Canadian <Metadata> Forum

Using metadata to describe archival holdings

2nd part

Sarah Klotz
Library and Archives Canada

Available also in: [PDF 25 KB] Full bilingual presentation  [PDF 2,434 KB] Image slides

Although these documents are all related to New France, the French and Canadian descriptions of these documents vary quite significantly. To incorporate both types of descriptions into a single search tool, one metadata language was selected for the mapping. We decided to use Encoded Archival Description (EAD) to transfer information from our National Archives database into a central extended markup language (XML) repository. We selected EAD because it is specific to archives and as it can be tagged in XML, is well suited for an online search tool. Another advantage of EAD is that it does not regulate the content of the descriptions making it easier to tag and reuse existing content.

As Lorraine has mentioned, these records were first described at the turn of the 20th century before archival descriptive standards were fully developed in Canada. The purpose of these original descriptions was to explain the content of the documents and to provide users with the information required to consult them. It should be no surprise then that there was always a consistent approach to these descriptions, even if the methodology had not been formalized. In their current state in the Colonial Archives database on the National Archives website, the descriptions from the Public Archives Report have been re-keyed and re-purposed for use on the website with a selection of these descriptions now being linked to their digitized copy of the record.

This search tool proved that it was possible to repurpose these descriptions. And so following this rather than creating new descriptions that may be more closely aligned to modern descriptive practices and to the descriptive practices of France, we opted to once again reuse our current descriptions.

Let's take a look at how the database currently appears on the NA website. In this example you have 9 fields. Archives describe information in hierarchical levels. This begins with the fonds, collection or series and works its way down to the file and item level. The majority of the records in this database are items and files, however, some documents have been described as volume. These correspond to a very granular level of description.

The first field indicates the provenance of the item and provides context for the record. This item is part of the Fonds des Colonies/Colonial Archives and of the General correspondence Series, known as Series C11A . The next field relates to the type of document. The records of this database are all textual records. The date of creation of the document is listed as between August and September 1701. This corresponds to the date indicated on the document and if no date is indicated then an approximate date is supplied by the archivist depending on what is known about a particular document this can be very general like, century, decade, range of years or more specific like a single year, month and day. The scope and content describes the content of the item. This field can sometimes be quite detailed. Since these descriptions predate databases and the Internet, they were originally created to provide as much detail as possible so that researchers could ascertain the usefulness of the documents without needing to come to Ottawa to refer to the finding aid. The archival reference number, original volume and folio number are used for citation and consultation if a researcher was interested in viewing the copies on microfilm.

Since EAD is an encoding standard, it does not instruct what or how to describe. It provides common elements and tags and thus the means to transfer data. As a first step before mapping to EAD, it was necessary to map the content to the International Standard of Archival Description (ISAD G). The French use ISAD G as their main guide in description and thus the mapping exercise would facilitate the comparison of our descriptions.

Through this comparison, we were able to determine which elements were essential for resource discovery. There were a number of fields in common, but I would like to point out those that were different:

1. When the French archives include descriptions of cartographic material, they require additional elements related to the scale, dimensions, support and form of the maps. These elements will not be included in the descriptions of textual records.
2. All of the institutions have additional descriptive elements that are not considered to be part of the scope and content. This information will be grouped together in a Note field.
3. Levels of descriptions of the National Archives include item, file and volume. According to current standards, a volume is not a true level of description. Rather than beginning the process of redescribing this material, this level of aggregation is accepted.
4. For the National Archives, only file and volume level descriptions have a title provided in a separate field. At the time these descriptions were originally created the title of the item was considered to be part of the general description. As a result the title is included in the scope and content.

The search is performed on a limited number of fields as not all fields exist for every institution. Individual searches will be conducted on the title of the fonds and series, the location of original, and date. One will also be able to search the title and scope and content field together. The results screen will display the date, title/description, reference number and location of the original. In the item/file display all fields will be visible with the exception of level of description and language of documents. These descriptions are then linked to their digital copies.

One might think that it would be impossible for descriptions created in the early1900s and a database created in the 1980s to be compatible with a relatively new encoding system. But if a description is to be useful it must contain a certain number and quality of elements so that a user can determine what the item is and if it is of use to them. To fully exploit all the available information contained in our descriptions, a standard that promotes the use of common as well as divergent elements was essential. EAD is very flexible and recognizes that to facilitate access it is not necessary to employ one single set of descriptive elements. Depending on the content, level of description and media, different elements are required to best describe an item. This has allowed us to make use of not only the fields that we share in common but also those that are unique to individual institutions, descriptions or media.

By using a more stringent standard, we may not have been able to make as much content, or as much detail about the content available to the public. This would have significantly diminished the usefulness of the descriptions by only making available those fields that were held in common. In effect, we would have lost valuable information simply because it would not have fit with the standard. As well, if we had to significantly redescribe some of our holdings to comply with a standard this would have significantly increased our costs, limited the descriptions and material available, and delayed the time in which this material would have been made available online.

The creation of a shared search tool linked to digitized images was achieved through the use of a common metadata standard that allowed us to find both the similarities and differences between our descriptions. The key to interoperability is not simply the use of a common standard but the use of a standard, like EAD, that is flexible and recognizes the uniqueness of descriptions. Although this project relates only to interoperability within the international archival community the key to this project was finding a common language. We hope to build upon this project, to provide integrated access to the holdings of different communities or for different audiences. The power of metadata standards then rests with its flexibility and ability to uphold, sustain and promote all of the intricacies that exist in descriptions.

Part 1 of the presentation in French by Lorraine Gadoury