Making Special Collections Not So Special? The Implications for Archives and Special Collections of the Report of the LC Working Group on the Future of Bibliographic Control

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Making Special Collections Not So Special?The
Implications for Archives and Special Collections
of the Report of the LC Working Group on the
Future of Bibliographic Control

• Christine Di Bella
• PACSCL Consortial Survey Initiative
• Presentation for PALINET Future of Cataloging
  Symposium
• May 29, 2008

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Outline

• My background
• LC working group guiding principles and
  milestones
• Recommendation Two
• Other relevant recommendations
• Problems
• Where do we go from here?

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My background

• Archivist, and approach cataloging and
  description issues (and this report) from that
  perspective.
• I do have a library degree and worked in academic
  library technical services during graduate
  school, so have been involved in cataloging and
  description in both library and archives
  settings.
• Currently direct PACSCL Consortial Survey
  Initiative, project to assess and improve access
  to unprocessed and underprocessed archival
  collections in 22 Philadelphia area libraries,
  archives, and museums.

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LC Working Groups guiding principles

• Redefine bibliographic control.
• Redefine the bibliographic universe.
• These first two principles hold exciting promise
  for archives and special collections.
• Redefine the role of the Library of Congress.
• Because so much of description in archives and
  special collections is for rare and unique
  materials, we tend not to be as affected by
  decisions by LC to do less centrally
• But standards and infrastructure are essential to
  our work, and especially to streamlining our work.

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Milestones for Special Collections in this report

• Inclusion and prominence within the
  recommendations.
• Categorization of description of special
  collections as higher-value activity.
• Fundamental shift for many libraries
• Emphasis on unification of communities of
  practice for describing different types of
  materials.
• Emphasis on integrating and sharing access.

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Recommendation Two(The Biggie)

• Enhance Access to Rare, Unique, and Other Special
  Hidden Materials.

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Make the Discovery of Rare, Unique, and Other
Special Hidden Materials a High Priority.

• Special collections cataloging and description
  higher-value activity.
• Shifting resources from mass distributed
  resources to what is unique or rare
• Goes against conventional wisdom in libraries,
  which, in the past, have tended to concentrate on
  the largest parts of their holdings or what gets
  used most frequently.
• Potential for integrating special collections
  cataloging into the workflow and/or
  retraining/cross-training staff.
• Format integration should have helped us do this
  for MARC-based description long ago need to
  fully capitalize on that promise, and apply it to
  other metadata formats as well.

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Streamline Cataloging for Rare, Unique, and Other
Special Hidden Materials, Emphasizing Greater
Coverage and Broader Access.

• We have the tools to do this, we just need to
  accept that it is necessary.
• Long-standing distinction between minimal, core,
  full levels for monograph and serials cataloging.
• DCRM(B) provides specific guidelines for
  minimal-, core- and collection-level cataloging
  of rare books.
• Describing Archives A Content Standard (DACS)
  has minimum, optimum, added value levels for
  archival description.
• Efforts underway already
• More Product, Less Process
• CLIR Cataloging Hidden Collections initiative
• Survey projects

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Integrate Access to Rare, Unique and Other
Special Hidden Materials with Other Library
Materials.

• Many of us want this, but we need help.
• Putting into one system vs. federated searching
• WorldCat and other online catalogs do this
  already, to a point
• Good as far as it goes, but limited for certain
  types of materials, particularly given the
  complexity of archival collections.
• Existing systems were not built with archives and
  special collections materials in mind, which is
  why we often were forced to develop our own
  systems.
• Barriers to participation for many small
  institutions.

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Integrate Access, continued

• What about our finding aids?
• Development on ArchiveGrid, OCLCs WorldCat
  equivalent for finding aids, lags far behind, and
  the system lacks certain kinds of functionality,
  like relevancy ranking of search results, that
  should be de rigueur.
• Mirrors challenge individual institutions face in
  developing finding aid delivery systems, which
  are nearly always segregated from other types of
  metadata delivery.

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Integrate Access, continued

• Integration currently more likely to happen with
  digital materials
• OAI initiatives like OAISTER
• Metadata production often happens through
  different workflows, however.
• Also have to reduce to the lowest common
  denominator when deliver through one system.
• How much of value is lost by move toward common
  systems vs. how much is gained by our users being
  able to find everything in one place?

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Encourage Digitization to Allow Broader Access.

