The central purpose of this collection of essays is to make a creative addition to the debates surrounding the cultural heritage domain. In the 21st century the world faces epochal changes which affect every part of society, including the arenas in which cultural heritage is made, held, collected, curated, exhibited, or simply exists. The book is about these changes; about the decentring of culture and cultural heritage away from institutional structures towards the individual; about the questions which the advent of digital technologies is demanding that we ask and answer in relation to how we understand, collect and make available Europes cultural heritage. Cultural heritage has enormous potential in terms of its contribution to improving the quality of life for people, understanding the past, assisting territorial cohesion, driving economic growth, opening up employment opportunities and supporting wider developments such as improvements in education and in artistic careers. Given that spectrum of possible benefits to society, the range of studies that follow here are intended to be a resource and stimulus to help inform not just professionals in the sector but all those with an interest in cultural heritage.

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Cultural Heritage in a Changing World

The Library of Congress (LC) and the Program for Cooperative Cataloging (PCC) interpretation of Resource Description and Access (RDA) 9.7 regarding gender when identifying persons reinforces regressive conceptions of gender identity. The rule instructs catalogers to record gender when identifying persons, and although RDA gives catalogers the flexibility to record more than two gender labels, LC limits Name Authority Cooperative Program (NACO) catalogers to a binary label: male, female, or not known. In this article, the authors challenge gender as a descriptive attribute for personal names, critique how LC is instructing NACO catalogers to record elements about gender, and make recommendations to address describing persons in LC authority records.

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What's Gender Got to Do with It? A Critique of RDA 9.7

This paper presents the results of the analysis of the causes for duplicate profiles in the Scopus database on the basis of a random sampling of profiles of 400 Russian authors and 400 organizations. We estimate the number of duplicate profiles and calculate the level of uncertainty that errors in bibliographic descriptions can contribute to the results of scientometric studies using the Scopus database. The analysis showed that in Scopus 76% of the organizations and 24% of the authors have duplicate profiles. In this regard, organizations lose an average of 17% of publications and authors lose 11%. The results of this study can be used in elaboration of the Scopus database and estimating the error level in the research assessment of institutions and individuals.

The Impact of Errors in the Sсopus Database on the Research Assessment

The persistent identifier (PID) landscape extends to cover objects, individuals and organisations engaged in the process of research. Established services such as DataCite, Crossref, ORCID and ISNI are providing a foundation for a trusted ecosystem and a new generation of services. Scalable identifier systems will support researchers and capture research activity in a holistic way, across the entire lifecycle. Challenges remain – siloed services are not interoperable; important types of objects are not adequately covered, many processes remain manual, and adoption, while strong, is not consistent across disciplines. This article draws on the work of the EU-funded THOR project to take stock of the current state of interoperability across the PID landscape and to discuss the next steps towards an integrated research record. Examples illustrate how this interconnectivity is facilitated technically, as well as social and human challenges in fostering adoption. User stories highlight how this network of persistent identifier services is facilitating good practice in open research and where its limitations lie.

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Connecting the Persistent Identifier Ecosystem: Building the Technical and Human Infrastructure for Open Research

Depuis les annees 1980, des objets materiels et immateriels d’une croissante diversite se trouvent qualifies de “patrimoine”. L’idee d’un patrimoine numerique est ainsi aujourd’hui institutionnalisee. Pourtant, si l’on en croit l’experience de la BnF au cours des vingt dernieres annees, l’acquisition d’une legitimite pour ces nouveaux objets patrimoniaux, qui vont des jeux video sur support aux archives de l’Internet, des ouvrages anciens numerises aux contenus dematerialises collectes sur le web, a ete une aventure mouvementee.Avec une periode d’experimentation, jusqu’en 2003, puis une periode d’industrialisation et de professionnalisation, jusqu’en 2008, la filiation entre patrimoine ecrit ou documentaire et patrimoine numerique a d’abord contribue a asseoir la place des documents et collections numeriques dans les missions de la bibliotheque. Cependant, cette continuite restait indissociable d’une profonde alterite, inherente a la nature du web et des objets documentaires qu’il genere. Ubiquite, volatilite, destructuration, massification, internationalisation, transversalite : autant de caracteristiques du web qui ont contraint la BnF a adapter ses processus de travail, ses methodes de traitement, ses outils et son organisation. L’etude de ce processus de patrimonialisation, qu’elle passe par l’observation des outils institutionnels qu’il mobilise, par l’etude des etapes ou gestes de ce processus, ou par les emotions qu’il suscite, fait apparaitre deux aspects complementaires du patrimoine numerique, interrogeant en profondeur l’identite et les missions de la BnF, dans son rapport a la societe et au monde. D’une part, le numerique œuvre comme outil de dissemination, de mediation et de mise en valeur du patrimoine deja existant ; d’autre part il voit emerger de nouveaux contenus et objets patrimoniaux. Dans la vision originelle d’une “tres grande bibliotheque, d’un type entierement nouveau”, la numerisation avait pour mission de reconcilier le patrimoine avec la nation, en utilisant la technologie comme outil de decloisonnement. Vingt ans d’experimentations et de pratique ont semble-t-il fini par renverser cette logique, faisant du numerique un nouveau patrimoine dans lequel la nation est appelee a se reconnaitre.

