http://orcid.org/0000-0003-1199-1631
Linked Data for Cultural Heritage (an ALCTS Monograph) is a UK reprint of an Association of Library Collections and Technical Services (ALCTS) publication. The volume aims to serve as a key resource for practitioners, researchers, academics and students to linked data concepts, practice and implementation in cultural heritage collections. It is edited by Ed Jones, Associate Director for Library Assessment and Technical Services at the National University in San Diego, and Michele Seikel, Professor of Library Studies at Oklahoma State University. Both editors have extensive experience in the area of linked data.
As an ALCTS monograph, the book’s chapters consist primarily of contributions from a range of experts based in North America. As someone with a relatively limited knowledge of some of the metadata schemas covered in the volume and linked data query language in general, I found that for the most part it was easy to follow and technical concepts were explained well. Diagrams also support the explanations in some chapters which aided in understanding.
The introduction, by Ed Jones, describes linked data, what it is and how it works. It summarises the relevant standards, its potential for discoverability on the Web and the challenges that need to be overcome. The next six chapters then examine aspects of projects and practice within linked data in the cultural heritage domain from around the world.
The first chapter, by Hilary K Thorsen and M Cristina Patuelli, surveys major projects in linked data such as Linked Open Data Libraries Archives and Museums (LODLAM) and Europeana. Carl Stahmer then looks at the practical aspects of migration to linked data via the case study of the English Short Title Catalog. This project came up with a social cataloguing solution that overcame the traditional tension between traditional cataloguing methods and researchers wanting to add their input to resource description.
Allison Jai O’Dell then reviews and reimagines how amenable controlled vocabulary tools from within library practice can translate to linked data practices and also how these could be expanded to take advantage of opportunities presented by the semantic web. The theme of controlled vocabularies is continued by Iker Huega and Michael P Lauruhn, who examine the role of authority control, identifiers and vocabularies and how the Resource Description Framework (RDF), the Web Ontology Language (OWL) and the SPARQL query language can be used in mapping vocabularies and identifiers across science, technical and medical publishing.
The last two chapters are devoted solely to projects within the library domain. Carol Jean Godby looks at how the Online Computer Library Centre (OCLC) has experimented with Schema.org as the foundation for a model of library resource description expressed as linked data. Sally McCallum’s chapter then looks at how the Library of Congress has developed the Bibliographic Framework Initiative (BIBFRAME) data model and then outlines the fundamental differences between MAchine Readable Cataloging (MARC) standards and BIBFRAME. It also provides a useful overview of RDF and other linked data developments which, if presented earlier, may have enhanced my understanding of prior chapters.
The volume also contains a comprehensive index which explains some of the terms; however, a glossary of terms may have assisted the novice reader as this volume is full of technical terminology and jargon. The assumed knowledge of metadata sets for example in Chapter 3 makes one part of that paper almost unintelligible without reference to sources outside it that explain what the various acronyms mean.
Given that the overview of linked data presented here is generally accessible to those at all levels, I think that the volume achieves its objectives of being a resource for students and practitioners wishing to learn more about practical implementations and the workings of linked data models.
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© 2017 Christopher Colwell
https://doi.org/10.1080/01576895.2017.1330594