• Moving from boutique to mass digitization
• Describing at a broader level rather than usual
  model of item-level metadata, which is completely
  impractical for collections that may contain
  millions of items.
• Examples of projects employing mass digitization
  for archives
• NHPRC-funded projects at Archives of Michigan,
  Aldo Leopold Foundation/University of Wisconsin,
  and Troup County, Georgia
• Joshua Rangers work at University of
  Wisconsin-Oshkosh
• OCLC Shifting Gears report
• Max Evans article in American Archivist,
  Archives of the People, by the People, for the
  People

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Share Access to Rare, Unique, and Other Special
Hidden Materials.

• Some archives and special collections have not
  shared their records in the past because they
  thought that since their materials were unique,
  other institutions would have little interest in
  their records.
• Growing recognition that this should be done, and
  hopefully, if the barriers to participation are
  lowered, it will be done.
• For legacy data, need to pull records from
  existing systems rather than require staff to
  recreate records in new systems.

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Observations

• These types of recommendations are not new for
  special collections, and less and less
  controversial.
• Many in archives and special collections
  community would agree in principle
  implementation (and resources to do so) is the
  main issue.
• There are a number of initiatives, projects, and
  developments in archives and special collections
  that precede or parallel the recommendations in
  this report.

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Initiatives that precede or parallel LC report

• ARLs Special Collections Task Force Hidden
  Collections efforts (appear to be the direct
  inspiration for recommendation two in the LC
  report) 2001-2006
• More Product, Less Process by Mark Greene and
  Dennis Meissner published in the American
  Archivist in 2005, but available since 2004
• Change in NHPRC processing grant
  guidelines/requirements (directly influenced by
  MPLP) 2006
• OCLCs Shifting Gears Report 2007
• CLIR Cataloging Hidden Collections initiative
  2008
• Institutional and consortial efforts such as the
  PACSCL Consortial Survey

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Typical concerns

• Not being able to meet user external or
  internal - needs.
• Since reference and retrieval in archives and
  special collections is highly mediated, we are
  often some of the heaviest users of our
  collections.
• Not being able to address the preservation needs
  of the materials
• Our staffing levels may not be able to
  accommodate the growing demand if more of our
  material is accessible, particularly by novice
  users.
• De-professionalizing the work of special
  collections

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Beyond Recommendation Two

• While special collections gets its own
  recommendation, important to realize that most of
  the report has applicability to our work.
• Since one of the main recommendations of the
  report is to integrate special collections into
  other collections work, seems particularly apt to
  point out these connections.

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1.1 Eliminate redundancies

• 1.1.1 Make Use of Data Available Earlier in the
  Supply Chain
• Role of donor and dealer description
• Information and processes used during
  accessioning
• 1.1.2 Re-Purpose Existing Metadata for Greater
  Efficiency
• Retro-conversion
• Researcher-supplied description
• 1.1.5 Develop Evidence about Discovery Tools to
  Guide Decision Makers
• Increasing attention to user studies in archives

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1.2 Increase Distribution of Responsibility for
Bibliographic Record Production and Maintenance

• 1.2.3 Expand Number of PCC Participants
• Particularly apt for NACO and SACO.
• Current structure makes it difficult for small
  institutions which many archives and special
  collections are to participate, even though
  they have original cataloging to contribute.
• 1.2.4 Increase Incentives for Sharing
  Bibliographic Records
• Goes back to Recommendation Two.

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1.3 Collaborate on Authority Record Creation and
Maintenance

• 1.3.1 Increase Collaboration on Authority Data
• Because archives and special collections often
  catalog material by or about people and corporate
  bodies with no published works, also more likely
  to have to create new name authority headings.
• But, if more headings produced by smaller
  repositories were shared, likely that the amount
  of duplicative original cataloging would
  decrease.
• Emerging archival standard for authority data,
  Encoded Archival Context (EAC) complement to
  Encoded Archival Description (EAD).

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• 1.3.3 Internationalize Authority Files.
• Archival description is increasingly looking to
  international standards like ISAD(G) and
  ISAAR(CPF) (specifically for authority data) when
  building its own, and creating tools that can
  interact with each other.
• Just as bibliographic information should be
  internationalized, so too should authority
  information.
• In the web environment, users less likely to care
  where information comes from they just want the
  information.

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3 Position Our Technology for the Future

• Technology in general and delivery systems in
  particular have always been problematic for
  archives and special collections
• Fitting our descriptive information into
  MARC-based systems was best option available, but
  always a difficult fit.
• Hierarchical nature of archival collections, many
  interrelationships vs. flat file structure of a
  typical OPAC.
• Vendors have not stepped in for the most part to
  develop good tools for creating or delivering
  finding aids, the core access tool for most
  archival collections.

