Interoperability Between Archival and Bibliographic Metadata: An EAD to MODS Crosswalk

Abstract

In this article we investigate the problem of semantic interoperability between archival and bibliographic metadata used in digital libraries and repositories. We investigate the semantic relationships between two metadata standards, namely the Encoded Archival Description (EAD) and the Metadata Object Description Schema (MODS). We propose a crosswalk between EAD and MODS consisting of three basic components: (a) a semantic mapping from EAD elements/attributes to MODS elements/attributes, (b) techniques to map the hierarchical structure of the EAD document to MODS, and (c) techniques to retain in MODS the information related to the archival components that is inherited from the descriptions of components of higher hierarchy in the EAD document.

KEYWORDS:

• metadata interoperability
• EAD
• archival description
• MODS
• bibliographic metadata
• crosswalks

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

We would like to thank Professor Christos Papatheodorou for his helpful comments in regard to this specific article. We would also like to acknowledge Michalis Sfakakis and Manolis Peponakis for the knowledge they provided us in relation to the use of bibliographic standards.