DCDC21 | Accessible and inclusive catalogues
Channel: ResearchLibrariesUK
Date: 05/07/2021

DCDC stands for Discovering Collections, Discovering Communities. It is a cross-sectoral conference, hosted by The National Archives, RLUK and Jisc, that brings together the GLAMA sectors (galleries, libraries, archives, museums and academia) to shine a light on our shared experiences, innovations, interests and concerns. The DCDC21 Conference explored how crisis can act as a catalyst for change within libraries, archives, museums, and cultural organisations. https://dcdcconference.com/

Diversifying databases: five easy pieces
Jo Pugh, The National Archives

Archival systems aren’t easy and increasing demands are being placed on them to move into a 21st century which prizes openness, diversity and transparency. Do techniques exist that can help us meet the needs of today’s audiences, diversify descriptions and tell new kinds of stories with our data? In this session I will outline five approaches to enhance, rewrite and recontextualise archival metadata at scale to meet these calls. We’ll explore what a catalogue which speaks with many voices might look like, discuss the role linked data, artificial intelligence and community outreach can play and consider a range of trailblazing international projects emerging new practice.

Computational analysis of catalogue descriptions: Collaboration as a catalyst for change
Rossitza Atanassova, British Library, and James Baker, University of Sussex

The paper discusses a transformative collaboration that brings together historical research using computational methods and the investigation of catalogue practice at cultural institutions. Our current AHRC-funded project Legacies of Catalogue Descriptions and Curatorial Voice: Opportunities for Digital Scholarship, a partnership between the University of Sussex, British Library and Yale University Library, has stimulated an interest amongst GLAM professionals in using corpus linguistic tools and approaches for the computational, critical and curatorial analysis of collection catalogues. We explain the background to this project, and the engagement with the GLAM community as part of the development of online training materials.

Remaking collections in times of crisis– insights from epistemological theory 
Roxanne Missingham, Australian National University

Libraries have curated knowledge through collections created over many centuries. Disasters offer on opportunity where rebuilding whether for replacement or for access (such as when physical collections are not available) to form new knowledge infrastructure. Exploring the nature of the creation, selection and accessibility of collections through an epistemological perspective provides a perspective for holistic creation of a knowledge base that can overcome the biases from development within the dominant culture. Adopting this perspective enables disasters shift in libraries within research universities to match the needs of contemporary research and education. Case studies demonstrate how such a shift can occur.