Youn
Jung Choi (Yuna)
LIS
471 Management of Photographical Archives
Description
of Photographic Collections
Selected online catalogs:
-Boston College University Library-Digital
Collection
-Northeastern University-Digital
Collection-Northeastern’s Historic Photographs
1.
Boston
College University Library
-Collection
Level VS Item Level Cataloging
Boston College University Library organizes their digital
collections related to the school history by subject: Athletics, Bapst/Burns
Libraries, Buildings/Main Campus, Campus Life, Events on Campus, and Robsham
Theater Productions.
Since the photographs in the collection are
digitized and described on the item level, there is no detailed description of
the collection as a whole, but a brief explanation of it is available. However,
it would be more helpful when gauging the collection if the website provided
the quantity, format, type, and distinctive features of the collection briefly.
There is no way to figure out the overall characteristics of the digital
collection unless I look through the photos one by one.
-Main
Entries
The main entries are different from collection to
collection. The history of the BC collection has Object, Title, Date created,
Format, General notes, Part of (collection), Use Restriction, Subject, Genre
Heading, Identifier, Sys.No., and Related collections entries.
<1.2
BC History Collection main entry>
:Creator
The biggest peculiarity of this collection is that it
does not provide any information about the creator. Other collections, like the
Boston Gas Company Photographs collection, have Creator, Abstract, and Contributor
entries. Also, it provides a hyper link of the creator to his other photos so
that users can search the related materials easily.
<1.3 Boston Gas Company Collection- main
entry>
I searched other types of materials to compare with the
photo collections. For example, books and pamphlets have the Creator entry and Publisher
entry.
<1.4
Book material main entry>
From this comparison, it seems like the BC Library
adjusts main entries flexibly according to the collections. A Book usually has clearly
stated creator-author, editor, illustrator, or photographer- and publisher
information in the book, so they have Creator and Publisher entries as main entries.
A photograph also has creator, or photographer, and publisher, or photo studio,
but often times this information is lost because of the characteristics of the
media.
I also disagree with the opinion that libraries
should provide one unified main entry for all collections without the
consideration of the characteristics of each collection. There would be a lot
of empty entries if the library applied the same main entry to different types
of materials. However, as Helena Zinkham points out, creator information is one
of the access points regardless of the guideline or tools the institution
chooses[1]. It
is true that there are a lot of cases that the photographer of the picture is
unknown. Nevertheless, even if all of the photos of the collection are unknown,
the library could provide “unknown” as the Creator entry.
:Format
The Format entry provides specified information about
the original photo. For example, it clarifies the quantity(one), type(albumen),
size(24 x 19 cm), and other physical features (mounted on board 31 x 25 cm) of
the photo so that users can get a sense of the actual photograph.
However, not all items have this detailed Format
information; some photos are just described as “1 black-and-white photo” with
their sizes. In my opinion, this is because it is difficult to define the type,
or the photos are pushed back on the priority list based on the needs of users
or the value of the collection. Therefore, the BC Library only describes basic
physical features.
<1.3
Boston Gas Company Collection- Format entry>
-Cataloging
format, subject thesaurus, and controlled vocabulary
The BC Library provides more detailed information
through the Object-METS menu. There are Title Information, Name:Corporate, Type
of Resource, Genre::workType:(aat), Origin Information, Language, Physical
Description, Note, Subject:(tucua, lctgm, LCSH), and Related Item:Host. From
this metadata, I can learn that the BC Library uses AAT for genre, and TUCUA,
LCTGM, and LCSH for subject category. As Jackie M. Dooley points out in her
article, the choice of subject thesaurus is important because it is directly
related to the access of the materials[2].
Since each subject thesaurus has advantages and shortcomings, using several
thesauri would be an effective alternative.
<1.5
METS metadata>
-Link
to other materials
The photographer information (if it exists), Subject,
and Genre Heading have hyper links to the other materials under the same category.
This function provides easy tracking and access to related collections which is
one of the advantages of online digitized materials.