https://tel.archives-ouvertes.fr/tel-02475991/document

Le numérique en bibliothèque : naissance d'un patrimoine : l'exemple de la Bibliothèque nationale de France (1997-2019)

This article describes the project to build the initial International Standard Name Identifier (ISNI) database by deploying the techniques used to develop the Virtual International Authority File (VIAF). It focuses particularly on the work of the OCLC team in transforming the VIAF “resource file” model of matched data into a robust, operational, and authoritative file of uniquely assigned ISNIs as a base for an ongoing ISNI assignment system, and on the quality assurance validation of the database provided by the British Library and the Bibliotheque nationale de France. The need for future interaction between ongoing ISNI assignment and name authority control in libraries is also explored.

The International Standard Name Identifier (ISNI): The Evolving Future of Name Authority Control

This article presents ISNI and VIAF as major initiatives leveraging the library Authority control. They are significantly changing the international landscape of bibliographic control addressing the challenge of reliably identifying people in the rapidly emerging global knowledge network. Both systems are built on the principles of UBC. Further, they are revitalising these principles by promoting a global economy in which the library authority data are playing a leading role in the Linked Data chain. The article presents ISNI and VIAF in complementary relation with one another and invites libraries worldwide to become full players in both initiatives.

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ISNI and VIAF – Transforming ways of trustfully consolidating identities

Depuis longtemps, les organismes qui gerent des donnees relatives aux personnes et collectivites impliquees dans les differentes etapes de la vie des productions intellectuelles attendaient un identifiant unique, international, pouvant servir de passerelle entre les differents systemes et bases de donnees et faciliter la circulation de l’information. ISNI (International Standard Name Identifier) a ete elabore pour repondre a cette attente. Cet article decrit les etapes du projet depuis sa gestation jusqu’a la mise en place du systeme de gestion. Il en expose les enjeux dans l’environnement numerique.

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ISNI : un identifiant passerelle

Pour les benevoles d’accompagnement, il s’agit d’etre la, aupres de la personne, etre present a l’autre quelle que soit sa dependance et sa capacite a communiquer. Accueillir l’autre vieillissant et le laisser « etre autre » afin que sa souffrance puisse s’exprimer et etre entendue. Ainsi, ecoute et regard peuvent permettre a cette personne âgee vulnerable d’etre reconnue en tant que sujet, dans sa dignite d’etre humain.

Approches documentaires : priorité aux contenus

As one of the 24 partners of the project Europeana Sounds, the BnF provides to Europeana metadata related to digitized sound recordings from its cultural heritage collection. This article describes the BnF experience with the Europeana Sounds project by taking as its point of departure the multiple challenges related to data transformation from base material, the MARC XML records that comprise also metadata related to digital objects, into the RDF based Europeana Data Model (EDM). By way of this experience the BnF is exploring technical methods for exposing and sharing in the best possible way the richness and granularity of its metadata, as well sharing its areas of expertise, such as controlled vocabularies and best practices with persistent identifiers. The array of issues addressed involves instructions that combine analysis of traditional bibliographic description, digital library metadata curation, critical look on the extant relationships between various data repositories within the BnF, current and future role of library catalogues, metadata production workflows, role of metadata quality, licencing issues, and more. The article discusses the organization of work so that skills and responsibilities are shared in the most efficient way. It also discusses lessons learned and perspectives regarding the evolution of the profession of the metadata librarian, including the need for a better understanding of the potential for the metadata to be reused and reprocessed, and the necessity to develop modeling and technical skills. Finally, in exploratory mode, the article highlights the possibilities offered by the Linked Open Data technologies for metadata reprocessing in innovative ways by taking down the data silos borders.

https://hal-bnf.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01373485/document

Anila Angjeli

Papers

The International Standard Name Identifier (ISNI): The Evolving Future of Name Authority Control

ISNI and VIAF – Transforming ways of trustfully consolidating identities

ISNI : un identifiant passerelle

Approches documentaires : priorité aux contenus

Data processing for digital libraries: the experience of the BnF with Europeana Sounds project