catherine owen describing performing arts data in the digital environment

Performing Arts Data Service

Catherine OwenDescribing Performing Arts

Data in the Digital Environment

Performing Arts Data ServiceUniversity of Glasgow


Performing arts data service

The PADS is based at the Gilmorehill Centre for Theatre, Film and Television at the University of Glasgow in Scotland.

The PADS is one of five service providers of the Arts and Humanities Data Service (AHDS)

Other Services include:

• History

• Archaeology

• Visual Arts

• Textual Studies

Tower and cloisters, Glasgow University, architect Sir George Gilbert Scott, 1868


What we do

• dance• theatre• music• film• broadcast arts

The PADS works with performance practitioners, archives, academics, and the performance industries and their representatives… the PADS collects, documents, preserves and promotes the use of digital resources in teaching, learning and research.

Birmingham Repertory Theatre’s Production of ‘Hamlet’, 1925 Courtesy Sir Barry Jackson Trust/Birmingham Central Library

The PADS collects resources relating to music, dance,

theatre, film and the broadcast arts...


Some key questions

• What am I describing?

• How does cataloguing change when I’m describing digital objects?

• What concepts do I need to pin down?

• How will users access my resources?

• How will my resources interoperate with others?


How does cataloguing change when I’m describing digital objects?

Content? Type? Format? Location? Access?

PhysicalResources

namesplacessubjects

photosrecordingsscoresvideo

slidescassettespaperdvd

address‘phone no.shelf no.box no.

opening hoursrights restrictions

DigitalResources

namesplacessubjects

photosrecordingsscoresvideo

tiffrealaudiojpegmpeg

URLfilenameftp site

softwarebandwidthrights restrictions

This simple model seems to work well for discovery of simple digital objects, but…


What are we actually cataloguing?

Cataloguing a ‘simple’ data resource...

1. A discrete digital object

2. A discrete digital object which acts as a surrogate for a physical object

3. A discrete digital object which acts as a surrogate for a physical object and which is one amongst a number of closely-related objects

4. A discrete digital object which acts as a exemplar for a collection of physical objects and which is embedded in a bibliographic data resource

Decisions about cataloguing are almost always locally-driven, must respond to the needs of a perceived user group or groups and must reflect the resources available… these resources may include personal skills, information sources, available technology and time.


Standards

These activities should be defined by standards:

Structuring the data:

Field names

Field types

Relationships

Describing the resource:

For resource discovery

For resource management

For preservation

Each record should be a conflation of different standards and working practices…


Which standards?

Problems with standards:

There are too many competing standards

Standards do different jobs for different user communities and different data types

A successful data resource must make use of a variety of different standards for both structuring the data and describing the resource

Creators are often tempted to use standards in an inappropriate way for ease

A successful data resource may:

Include field types from a variety of standards (e.g. Dublin Core, ISAD) as well as local fields

Populate the fields using AACR2

ISO etc. as well as specialised cataloguing practice for e.g. music

Use standard terminology, controlled vocabularies, name thesauri, classification schemes


The Dublin Core

• Most creators of electronic resources are now encouraged to use the Dublin Core set of fields to describe their resources

• The Dublin Core should be used to facilitate:• Resource discovery• High-level interoperability

• It is not intended to:• Contain information specifically for management or preservation of the

resource• Replace accepted cataloguing practice• Support granular, sophisticated interoperability between disparate

resources


Some key problems

‘Format’

Non-standard media (e.g. video, audio, music score, play script, choreographic notation etc.)

Complicated or ill-defined rules for cataloguing media types

Lack of guidelines for dealing with multiple parts, excerpts etc.

Multiplicity of local solutions

‘Subject’Lack of cohesive community identity

Complicated or ill-defined rules for describing subjects, events and concepts

Poor or ill-defined classification schemes, controlled vocabularies and thesauri

Multiplicity of local solutions

And... Tendency to confuse or conflate ‘format’ with ‘subject’

Tendency to conflate multiple instances of the object


Performing arts documentation

Always the same old problems…

Who? Lack of standard names, international names...

Chaykovsky or Tchaikovsky

Bernard Shaw or George Bernard Shaw or Shaw, G.B.

Where? Same place, different name...

Theatre Royal Bristol or Bristol Old Vic or Bristol New Vic...

What? Same work, many identites...

Eroica or Symphony no.3 Eb op.55


What do users want?

An academic may seek...Russian chamber music of the early 19th century

A performer may want...Music for violin, cello, bassoon, horn and harp

A teacher may want...Advanced grade pieces between 1750 and 1900

A producer may be looking for...19th century salon music

They will all be happy with… Glinka’s Serenade on themes from Donizetti’s ‘Anna Bolena’ - but how can we make sure that they find it?


What information?

Which classification scheme?

Dewey (including Reeves/McColvin revised Dewey)?

UDC?

LC?

Specialist subject-specific identifiers?

(opus numbers, scholarly works, in-house schema)

Which name authority list?

New Grove Dictionaries, AllMedia Guides, IMDB

Which naming convention?

AACR2?


Performing arts classification

Classification schemes are not enough…

Are we describing the ‘medium’ or the ‘intellectual content’?

What is the ‘subject’ of this work?

What do users need to find?

Score or sound recording or music literature?

‘Autumn Moon’ courtesy Edward McGuire


What is a collection?

• A database? A selection of images? A digital text?

• Is ‘the collection’ a static or dynamic concept? Who defines what fits together?

• Does ‘collection’ mean physical location? Is this meaningful when your archive is virtual?

• How should we control the levels at which documentation is applied?

All images courtesy Donald Cooper/Photostage


Describing the performance

Is ‘the performance’ the obvious ‘collection-level’?

- performing arts essentially people, activity and event-related

- many collections are of performance-related ephemera

- can offer useful parallels for other subject areas e.g. archaeology

What are the drawbacks?

- not all performance data is specifically event-related

- existing standards not designed to describe temporal concepts

- multiple creators, dates, publishers

- defining location complex


Resources for performing arts cataloguers

Grove Music Dictionaries

http://www.grovemusic.com/

Internet Movie Database

http://www.imdb.com/

Internet Theatre Database

http://www.theatredb.com/

Authority tools for audio-visual cataloguing

http://ublib.buffalo.edu/libraries/units/cts/olac/capc/authtools.html

Information Sources in Music

http://rylibweb.man.ac.uk/data1/ad/guides/intrmus.html

IASA Cataloguing Rules

http://www.llgc.org.uk/iasa/icat/

• creation of restricted area on PADS servers for data assembly• creation of dedicated theatre-specific metadata and display templates• documentation training for project research staff• data input by PADS staff on secondment• conversion of additional data sources for data entry

Michael Gambon, King Lear’ RSC 1983Courtesy Donald Cooper / Photostage

catherine owen describing performing arts data in the digital environment

Documents

simple data resource

use of digital resources

discrete digital object

easea successful data

variety of different

variety of standards

practiceswhich standards

resources available