Metadata

“Metadata, the information we create, store, and share to describe things, allows us to interact with these things to obtain the knowledge we need.”
Understanding Metadata, NISO

“Metadata is a love note to the future.”
Jason Scott

What is Metadata?

Metadata literally means “data about data,” or, you might say, “information about stuff.” Metadata provides information about the content and context of a resource so that current and future users can find it and understand it.

Descriptive metadata for digital cultural heritage collections aims to answer some basic questions for users:

  • What am I looking at?
  • Who created it?
  • When was it created?
  • Where was it created?
  • Who owns it?
  • How can I use it?

Metadata for Recollection Wisconsin and DPLA

Each item contributed to Recollection Wisconsin must include four descriptive metadata fields:

  • Title
  • Subject
  • Type
  • Rights

We strongly recommend including four additional metadata fields when possible:

  • Date
  • Description
  • Creator
  • Place

The Recollection Wisconsin Metadata Essentials provides detailed guidelines and examples for each required and recommended metadata field.

Metadata for Hosted Collections
If you’re building a digital collection hosted by the Milwaukee Public Library, we’ll provide you with a customized spreadsheet to input descriptive metadata for your items. You can preview a generic spreadsheet for metadata entry here.

Metadata for Harvested Collections
If we harvest your metadata from an OAI-PMH repository, all metadata fields you wish to share must be mapped to appropriate qualified or unqualified Dublin Core elements. For more information, refer to the Recollection Wisconsin to DPLA Metadata Map.

Creating Standardized Metadata

Controlled Vocabularies
A controlled vocabulary is a predetermined list of terms and phrases used to describe resources. Controlled vocabularies help establish consistency and enable discovery by grouping and connecting related content.

Recommended controlled vocabularies:

SubjectLibrary of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH)
Library of Congress Thesaurus for Graphic Materials (LCTGM)
Getty Art and Architecture Thesaurus (AAT)
Nomenclature 4.0
TypeDCMI Type Vocabulary
CreatorLibrary of Congress Name Authority File (LCNAF)
PlaceGetty Thesaurus of Geographic Names
LanguageISO 639.2 (Codes for the Representation of Names of Languages)
RightsRights Statements URIs

General Metadata Entry Guidelines

  • Avoid the use of abbreviations. Spell out the full names of communities, people and places.
  • Capitalize all proper names. Capitalize only the first word in titles and subject terms.
  • Avoid using ampersands (&), ellipses (. . .) and HTML tags. For example, do not use < br >
    or < br / > within metadata fields to force a line break.
  • Fields for which there is no available information should be left blank. Avoid using “unknown,” “anonymous,” etc.

Sample Metadata Records

Further Reading