-The
Level of Description
One of the characteristics of the BC Digital
Collection is that there is no Description entry, but some collection photos
have an Abstract entry which provides a short description of the image. This
term seems like it is from the abstract of a book or text material.
Other images do not have abstract entries, so the
Title does most of the description of the photo. Often times, no additional
description is available other than the title, so the title and the description
are the same. The BC Library does not portray the image of the photo in detail
which requires a lot of time and work. However, they provide specific
information about the photo to enable users to get a sense of the actual image
of the photo as much as they can through Format and General notes entries.
-
Ofness and Aboutness
The Abstract says the photo is “Image of passersby
in front of shop fronts and men at work in gas pipe trench.”(<1.3 Boston Gas
Company Collection>) This is more likely “of” the photo image rather than “about”
it. There is no reason or background information of this event but there is an objective
description of the scene. It is easier to process for librarians but would not
be very helpful to researchers.
2.
Northeastern
University
-Collection
Level VS Item Level Cataloging
Northeastern University provides their historical
photographs by subject: Academics, Athletics, Co-op, Events, and People. Similarly
to the BC Library, there is no collection level description. Although it is a digital
collection, which means all of the items are digitized and accessible directly,
it would be useful to get the sense of the collection if the collection
description was provided.
<2.1
NU Digital Collection Historical Photographs>
Other
collections, which are not digitized, provide collection description including
volume, scope and content note, and arrangement information. However, there is
no information for each photo so users need to visit the library and look
though all the photos to find materials which they need.
<2.2
NU Office of University Photography (A62) collection>
-Main
entry
<2.3
NU main entry>
:Description
The main entries are Title, Description, Date, Photographer,
People, Place, Group, Topics, Copyright, Collection, and Photo Number. Often times,
the Title substitutes the detailed description and the Description also describes
“of” the image rather than “about” the photo. However, the People, Place, Group
and Topic entries help users to figure out the contents of the image and
connect to other related materials.
:Format
and MPLP issue
There is no format or physical description entry, although
it is essential information for photo materials. While the BC Library provides
the type and size of original material, NU Library does not provide any
information. Also, there is no mention of the format of the digitized photo
image; I assume it is a jpg file from the photo number.
Some photos, however, provide the physical format
information in the Description entry.
<2.4
NU Description entry>
In this record, the Description entry provides the
location information as well as the characteristics of the original material. Putting
this different information in the Description entry together makes it hard for users
to figure out the information in a glance. It would be better to make a
Location entry and Format entry to clarify each part of the information.
To provide physical information about photos,
librarians have to measure the size and identify the type of each photo which
takes a lot of time and effort. There is a possibility that NU decided to
provide more photo images, rather than provide detailed image information,
according to MPLP. Since the collections are the university’s records, there
might be the need to search for the actual image of a specific person or scenes
of the school rather than other characteristics of the photo. As Anne L. Foster
argues in her article, the advantage of MPLP is its flexibility, and according
to the size of institution and the characteristics of the collection, it can be
applied flexibly[3].
:People,
Place, Group, and Topic
These entries remind me of the FRBR model, which is
a conceptual model of the bibliographic record. Group 1 of the FRBR model is “products
of intellectual and artistic endeavor” and consists of work, expression,
manifestation and item. Group 2 is “responsible for the intellectual and
artistic content” and consists of person and corporate body. Group 3 is “subjects
of works” and consists of concept, object, event, and place[4].
The NU Library provides People, Group, Topic, and Place
entries which are groups 2 and 3 but not group 1. This reminds me of Jackie M.
Dooley’s argument about the choice of main entry. She also points out since
AACR2 is greatly based on authorship of texts, it causes highly unsatisfactory
results when cataloging photographs[5]. In
the same context, group 1, which represents the work and authorship, is
excluded from the main entry.
As I mentioned before, since the collections are
about the university’s history, there might be a large need to search specific
faculty members or school buildings. In these cases, the People, Group, and Place
entries would be helpful for those needs.
