We are pleased to announce that we will be holding an in-person Conference, followed by the UKCoR RDA day, on 6th-8th September 2023 at IET Birmingham: Austin Court.
The main conference will take place over the first two full days, followed by a day hosting the UK Committee on RDA (UKCoR) for an exciting day covering all things Resource Description and Access (RDA).
Register your interest, and find out more on our CILIP Event Page.
As we Re-vitalise the Metadata & Discovery Group in 2023, we hope to Re-energise our communities of practice, Re-establish our principles, and Re-imagine the future of description/metadata.
To that end, this year’s MDG Conference aims to explore the topic of “Re-Discovery” as discovery is at the heart of the information world and the vital purpose of all metadata work.
The MDG Conference will explore all aspects of metadata and discovery from traditional cataloguing in libraries and archives, to metadata management, research data management and digital preservation in institutional repositories, digital libraries, and beyond.
We encourage submissions from library workers, information professionals, Library and Information Science students and researchers, research data and open access specialists, meta/data suppliers, and standards and system developers; anyone involved in metadata work!
View the full Call for Proposals and find out more about how to Submit on our CILIP Event Page.
In this next issue of C&I we’ll be looking at “local practice”.
What does your institution do differently from the norm, metadata-wise? Do you add, or request, more standard MARC fields than would be found on a common record, for example, or do you add your own local fields? Do you (heaven forfend) just discard the standards and do your own thing? Why do you have these local practices? Is it to aid in local workflows, because of specific user groups, or just because it’s how things have always been done? Do any of your local practices make it difficult to share your data – or do you think that everyone could benefit from the way you do things?
Catalogue & Index (ISSN: 0008-7629) is the periodical of CILIP Metadata & Discovery Group. It has been published since 1966 to discuss the organisation of knowledge to enable resource discovery and collection management, including articles on cataloguing, indexing, metadata, national and international standards and formats.
The deadline for this issue is 31st June. Please contact the editors (Philip Keates: P.Keates@kingston.ac.uk and Martin Kelleher: martind@liverpool.ac.uk) with proposed papers, any queries, or if you want to offer a paper that does not fit into the theme mentioned. We are always happy to consider papers on topics unrelated to an issue’s theme, especially if it is the result of some research you have conducted, or a project you have been involved in. We encourage people from all sectors to contribute, and actively welcome international contributions as well. Papers can be up to 2,000 words, and we are happy to include a selection of images. Please check our guidance for contributors:
Join CILIP on 4th May at 12:30 for a new module in the Data Driven Librarianship course powered by Nielsen BookData, recognised by CILIP. In the Research Module Update, Nielsen BookData will provide a full year review of the UK book market’s 2021 performance, including a look at their library loans data and further insights from LibScan. Register now for free: https://www.cilip.org.uk/events/EventDetails.aspx?id=1623059&group=
Established through the MDG, this is an initiative to allow UK libraries to contribute directly to the Library of Congress Name Authority File, the dominant authority file for the English Speaking World and beyond.
A total of 4 institutions (University of Aberystwyth, University of Liverpool, Sheffield Hallam University and University of Leeds) are in the process of training to contribute (a fifth, University of Cardiff, are already expecting to join in the next round of training), and full activation and utility will proceed subsequent to the full establishment of the funnel and completion of training and registration. Please contact Martin Kelleher (martind@liverpool.ac.uk) for further details and expressions of interest to join.
Proposals are invited for the CILIP Metadata and Discovery Group (MDG) biennial conference “Metadata and Discovery” to be held from 7th-9th September 2022 at IET Birmingham: Austin Court in Birmingham, England.
Conference theme
With our mission to advocate for Metadata and Discovery firmly established this year’s conference aims to explore a wide range of advocacy initiatives to showcase current metadata impact across the information sector. The focus of the conference will be on revealing the everyday metadata activities that drive discovery in our information economy and the skills and competencies needed to carry out this work. The conference will explore all aspects of metadata advocacy from traditional cataloguing to research data management and preservation and everything in between. We encourage submissions from information professionals, students and researchers, research data and open access specialists, data suppliers and standards and system developers on this theme and active audience participation.
Conference schedule
The main conference will take place over the first two full days. We are pleased to announce that, on the third day of the conference we will again be hosting the UK Committee on RDA for a day of RDA related news and activities. Visits to libraries may be arranged for the Tuesday preceding the conference.
