Map Curators' Business Meeting Friday 8th September 1999 -
Oxford Brookes University
Provisional Agenda
1) Apologies for absence, minutes of the last meeting,
and matters arising not covered elsewhere.
2) Harmonisation of UKMARC format with MARC21 (the
former USMARC).
3) What can the MCG do to support map curators in their
day-to-day work? Bring ideas to the meeting.
4) Training What's coming up?
Maps and plans, identification and preservation of
materials, Society of Archivists, PRO, 12th December 2000.
5) How can the MCG reach out to other Map Curators?
6) Cartographiti - Are readers happy with it?
7) lis-maps - Is it used to its full potential?
8) Any Other Business
Minutes of the last meeting:
Map Curators' Business Meeting Thursday 9 and Friday 10
September 1999
Due to the busy symposium schedule the meeting was divided
between two slots.
1) Apologies from: Wendy Cawthorne, Bob McIntosh, Richard
Oliver.
2) Report on International Cartographic Association
meeting in Ottawa. April Carlucci mentioned the session
given by the Association of Canadian Map Libraries and
Archives (ACMLA) in which the Congress of Cartographic
Information Specialist Associations (CCISA) was discussed
as an umbrella organisation that might combat the
fragmentation of the profession, as perceived in north
America. April noted that it was heartening to see people
everywhere having the same problems. A full report will
appear in the next edition of Cartographiti.
3) Report on Co-operative Cataloguing in the UK
Nick Millea noted that there had been some discussion
between the legal deposit libraries at a meeting held last
May. Developments had been delayed while the National
Library Scotland replaced its catalogue system. It was
confirmed that the records generated should be available to
all the library community. There had also been two
Research Support Libraries Programme (RSLP) bids of
interest: a Scottish one called charting the Nation; and
'Mapping the World' which concerns the retro-conversion of
the catalogue records of seven collections. This latter
project had been initially unsuccessful, but was being
resubmitted.
4) LIBER web site
Chris Fleet reminded people of the LIBER web site which
includes many useful references for map
curators: http://www.konbib.nl/kb/skd/liber/intro.htm#
5) Outreach to other Map Curators
Concern was expressed at the small number of Map Curators
attending the Map Curators Workshop (attendance consisted
mainly of people from the legal deposit libraries and the
military survey). Where, it was asked, were all the
university, local government and museum map curators? The
expense and difficulty of an event spread over two days was
mentioned which lead to the suggestion of occasional
regional meetings taking place, probably over an afternoon
and organised by a regional representative. The lack of
awareness of the MCG was considered a problem. It was
suggested that Cartographiti and lis-maps should advertise
each other. The web page had not been updated for a while
and Barbara Morris volunteered to assist with html editing,
but would require others to provide her with copy. It was
considered that the Library Association should be sent a
copy of our report. An edition of Cartographiti would be
devoted to the Map Curators Workshop and an extra large
print run would be used as publicity material with copies
being sent to those UK map collections who did not all
ready receive it. It was suggested that perhaps the MCG
should seek a higher profile in institutions that taught
librarianship. John McIlwaine(UCL) and Al Roberts
(Aberystwyth) were suggested as people to approach
initially.
6) Training in the use of digital spatial data
The Digimap project would be holding various training
sessions in the coming months, however these were only
available to UK Higher Education as is Digimap itself. For
more information on Digimap see:
http://edina.ac.uk/digimap/
7) Any Other Business
Chris Fleet announced that LIBER was creating a Who's Whom
of Map Curating to aid communication between map curators
and identify areas of expertise that they were each willing
to share. Questionnaires for this were available on the
web and it would also be plugged on lis-maps.
Chris Board announced that the Charles Close Society for
the Study of Ordnance Survey Maps had received a legacy
with which it was proposing to make copies of maps from
collections that were in danger.
Ann Sutherland thanked Margaret Wilkes for her help with
the display on the MCG board and congratulated Chris Board
and Roger Anson on their being made Hon. Fellows of the
ICA. It was noted that the former was now chairing the ICA
committee on the History of Cartography.
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