-
Level of description, ofness and aboutenss
Most of photos have a brief description “of” the
photo. However, some photos have description “about” the photo. For example,
the photo of President John A. Curry at commencement has the description of not
only the photo image itself, but also background information of the time the
photo was taken. To describe this kind of “about” description, the librarian
who catalogs should have background information, and also it takes more time
and effort than simple “of” description. However, it will be helpful to
researchers because they can learn additional information about the president
and the events during his tenure.
<2.5
NU Description entry-2>
-Link
to other materials
Although the collection is a digitized online
collection, it does not provide any hyper links to other related materials. It
provides subject headings through the Topic entry, but users should search them
by themselves. As mentioned before, since the hyper link function is only
available at the online catalog and most users expect this function, it will be
more helpful to users if the Digital Collection provided hyper links.
In conclusion, the digital photo collections of
Boston College and Northeastern University are more concentrated on item level
description rather than collection level description. In the digitized
collection with item level description, it is much easier to get the sense of
the photo collection because users can look through all the images without
visiting the library. It is obviously a time-consuming job to scan all the
images and do item level description. However, it is exceedingly convenient for
users because the online catalog can provide hyper links to related materials
as well as easy retrieval by keyword search. At this point, the People, Place,
Group, and Topic entries of Northeastern University will be especially helpful
for retrieval considering the characteristics of the university’s
collections.
During this assignment, I was on the user’s side, so
I wanted more detailed description and information. Even if the collection has
an item level description, still I thought it would be better if there were an
overall collection level description. Also, since most of the descriptions are “of”
the photo rather than “about”, I thought that it would be helpful to provide
not just the list of objects in the image but the background information of the
photo. However, I also realized that it would take too much time to do the job
for all collections. Therefore, it is important to consider the resources a library
can invest and the importance of the collection and potential needs for the
collection. As the BC Library applies different main entries according to the
collection and material type, it is necessary to apply the standard flexibly.
Bibliography
Carnell, Brett. “Arrangement Schemes for Photographs”.
Prints & Photographs Division, Library of Congress
(2004): 1-3.
Dooley,
Jackie M. “Processing and Cataloging of Archival Photograph Collections”. Visual Resources Vol.
11(1995): 85-101.
Finnegan,
Cara A., “What is This a Picture Of?: Some Thoughts On Images and Archives”. Rhetoric
& Public Affairs. :116-121.
Foster,
Anne L. ” Minimum Standards Processing and Photograph
Collections”. Archival Issues Vol.30,
No,2 (2006): 107-117.
Layne, Sara Shatford. “Some Issues in the
Indexing of Images”. Journal of the
American Society
for Information Science, 45, 8
(1994): 583
Mates, Adam. “Scurlock Photographs Cataloging
Analysis”. (2004):1-8.
Neal, Diane. “News Photographers, Librarians,
Tags, and Controlled Vocabularies: Balancing the
Forces”. Journal of Library Metadata,
Vol.8(3) (2008):199-213.
Tillett, Barbara B. “The FRBR
Model(Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records)”, ALCTS Institute on Metadata and AACR2
(2003)
Zinkham, Helena. Photographs
Archival Care and Management. Chicago: Society of American Archivists, 2006. Library of Congress
(2004): 1-3.
[1] Helena Zinkham, Photographs
Archival Care and Management (Chicago: Society of American
Archivists, 2006), 168.
[2] Jackie M. Dooley, “Processing and
Cataloging of Archival Photograph Collections”, Visual Resources Vol. 11(1995): 94-95.
[3] Anne L. Foster,” Minimum Standards Processing and Photograph Collections”, Archival Issues Vol.30, No,2 (2006): 117.
[4] Barbara B. Tillett, “The
FRBR Model(Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records)”, ALCTS Institute on Metadata and AACR2
(2003):6-9.
[5] Jackie
M. Dooley, “Processing and Cataloging of Archival Photograph Collections”, Visual Resources Vol. 11(1995): 91.
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