Conference topics
MDG welcomes proposals that cover, but are not confined to, the following areas:
Cataloguing/classification/indexing in any medium
Standards: creation and adoption
Controlled vocabularies
Authority control
Ethics
Data management
Library and Collection Management systems
Discovery systems and interfaces
Linked data
Search engine visibility
Digitization
Repositories
Knowledge bases
Education and careers
Metadata outside the library
Collaboration and co-operation
Proposals closely reflecting the main conference theme will be especially valued.
Formats
We welcome proposals, in English, in the following formats:
Conference papers (20-30 mins). An opportunity to present how your work, project or research innovates discovery.
Lightning talk (10 mins). Shorter presentations on the above topics and themes. Please consider this if you have something to share but do not have a full conference paper.
Interactive sessions (up to 30 mins). With the venue offering breakout rooms, we particularly encourage presentations with interactive elements.
Panel discussions (30 mins). Panels comprised of 2-3 representatives from different institutions commenting on an agreed topic or challenge.
Posters. An opportunity to present your work/project/research in visual form. Time will be included during the conference to allow poster presenters to engage directly with delegates and discuss the contents of their poster. Please consider this if you would prefer to present in a less formal way.
Submissions
We hope to hear from professionals in every library sector and also encourage submissions from current and recently graduated LIS students who would like to take this opportunity to present their research to the cataloguing community.
Cataloguers, indexers and other metadata specialists have a significant role to play in the future of information services and it’s something worth shouting about. Whether you are an experienced presenter or hoping to share your thoughts for the first time in front of a welcoming audience we hope you will consider submitting a proposal.
Submissions deadline
Submissions should be made by 15th April 2022in an attached document via email to w.peaden@aston.ac.ukand should include:
Title of proposed presentation
Presenter(s) name, position and affiliation (if any), email address and biographical note (50 words max)
Presentation format
Presentation topics
Presentation abstract (500 words max)
Proposals will be reviewed by the conference planning committee and selection will be made based on their content, relevance and overall fit with the conference aims. In some cases it may be necessary to make amendments in order to meet programme requirements.
Presenters will be notified of their success by email on13th May 2022 at which point further detailed instructions on conference registration, travel, accommodation and publication will be shared. If you have any initial questions do get in touch!
The new issue of Catalogue and Index (205) has been published.
Welcome to C&I 205, And welcome to 2022! Hopefully it will be a happier and healthier year for all of us than 2021. Or 2020. We covered issues with the still continuing COVID19 epidemic last issue however, which demonstrated the adaptability and innovation undertaken by many in the face of one of the most significant crisis of the age, however, and this issue looks hopefully into the future into how the kind of innovations that many of us have been practising for years can be surfaced, publicised and realised. The topic for this issue is advocacy.
In many ways, the work of the metadata librarian has always been a backroom job. Many of us experience the situation whereupon telling someone our profession, if they use the library or institution we work for, (or have done), that they admit to never having seen us working there, no matter how well they feel they know the staff. This isn’t surprising, since metadata work is often undertaken in the back room, and doesn’t involve working at any of the customer facing desks in the library. Now perhaps, many of us are often working even more backroom, in the backroom of our houses, at least some of the time, as in an increasingly normalised and common practice in the modern workforce than was the case 2 years ago.
However low profile we may be in our terms of our customers, however, there is an increasing need to increase our profile professionally. As the use of union catalogues have been proven to be a valuable and efficient approach to sharing data, so the sharing of practices, standards and support between ourselves and with other stakeholders is increasingly of value in ensuring and improving the quality and consequent value of that data. Furthermore, to develop the kind of higher profile that facilitates greater engagement with stakeholders and higher profile that facilitates greater engagement with stakeholders and the ability to serve the purposes of our customers, there is a need to advocate for the value of the services we provide. In order to gain the kind of support and empowerment that will empower us to fulfil the mighty role that data management is to take, as not only libraries but the information world in general slowly moves towards the next great leap in networking. This next great leap is into the much heralded semantic web, the full realisation of the potential of linked data, and to be empowered to do that, we need a voice, or perhaps many voices, and in many ways, perhaps those voices need to be our own. In short, we need to employ the art of advocacy.
