Developed by Courtney Dean, Margaret Hughes, Kelly Kress, Shira Peltzman in 2017.
Archivists at UCLA had been long aware that media terms used within finding aids varied widely, at LSC and elsewhere. Media terminology can vary greatly in spelling, term, or phrase, even amongst existing library thesauri. Recognizing the need for a robust controlled vocabulary, UCLA archivists worked together to standardize term usage within their description. The controlled vocabularies here were designed for the explicit purpose of describing media in finding aids. It is acknowledged that catalog records will continue to adhere to other, existing standards. The results are controlled vocabularies for audio, born-digital, film, and video source media.
Concurrently, UC digital archivists were writing the UC Guidelines for Born-Digital Description. In order to accelerate and leverage both groups' work, the UCLA archivists were deputized to form a Lightning Team and tasked with developing a controlled vocabulary for born-digital source media and related terms to accompany the Born-Digital Description guidelines as an appendix. It should be noted that the full audiovisual (AV) controlled vocabulary was out of scope for this particular document, and so only digital AV carriers were included, as appropriate.
Included in the controlled vocabulary list are “born-digital related terms” which consist of carriers and other digital terms that often appear in disparate ways. While more style-based, for example “Internet” vs. “internet,” the standardization of these related terms will further aid in consistent archival description. We also recommend adhering to the Chicago Manual of Style, 17th Edition for general style guidance.
The team reached out informally to colleagues at institutions throughout the UC system, California, and the US and inquired as to which standards institutions were using for describing media, and whether they had an internal controlled vocabulary. The responses of that informal inquiry revealed what many within the UC system have experienced -- a lack of agreement on terms. The Getty’s Art and Architecture Thesaurus (AAT) was the most commonly used resource, but no one felt that any single authority was comprehensive. Furthermore, choosing a broad thesaurus such as AAT also leaves the door open to have a variety of terms used (albeit, still standardized). The desired controlled vocabulary was a narrower, specialized list, which would allow processors and users to easily search collections for those preferred terms and have a shared understanding of what those terms mean.
To begin with, the team created a standards crosswalk which included common AV and born-digital terms, pulling from Public Broadcasting Metadata Dictionary Project’s PBCore; AAT; Resource Description and Access' (RDA) content, media type, and carrier; and what were dubbed “terms in the wild.” The crosswalk was referred to repeatedly throughout the process, which helped in two ways. It allowed for easy identification of gaps in the terms of the those authorities, such as inadequate or missing terminology, and illustrated when there was a lack of consensus, for example DAT vs. digital audio tapes. The crosswalk also served as a reminder when appropriate terms had been identified by an authority, such as "flash drive." The team created local terms where gaps were identified, however, existing authorized terms were chosen whenever possible.
Consideration was also given to colloquial language and usability needs of end users. As these are guidelines for description, it is important that familiar and recognizable language and terms are employed. A conscious choice was made to use proprietary names (Zip, Jaz, MiniDisc, etc.) as this information can be helpful to researchers in dating the contents of these carriers, especially because many of these formats were often short-lived. Many terms were not included in PBCore, as it focuses primarily on AV materials, and the terminology included in both AAT and PBCore often conflicted. In many cases the AAT term was chosen since it is the more commonly used resource, and also more comprehensive, but in some cases PBCore’s detailed language was found to be the better option.
Software and system formatting concerns played a role, as well. For example, when deciding the language of floppy disks, i.e., “3.5” floppy disk,” “3 ½ floppy disk,” and “3.5 inch floppy disk,” the latter was chosen in part because it does not employ fractions, which display differently depending on software, or quotes, which can be auto-changed to smart quotations depending on software. Furthermore, both RDA and Describing Archives: A Content Standard (DACS) encourage users away from abbreviations, resulting in the choice to spell out the word “inch.” The final choice, “3.5 inch floppy disk,” will both avoid common systems errors and be easily understood by end users.
In line with other UC guidelines, this list was created with the flexibility to be applied to efficient processing work. For example, when describing content at a series level, description could simply be limited to “memory cards.” Alternatively, if more granular description is warranted, the processor has an option to include information about specific types of memory cards in parentheses after the term. For example, “Collection contains 2 memory cards (2 mircoSD, 1 CompactFlash II).”
These lists are merely a starting point and will be updated on an ongoing basis, especially as new technologies, standards, and best practices arise.