Student Forum

The Trans Metadata Collective (TMDC) is an ad-hoc group of nearly a hundred information professionals, developed best practices for the description and classification of trans and gender diverse information resources. The culmination of their work, Best Practices for Trans and Gender Diverse Metadata give precedence to transparent practices, cultural sensitivity, correct identification, explicit descriptions of transphobia, and regular assessment of trans-related content. The TMDC report emphasizes the importance of minimizing potential harm and protecting privacy in metadata creation. Overall, the report aims to enhance the representation and inclusion of trans and gender diverse communities in cultural heritage institutions. The author of this paper was the primary organizer for and a co-author of the TMDC report. In this paper, I briefly summarize the collective’s investigation and outline its recommendations regarding common metadata standards, including RDA (Resource Description and Access), Library of Congress Classification (LCC) and others. Following this, I offer initial considerations about how the TMDC’s principles and recommendations affect Dublin Core metadata (both the Core and the DCMI metadata types).

This study aimed to connect different descriptive elements from various institutions to preserve the context and effectively manage the archives of the Japanese Government General of Korea. Currently, the official documents of the Japanese Government General of Korea are dispersed across multiple institutions and described using different descriptive methods, making it challenging to achieve integrated access. To address this issue, this research compared the descriptive elements used by each institution and attempted to link these elements using the RiC-CM. The descriptive methods of each institution varied significantly in terms of the number of elements, hierarchy, and presentation style, largely due to their focus on core holdings. While the results of linking these documents showed modest connections when examining only three records, it is believed that more meaningful results can be obtained by expanding the scope by controlling values such as language, institution names, years, individuals, and departments. Thus creating a broader network not only for the Government-General of Korea archives and for connecting with other modern and contemporary documents.

This paper proposes the application of linked open metadata in order to improve discoverability, provenance research, and restitution efforts for Nazi-looted art. Multinational and national online registries, including the German Lost Art Database and lootedart.com, were created in response to the 1998 Washington Conference on Holocaust-Era Assets. The next step is to expand upon the work of these repositories by creating robust linked metadata for the objects described within them. Linked open data will support data integration across institutions, increase discoverability, and enable machine learning and artificial intelligence applications in the looted art space. Included is a proposal for a data model that is adapted to the specific, contextualized needs of looted art objects and built using elements from the Europeana Data Model, Dublin Core, and RDA. Using these widely adopted frameworks in conjunction with standardized vocabularies will increase interoperability and support ease of implementation. Employing a hypothetical example, we illustrate how a knowledge graph can help researchers to sift large amounts of data, thereby increasing the chances of matching objects from disparate data sources.

Since the 1940s, superhero comics have occupied a pervasive position within modern popular culture, from books to movie franchises and video games. Contemporary comic characters have multiple storylines, are rebooted every few years, and crossover frequently with other comic series. Without the necessary background knowledge, a new comic reader faces a high barrier to entry. For comic books to remain open, accessible, and to meaningfully engage an audience as diverse as its content, an interconnected and flexible metadata structure is critical. We believe that improved metadata standards and structures can make comic books accessible to a new readership with a diverse range of backgrounds and experiences. By implementing a knowledge graph and metadata structure, a vast collection of comics can be transformed into an accessible, intuitive database. To demonstrate this improved functionality, we created a sample knowledge graph for two comics in the DC Universe: Nightwing and Superman Son of Kal-El. We combined a fan created and maintained comic book database, The Grand Comic Database (comics.org), with an open-source, fan created, comic book ontology, Comic Meta (comicmeta.org), and applied bespoke customizations to highlight possi

Makerspaces and Fab Labs are growing in popularity and now have large repositories of unique and nontraditional resources. However, there is a noted gap in the literature addressing the long-term management of Makerspace resources. Based on the digital resources of one Makerspace [The Champaign- Urbana Community Fab Lab (CUCFL)] we created a metadata schema useful to both staff and patrons to manage these items. Our central goals were to organize, improve search and discovery, and allow for adaptability. The CUCFL needed the schema to allow for change, so we originally created a simple schema to serve as a blueprint for a refined final version. For the CUCFL, the final version is an updated metadata schema adapted to serve as the information architecture for a new website functioning as a staff and public accessible library of their resources. With this example, we hope to encourage more research and development in this area. This project was supervised by Professor Inkyung Choi at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

Time-aligned textual transcriptions and the relationships between them and other files to which they relate can have complex creation narratives. This paper/presentation addresses critical questions related to cataloging and record creation for these types of digital artifacts. The approach appeals to WEMI and the file creation workflow as a way to analyze transcriptions and annotations as independent works from their source material. Arguments are presented for an analysis where transcriptions are independent expressions if not also independent works. According the Dublin Core 1:1 principle this means that Dublin Core based metadata schemas should support these resources with a separate description record. The two records—source media and transcriptions—ought to be related but separate. Modern practices of language documentation can complicate the expression of relationships because single files may include multiple expressions or both annotations and translations via different contributors.