Documentation has always been crucial in human society. Today almost all communication are being stored digitally. In order to deal systematically and coherently with old and new media in the world today, you have to deal with the physical as well as the social and cultural context. Alongside this, there is now increasing interest in documentation theory and science, and documentation studies has become a distinctly lively field of research as well as a basis for professional practice in libraries, archives and museums.

This groundbreaking new book introduces and demonstrates the value and relevance of a new approach to the documentation, communication and information field, complementary to the traditional library, information and archival sciences. It offers an introduction to documentation studies; a new discipline within the overall information studies umbrella - and gives a broad and general theory for documentation.