CA Professional Standards & Ethics 5

Question 1

When Native American tribes request the return of records and cultural materials held in archival collections under NAGPRA-related frameworks, archivists should:

Accepted Answer

Engage in good-faith consultation and follow legal and ethical obligations for repatriation

Answer

Ethical archival practice requires good-faith engagement with tribal communities and compliance with legal frameworks governing repatriation of culturally sensitive materials.

Question 2

An archivist is writing a finding aid description for a collection that contains materials now considered offensive or historically biased. The ethical approach is to:

Accepted Answer

Describe the content accurately while providing contextual notes that acknowledge harmful language or bias

Answer

Ethical description requires accuracy about collection content while providing appropriate context that acknowledges harmful language or biased perspectives without omitting or reproducing them uncritically.

Question 3

Which of the following situations would most clearly require an archivist to invoke mandatory reporting obligations regardless of institutional preference?

Accepted Answer

Evidence in archival records suggests ongoing child abuse by a currently active individual

Answer

Evidence of ongoing harm, especially to children, typically triggers mandatory reporting obligations that supersede institutional preferences or professional confidentiality considerations.

Question 4

The concept of 'archival neutrality' has been critiqued in contemporary professional ethics primarily because:

Accepted Answer

Claims of neutrality can mask how appraisal and description decisions embed values and power dynamics

Answer

Contemporary archival ethics scholarship has shown that claims of neutrality obscure how archivists' decisions about what to preserve and how to describe it inevitably reflect and perpetuate power relationships.

Question 5

When an archivist accepts a position at a new institution and has knowledge of confidential information from a previous employer, professional ethics require them to:

Accepted Answer

Maintain confidentiality about the previous institution's strategies, donors, and restricted information

Answer

Professional ethics require maintaining confidentiality about a previous employer's private information even after changing positions, as this trust is fundamental to the profession.

(CA) Certified Archivist Certification Practice Test

(CA) Certified Archivist Certification Practice Test

CA Professional Standards & Ethics 5