What, Where, When, and Who:
A Renaissance for the Reference
Collection
Michael Buckland
School of Information Management & Systems
and Electronic Cultural Atlas Initiative,
University of California, Berkeley
Ohio State University Libraries, November 15, 2005
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In a paper library the reference collection is arranged in
convenient categories and for making notes on . . .
What, When, Where, Who, Why, and How
using specialist genres of reference works:
• General and subject areas: Dictionaries and encyclopedias
• Geography section: Atlases and gazetteers
• History section: Chronologies and time-lines
• Biography section: Who’s whos, biographical dictionaries
• etc.
This has become more difficult in a digital environment.
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WHAT? Searching by topic, e.g. Dewey, LCSH, any
subject index, or category scheme.
Two kinds of mapping in every search:
•
Documents are assigned to topic categories, e.g. Dewey
•
Queries have to map to topic categories, e.g. Dewey’s
Relativ Index from ordinary words/phrases to Decimal
Classification numbers.
Also mapping between topic systems, e.g. US Patent
classification and International Patent Classification.
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Text
Numeric
datasets
It is difficult to move between different media forms.
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Maps
Text
THESAURUS
GAZETTEER
Captions
Numeric
datasets
Different media can be linked indirectly via metadata,
but sometimes (e.g. for socio-economic numeric data
series) you also need to specify WHERE.
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WHERE. Geo-temporal search interface. Place names found in
documents. Gazetteer provided lat. & long. Places displayed on
map.
Timebar
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Zoom on map. Click on place for a list of records. Click on record to display text.
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WHERE Place names are problematic:
- Variant forms: St. Petersburg, Санкт Петербург, SaintPétersbourg, . . .
- Multiple names: Cluj, in Romania / Roumania / Rumania, is
also called Klausenburg and Kolozsvar.
- Names changes: Bombay  Mumbai.
- Homographs:Vienna, VA, and Vienna, Austria;
50 Springfields.
- Anachronisms: No Germany before 1870
- Vague, e.g. Midwest, Silicon Valley
- Unstable boundaries: 19th century Poland; Balkans; USSR.
Use a gazetteer!
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A catalog record: Isle of Man Tramways. ISBN 0715347403
008
700812 1970 enkabh, b,fe 001 0 eng Country of publication code for
England
043
a e-uik– Geographic Area Code. The cataloger has erroneously used the
“Country Code” used in field 008, instead of the Geographic Area Code prescribed
for 043. Should be e-uk-ui for “Europe. Great Britain Miscellaneous Island
Dependencies”.
050 0
a TF764.M27 b P4 1970 Geographic code embedded in Library of
Congress Classification number
082 0 a 388.4/6/094289 Geographic code embedded in Dewey Decimal Classification
number
100 1 a Pearson, Frederick Keith. Author
245 10 a Isle of Man tramways, c by F. K. Pearson;… Place name used adjectivally
in title.
260 a Newton Abbot : b David & Charles, c 1970. Place of publication, not in the
Isle of Man.
500 a Imprint covered by label: A. M. Kelley, New York. Note that Place of
publication obscured.
6102 0 a Manx Electric Railway Company. Adjective for Isle of Man used in
corporate name used as subject heading.
650 0 a Street-railroads z Man, Isle of. Geographic subdivision using inverted form of
name. The island known as Man is represented six different ways, three searchable.
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Catalogs and gazetteers should talk to each other!
Catalog
search
Gazetteer
search
Geographic sort / display of catalog search result.
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Ask the gazetteer where Urbana is?
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Maps
Text
THESAURUS
GAZETTEER
Captions
Numeric
datasets
Proper place name control requires a gazetteer
-- and latitude and longitude allow points on maps.
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WHEN. Search by time is also weakly supported.
Calendars are the standard for time.
But people use the names of events to refer to time periods.
Named time periods resemble place names in being:
• Unstable: European War, Great War, First World War.
•Multiple: Second World War, Great Patriotic War.
•Ambiguous: “Civil war” in different centuries in England,
USA, Spain.
• Places have temporal aspects & periods have geographical
aspects: When the Stone Age was, varies by region.
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Similarity between place names and period names
So a similar solution: A gazetteer-like Time Period Directory.
Gazetteer:
Place name – Type – Spatial markers (Lat & long) -- When
Time Period Directory
Period name – Type – Time markers (Calendar) – Where
Note the symmetry.
Note the connections between Where and When.
A directory of 2,000 named time periods derived from LCSH
Chronological subdivisions is at ecai.org/imls2004
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Web Interface - Access by country / US state / world city
Named periods used in
scholarly discourse.
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Web Interface - Access by map
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Web Interface - Access by timeline
Link initiates search of the
Library of Congress catalog
for all records relating to this
time period.
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WHEN and WHAT. These named time periods are derived
from Library of Congress catalog subject headings and so can
be used for catalog searching which finds books on topics
important for that time period.
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Genres and INFRASTRUCTURE
Maps
Text
THESAURUS
GAZETTEER
Captions
TIME PERIOD DIRECTORY
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Numeric
datasets
Timeline
Chronology
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WHEN, WHERE and WHO. Catalog records found from a
time period search commonly include names of persons
important at that time. Their names can be forwarded to, e.g.,
biographies in the Wikipedia encyclopedia.
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Place and time are broadly important across numerous tools
and genres including, e.g. Language atlases, Library catalogs,
Biographical dictionaries, Bibliographies, Archival finding
aids, Museum records, etc., etc.
Biographical dictionaries are heavy on place and time:
Emanuel Goldberg, Born Moscow 1881. PhD under Wilhelm
Ostwald, Univ. of Leipzig, 1906. Director, Zeiss Ikon,
Dresden, 1926-33. Moved to Palestine 1937. Died Tel Aviv,
1970.
Life as a series of episodes involving Activity (WHAT),
WHERE, WHEN, and WHO else.
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BIOG. DICT.
Maps
Text
THESAURUS
GAZETTEER
Captions
TIME PERIOD DIRECTORY
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Numeric
datasets
Timeline
Chronology
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BIOG. DICT. 2
BIOG. DICT.
Text 2
Text
Maps
THESAURUS 3
THESAURUS 2
THESAURUS
GAZETTEER
Captions
GAZETTEER 2 etc
GAZETTEER 3
TIME PERIOD DIRECTORY
TIME PERIOD DIRECTORY 2
TIME PERIOD DIRECTORY 3
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Numeric
datasets
Time line
Chronology
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Through
- standards
- good practice
- interoperability
an “intermediate infrastructure” like a traditional
reference collection could be built and shared.
Thank-you!
ecai.org/imls2004
buckland@sims.berkeley.edu
Work done jointly with Fredric Gey, Ray Larson, and others.
Acknowledgments: Institute of Museum & Library Services,
National Science Foundation, DARPA, Academia Sinica (Taiwan),
Alexandria Digital Library project, and others.
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