University Archives: Copyright & citation

The Copyright Act and archival records

While the Archives owns copyright to many of its holdings, there are some documents where copyright belongs to a third party. In such cases, copyright law must be respected.

We are required by the Copyright Act to notify our researchers that:

• any copy is to be used solely for the purpose of research or private study; and,

• any use of a copy for a purpose other than research or private study may require the authorization of the copyright owner of the work in question.

Citation of archival records

All citations of archival records should do two things: locate the cited record and describe the original record in order to place in an intelligible context the portion actually quoted or reproduced. The goal is to allow scholars and archivists to retrieve a cited item from the fonds or collection to which it belongs.

In a BIBLIOGRAPHY, a citation to archival material contains one part:

1. the location reference

In a FOOTNOTE, a reference to archival material contains two parts:

1. the location reference and
2. the document description

Location reference elements

Name of repository

Title of accession, fonds or collection

plus:

Bibliography       Accession or fonds/collection number

Footnote          Accession or fonds/collection number and series/subseries/file/item