There are 3 papers featured in this issue, covering the various aspects of advocacy. Jenny Wright’s article directly addresses the value of metadata and defines it’s value and sets a strong argument for why it’s something that requires and deserves advocacy in the first place. Emma Booth’s article applies to fulfilling this need and demonstrates the effective application of advocacy by herself and others to increase the recognition of metadata as a valuable resource, and the resultant positive impacts upon standards and practices in the library and library supply industries Finally, Anne Welsh reasserts the value of publication-in-hand cataloguing, and advocates for the recognition of the same as an important and vital part of the modern metadata landscape, demonstrating it’s importance through historical reference and contemporary demonstration of need and value of it’s application. Altogether, these 3 papers work together to provide a well rounded argument, which, if applied effectively (and certainly these papers already demonstrate how such advocacy is already being used effectively) provide a sound footing for the demonstration of the value of metadata. Hopefully, they will inspire and educate all of us who read them to advocate more effectively for the value of metadata which can only be a good thing for those who use the services we provide. Martin Kelleher
The Metadata and Discovery Group is pleased to announce its first single day, online only conference on 8th December 2021. CILIP MDG members and non-members are both welcome to attend. The conference will run from 10.00 to 16.00 and be held on Zoom.
Our keynote speaker this year will be Alan Danskin, Collection Metadata Standards Manager at the British Library who will present on the Futures of Cataloguing.
10:00-10:10*
MDG
Welcome and introduction
10:10-11:10
Alan Danskin
Keynote
11:10-11:30
Break
General chat rooms
11:30-12:00
Helen Williams
LSE’s adventures in Wikidata-land: tears and triumphs down the rabbit hole
12:00-12:30
Jenny Wright
Working in the future: the inclusion of ISNIs in MARC21 bibliographic records, using automated solutions
12:30-13:30
Lunch break
General chat rooms
13:30-14:00
Amber Billey and Sarah Theimer
Introducing Open Cataloguing Rules: creating a freely available cataloguing code alternative to RDA
14:00-14:30
Getaneh Alemu
From the principle of sufficiency and necessity to metadata enriching
14:30-15:00
Break
General chat rooms
15:00-15:10
Barbara Band
To Dewey or not to Dewey: the idiosyncrasies of cataloguing for school librarians
15:10-15:20
Victoria E Edwards
The quality management of bibliographic metadata for e-books in UK higher education libraries
15:20-15:50
Martin Kelleher
A UK NACO and SACO funnel – a call for funnelers
*Timings subject to change until further notice
Costs
The conference is £20 +VAT for CILIP MDG members or £26 +VAT for non-members.
Housekeeping
All presentations and question and answer sessions will be recorded and later uploaded to our YouTube channel. Questions can be taken directly after the presentation or submitted to the panel via the chat function. You can visit and subscribe to our YouTube channel here. You will find past presentations and conference papers there.
Catalogue & Index Call for Papers – September (issue 204) 2021
For the next issue, we’re looking at the impact that the COVID-19 pandemic has had on our work with metadata.
What are the key work struggles that you have faced over the past year, and how have you attempted to handle them? Does the phrase “new ways of working” fill you with dread, or have you discovered positive aspects to remote working? Have any projects suddenly become more achievable, or swathes of work become impossible to accomplish? Have you worked on anything that has been directly connected to tackling the pandemic, or reducing the risks for the users of our resources? How have you tried to stay in touch with colleagues, formally and informally? And do you have any sense that certain changes will be here to stay?
The deadline for this issue is 31st August. Please contact the editors (Philip Keates: P.Keates@kingston.ac.uk and Martin Kelleher: martind@liverpool.ac.uk) with proposed papers, any queries, or if you want to offer a paper that does not fit into the theme mentioned. We are always happy to consider papers on topics unrelated to an issue’s theme, especially if it is the result of some research you have conducted, or a project you have been involved in. We encourage people from all sectors to contribute, and actively welcome international contributions as well. Papers can be up to 2,000 words, and we are happy to include a selection of images. Please check our guidance for contributors:
Our March issue presents a range of papers on many aspects of subject headings and controlled vocabularies, from ethical challenges to standardisation efforts.
How do you view the importance for discoverability of subject access through headings, and do you have any stories or research to support this? Have you worked on projects that have involved subject headings? Have you fought to change outdated and/or offensive headings, and do you have any thoughts on the ethical challenges presented by this aspect of librarianship? Do you use, or are you involved in creating or maintaining, any specialised or bespoke vocabularies? We’d be very happy to help spread the word about vocabularies you’ve found useful which others might not know about.
The deadline for this issue is 28th February. Please contact the editors (Philip Keates: P.Keates@kingston.ac.uk and Martin Kelleher: martind@liverpool.ac.uk) with proposed papers, any queries, or if you want to offer a paper that does not fit into the theme mentioned. We are always happy to consider papers on topics unrelated to an issue’s theme, especially if it is the result of some research you have conducted, or a project you have been involved in. We encourage people from all sectors to contribute, and actively welcome international contributions as well. Papers can be up to 2,000 words, and we are happy to include a selection of images. Please check our guidance for contributors:
CILIP Metadata and Discovery Group 