On Tue, 8 Sep 1998, Jul,Erik wrote:
> Jim: You wrote:
>
> > No matter how much we may want to place the event itself into our
> > description,
> > we cannot.
> >
> [Jul,Erik]
>
> This was my view, too, but I have now been told that certain
> communities, most notably, museums, *do* want to record abstract events
> in metadata in addition to any artificats that may emanate from an
> event.
>
> Perhaps someone who actually wants or needs to create metadata records
> for events could enlighten the list with an example and an explanation.
OK, I'll take a stab. Other members of the CIMI testbed group, as well as
other 'real-world' members of meta2 will doubtless chip in with better
examples.
First off, it's worth saying that I -- and others -- probably ALWAYS
actually thought in terms of objects/resources related to events. It was
just so OBVIOUS, or integral to our way of working, that we never thought
of expressing it in this way. Thanks to Per Pedersen of Denmark's National
Museum for opening my eyes...
Take a museum object. For example, an 18th century silver teapot. In
itself, it's nothing special. The museums of the world are doubtless
littered with 18th century silver teapots. In fact, the older members of
the list maybe even HAVE 18th century silver teapots! ;-)
This one, however, is special because of it's association with a
particular person and something he did with it. Allegedly, Bonnie Prince
Charlie (leader of an attempt to remove Protestant King from British
throne, restoring his (Catholic) family to power in the mid eighteenth
century, for those who want to know) DRANK from it.
The tea pot is not important because it is a tea pot.
The tea pot is not important because of its owner (assuming we even know
who that was -- care to comment, Ian?)
The tea pot is important because of an event (the act of drinking?) with
which it is associated.
Using an event concept, 'normal' records for the tea pot (simply
catalogued as an object) may be related to a 'normal' record for the
Prince.
Similarly, a building or a location changes function over time. Different
'change of use event' records might therefore be associated with a single
record for the building, charting these perhaps vitally important changes.
Mosques in Istanbul, for example, were in many cases originally churches.
The building might remain basically the same, but a change of use event
has quite far-reaching implications for what you might DO in such a
building, and how it should be considered in its wider context...?
Paul
== dr. paul miller ============== [log in to unmask] ==
collections manager, archaeology data service, king's manor
york, YO1 7EP, UK tel: +44 (0)1904 43 3954
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