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3.1.1 Develop a More Flexible, Extensible
Metadata Carrier.

• As mentioned previously, MARC was always a
  difficult fit for archival description.
• While a market has developed around MARC, it is
  still small compared to the overall market for
  information systems. (Though much larger than the
  market for archives and special collections!)
• Emphasis on MARC-based systems may have inhibited
  development around more flexible archival
  descriptive standards.

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3.1.2 Integrate Library Standards into Web
Environment.

• In archives, as in any other information setting,
  people want to get their information on the web,
  and in particular, they want to get it through a
  simple Google search.
• People also want information pushed to them, as
  well as available through sites that they visit
  all the time (which arent necessarily our
  sites).
• APIs allow for integration into customizable
  sites like Facebook, iGoogle, My Yahoo, as well
  as incorporated into other websites.

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3.2 Standards

• Archival standards development community still a
  small niche, and somewhat isolated from larger
  standards community.
• Lack of connection to system development.
• We know that in order to progress we need
  standards.

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4.1 Design for Todays and Tomorrows User

• 4.1.1 Link Appropriate External Information with
  Library Catalogs.
• People want description, content, and context,
  all accessible from one place.
• 4.1.2 Integrate User-Contributed Data into
  Library Catalogs.
• Emphasis on minimal processing (including
  description) means our users will have an ever
  larger role to play in improving intellectual
  access to our materials.
• 4.1.3 Conduct Research into the Use of
  Computationally Derived Data
• Use and patron demand as criteria for further
  processing or description.

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5 Strengthen the Library and Information Science
Profession

• Research orientation
• Decisions for practice based on research.
• Archival education traditionally based out of
  history programs.
• Later move to library science programs, but still
  a split.
• Growing importance of understanding organization
  and description of information.

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Problems

• Bibliographic control
• For many, bibliographic book
• Gets at the fundamental lack of understanding of
  the work required to catalog a book vs. an
  archival collection that may consist of millions
  of items.
• Since one of the guiding principles is to
  redefine bibliographic control this may change
  over time, but think the very title of the group
  makes archivists and special collections
  librarians wonder whether it applies to them.
• Perhaps as a result, little to no response from
  the archives community.

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Problems, continued

• Lack of involvement of archivists, as exemplified
  in
• SAA, EAD not mentioned at all
• EAC and other emerging standards for archival
  description not on the radar
• A nitpick, but perhaps an illustrative one When
  referencing More Product, Less Process,
  arguably the most significant article on this
  topic from an archival perspective, both authors
  names are misspelled, both times.

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Where do we go from here?

• LC Working Group report as a jumping off point
  for special collections initiatives
• Less detailed recommendations than the other
  sections, but also the section in which
  individual institutions have the greatest role.

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Where we go from here

• Sharing templates and best practices that
  contribute to efficiency.
• University of Illinois rare book cataloging
  project.
• Adhering to standards, and not being afraid to
  use the minimum standards recommended.
• DACS, in particular, provides good guidance for
  this.
• Making our descriptive tools multi-purpose, and
  multi-purposing our description.
• Tools like MarcEdit facilitate this.

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Where we go from here, continued

• Reconceptualizing access and digitization.
• Committing to not just developing and adhering to
  standards, but developing delivery systems so
  users can easily find what we have and,
  ideally, contribute.
• One consortiums example

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PACSCL Consortial Survey

• 22 participating institutions
• DACS compliant (single-level optimum)
  collection-level descriptions that can be output
  as MARC, EAD, HTML, or PDF, in addition to being
  included in a public interface to the survey
  database.
• Have surveyed 1,776 collections totaling over
  15,000 linear feet since the start of the project
  (6 months and 4 institutions to go)

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Consortial Survey Next Steps

• Applying to CLIR for multi-tiered follow-up
  project
• Minimal processing for highest research value
  collections (approximately 330 collections
  totaling over 9,500 linear feet). Descriptive
  tools will include MARC records and EAD finding
  aids.
• Conversion of legacy paper and electronic finding
  aids for unsurveyed collections to EAD.
• Improved online access, including MARC records,
  for all surveyed collections.
• Plan to apply for digitization funding in later
  stages.

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For questions, further discussion or information
on PACSCL projects

• Christine Di Bella
• Archivist and Project Director
• PACSCL Consortial Survey Initiative
• 215-732-6200, ext. 201cdibella_at_hsp.org
• project website
• http//www.pacsclsurvey.org