1. Medium e.g. Radio
2. Type of role Administrators;
Content Managers (Producers/Controllers); Creatives
(Writers/Artists); Managers; Other; Performers
(Actors Presenters/ Reporters/Broadcasters/ Presenters);
Researchers
(Archivists, Librarians); Technical
metadata, a form of digital cataloguing, requiring accuracy, and aligning the correct information into the appropriate places.
A taxonomy was built to facilitate the search. This is where an MSc and knowl- edge of information architecture came to the fore, but equally, years of using Library of Congress and Sears, and dealing with user enquiries were extremely valuable. Personally, I think Google has spoiled people and made those wonderful standards obsolete as people search with natural language rather than a defined vocabulary, and then find this type of searching does not translate to a curated database. (I may yet tackle this as a PhD thesis.) But, these standards facilitate an understanding of taxonomic structures, keywords, how to manage “refer to” and “also see” to deal with search terms, and render information findable. The particular jargon and specificity of search terms needed for a specialised sub- ject area mean that standard taxonomies such as LC or Sears lack the vocabulary needed. However the Glossary of Filmo- graphic terms from the International Feder ation of Film Archives (fiaf) provid- ed a good reference. Sue Malden from the British Entertainment History Project also shared the taxonomy they are developing. Ultimately, the CHBBC taxonomy was developed from the vocabulary used in the collection.
A second contribution to the data was building a structured syntax to drive the filters as shown below. For every role held by the individual, the chain of six different pieces of information was created, joining with an (_) underscore. The concept is that each of the six components should be a filter. Currently the website only allows the filtering by role, but it does mean you can easily identify the technical staff, manag- ers, etc in the collection.
The use of field masks for the role type ensures consistency in the descriptor. Consistency is achieved in the facets for the BBC divisions and Programmes by using the general taxonomy. Null is used for any facets where the information is not relevant, or not extant.
A worked example for John Bethel, a music librarian, would be as follows:
Radio_Researchers_Music Librarian_ Nations And Regions (Manchester Music Department_null_1961-1990
John Bethel did not work on particular programmes as such, so null is used in this instance for the fifth element of the syntax.
We weren’t able to fully implement this within the time frame of the project, but I do have hope that it will be completed if further funding can be identified. My current project is the Tools of Knowl-
edge, which is working to digitise the SIMON database of Scientific instruments
– a series of catalogue cards. This project brings together academics from the Uni- versity of Sussex; The Whipple Museum in Cambridge and the National Museum of Scotland (
https://tinyurl.com/3dc9cfj6). This project has given me the opportunity to develop a plethora of new skills. My sec- tion of work here has centred on working with Transkribus, a system for digitising handwritten documents and data cleaning, using Openrefine – a very powerful open- source tool for working with large volumes of data – to link addresses to Geolocation data.
The historical street maps needed for these locations are taken from the crowd- sourced resource, the GB1900 Gazetteer, which captured all the place names and written content from the Ordnance Survey six-inch mile maps of England, Scotland and Wales for the period 1888-1913. Com- bining the two data sets will ultimately allow us to produce a map showing where the instrument Makers carried out their trades. A second current project is Full Stack Feminism, which responds to take action against bias and implicit, as well as explic- it, forms of discrimination that manifest in our digital worlds and technologies (A toolkit is available at https://fullstackfeminismdh.
pubpub.org/). It looks at bias in the language of digital structures, and aims to embed intersectional feminist thinking and prac- tices within and across the broad discipline of digital humanities. It is interesting to note that this project (and many others in this field) use Dublin core as a data standard. This project team consists of academics from the Universities of Sussex, at Maynooth and TU Dublin. Each project offers a new opportunity to develop and hone skills, but ultimately builds on the foundation of solid librarian- ship and information knowledge. While I have yet to learn how to code, my IT skills have expanded astronomically. For librarians and information professionals looking to expand their horizons, Digitisation and data projects are an amazing opportunity. They are also evidence that our skills are essential in a digital age. IP
October-November 2023 INFORMATION PROFESSIONAL 47
3. Key role
Roles at the BBC: e.g. Producer or Correspondent
4. BBC Divisions
Listed in the Thesaurus: e.g. Outside broadcasts
5. Programmes
Listed in the Thesaurus: e.g. Blue Peter
Dates
Year or year to year e.g. 1989-1994
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