Criteria and priorities for selecting objects of historical and cultural documentary heritage for digitization

Abstract

The purpose of this work is to identify and generalize the criteria for selecting historical and cultural documentary heritage objects for digitization and further preservation and providing access for users. The research methodology consists of applying general scientific and special methods, in particular, the system approach, analysis, synthesis, logical method, and visualization of research results. The scientific novelty of the work lies in identifying different approaches and a developed system of criteria and priorities, generalizing these criteria for selecting historical and cultural documentary heritage objects for digitization and the conditions to be taken into account, as well as the need for a coordinated position of various departments in this direction, attracting official expertise to determine the sequence and priorities to avoid duplication of digitization. Conclusions. The selection of objects of historical and cultural documentary heritage for digitization is a task that must maintain a balance between the national significance of the funds for the history of national states and the history of mankind, the user's requests and the task of preserving the funds. Digitization offers significant benefits to users of digital cultural resources. The main criteria for selecting objects for digitization are: value, uniqueness, and rarity of documents; documents related to objects of national heritage; documents that have research value; and documents that have an unsatisfactory physical condition; documents that threaten to lose information; documents in high demand and publications that are available in limited quantities. The main goal of selecting cultural heritage objects for digitization is to promote the establishment of Ukrainian identity, the introduction of digital objects of national memory of Ukraine and world heritage into a wide social circulation, and the integration of various Ukrainian digital cultural information resources into a single information system.