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Archival Description and Access After Finding Aids

Explore the transition from traditional print-based archival access to modern, relational database-friendly systems like EAC-CPF. Learn about current standards, future trends, and the importance of context in archival description.

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Archival Description and Access After Finding Aids

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  1. Archival Description and AccessAfter Finding Aids

  2. Daniel Pitti Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities University of Virginia § November 2008

  3. Overview • Traditional (print) archival access • Reimagining Description and Access • ICA and communication standards (EA…) • Where we are going … • Current status of transition • Closer Look at EAC-CPF • Final thought

  4. Traditional Description • Finding aids (narrowly defined) • Single print apparatus • Provenance-based: all records by a single creator treated as a unit • A hierarchy of whole-part • Components of description intertwined • Example: Rostovzeff (the old standby)

  5. EAD • 1998, DTD, SGML and XML • 2002, DTD, SGML and XML • 2007, Schema, but conforming to 2002 DTD • Currently EAD is about finding aids • A single apparatus • Render in print (“classic” finding aid) • Render in browser

  6. Reimagining Description and Access (1) • Rigorous analysis of the logic and structure of archival description • Recognition of the functional inadequacy of single apparatus • Increasing differentiation and formal definition • Components of archival description • Relations between components

  7. Reimagining Description and Access (2) • Reimagining not entirely new • Peter Scott, "The Record Group Concept:  A Case for Abandonment"  American Archivist 29:493-504 (October 1966) • Advanced technologies: means to realizing description and access

  8. Components of Archival Description • Description of records (as such) • Context: creators • Context: functions and activities documented in records • Components interrelated with one another • Dedicated descriptive semantics and structure for each component

  9. International Council on Archives and Encoded Archival … • ISAD(G) / EAD (records: 1994; 2000) • ISAAR(CPF) / EAC-CPF (context: corporate bodies, persons, families; 1994, 2003) • ISDF / EAC-F (context: functions; 2008) • ISDIAH / EAG ([repository] guide; 2008)

  10. What We Need To Do • Complete work on EAC-CPF and EAC-F • Revise EAD • Accommodate moving the present into the future • EAD needs to accommodate EAC-CPF and EAC-F namespaces • Simplify EAD • Considerably less “mixed content” • Move “label” and “head” to out-of-line, i.e., make <archdesc> purely about description • Make EA… standards relational database “friendly”

  11. Current Status of Work • EAC-CPF in draft • Preliminary testing • 109 MARC records > XML Slim > EAC-CPF • Three Australian records • Bright Sparcs > EAC-CPF • People Australia (ANL) • EAC-CPF Tag library underway (multilingual) • ISDF/EAC-F to follow • EAD: revise here, revise now!

  12. EACWG Members • Anila Angjeli (BNF) • Basil Dewhurst (ANL) • Wendy Duff (Toronto) • Hans-Joerg Lieder (SBB) • Dennis Meissner (MHS) • Victoria Peters (Glasgow) • Daniel Pitti (Virginia) • Chris Prom (Ill.) • Jennifer Schaffner (OCLC) • Bill Stockting (BL) • Stefano Vitali (SAF) • Kathy Wisser (UNC) • Karin Bredenberg (SNA) • Lina Bountouri (Athens)

  13. EAC-CPF (1) • Authority control for corporate bodies, persons, and families but more … • Controlled vocabulary description of named entity (place, occupation … and extensible) • Prose biography or history of entity • Chronological list (date, place, event)

  14. EAC-CPF (2) • Designed to be relational database “friendly” • Designed to be used in an international, multilingual, and shared environment • Designed to enable ingesting and integrating • Authority control records • Biographies and histories • From two or more sources • Based on one or more sets of descriptive rules • To provide union access

  15. EAC-CPF (3) • Designed to provide access to resources in any form created by or about the same entity • Archival records (of course) • Books and journal articles • Museum objects • Whether Internet-accessible or not • Designed to facilitate creation of organizational charts and family trees

  16. CHANGE WE CAN BELIEVE IN!

  17. If you would like to look at a diagram of the schema in its current draft, please visit the following web site: http://www.iath.virginia.edu/~dvp4c/eac-cpf/cpf.xsd.html

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