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The <controlaccess> element is a wrapper element that groups key access points for the described materials and enables authority-controlled searching across finding aids on a computer network, serving a function similar to the added entries and subject headings in a catalog record (1XX, 6XX, and 7XX fields in MARC). Hundreds of names and subjects can appear in a finding aid; processors and catalogers identify the most significant ones for special encoding as controlled access terms. Finding aid searches limited to <controlaccess> subelements will improve the likelihood of locating strong sources of information on a desired topic, because access terms will have been entered in a consistent form across finding aids. At a minimum, the same controlled access terms should be encoded in EAD as in the MARC record for the collection. The elements contained in <controlaccess> are these (listed here in the order in which they will be discussed):
The archival principle of multilevel description, the SGML concept of inheritance, and the EAD <controlaccess> element can all work together to provide a very sophisticated access system. The trade-offs are the need for a very sophisticated search engine to take advantage of the tagging and the added cost of marking up the text. Each institution will need to weigh the costs and benefits of depth of indexing based on availability of appropriate search and display mechanisms, the size and research value of a collection, and the expense of doing more complex markup. For many collections, and in many repositories, bundling all the controlled access terms in <archdesc> will be the most practical approach.
The SOURCE attribute designates the source of a specific controlled vocabulary term or the rules that were used to formulate it. For each of the index term subelements available in <controlaccess> the SOURCE attribute is a semiclosed list.(67) The source list includes acronyms for several types of sources:
If the appropriate thesaurus, authority list, or cataloging rules source is not included in the semi-closed list enumerated in the EAD Tag Library, a code for it can be specified in the OTHERSOURCE attribute (the SOURCE attribute is set to the value "other", and then the code for the source being used is supplied in the OTHERSOURCE attribute). Note that "local terms" may be encoded as one type of OTHERSOURCE, but just as is the case in an online catalog, extensive use of local terms will greatly reduce the effectiveness of cross-finding aid or cross-institutional searching.
The AUTHFILENUMBER attribute can be used to specify an authority record number for a name or term. If AUTHFILENUMBER is used, the SOURCE attribute also should be used to identify the authority file from which the record number was taken. By including the AUTHFILENUMBER attribute, it may become possible to pull an authority record into a finding aid dynamically in order to make cross references available for searching. This is especially useful when, for example, an individual is the subject of a body of materials, since it is not possible to encode <persname> within <subject> (see also section 3.5.3.5).
The ROLE attribute is available in <corpname>, <famname>, <persname>, <geogname>, <name>, and <title> to specify the relationship of the named entity to the materials. Examples of such usage are illustrated in section 3.5.3.2.
The ENCODINGANALOG attribute specifies a field or area in another descriptive encoding system to which an EAD element or attribute is comparable. Mapping elements from one system to another may help build a single interface that can index comparable information in bibliographic records and finding aids. ENCODINGANALOGs also could be used to arrange access terms for display purposes. Perhaps most significantly, it may be possible to generate a basic MARC record from a finding aid based on ENCODINGANALOG values.
MARC encoding analogs are specified in the EAD Tag Library for each relevant element.(68) The name of the related encoding system may be designated in one of two ways. First, it can be specified with the RELATEDENCODING attribute in <archdesc>, the value of which would be inherited by every ENCODINGANALOG attribute throughout the finding aid.
<archdesc langmaterial="eng" level="collection "relatedencoding="marc"> <controlaccess> <head>Topics</head> <subject encodinganalog="650" source="lcsh"> Fishery law and legislation--Minnesota.</subject> </controlaccess> </archdesc>
Alternatively, if multiple encoding systems will be referred to within <archdesc>, the name of the specific encoding system may be encoded in each occurrence of the ENCODINGANALOG attribute value. If MARC is the related encoding system, the value for the ENCODINGANALOG attribute is the appropriate MARC field number.
<archdesc langmaterial="eng" level="collection"> <controlaccess> <head>Topics</head> <subject encodinganalog="marc650" source="lcsh"> Fishery law and legislation--Minnesota.</subject> </controlaccess> </archdesc> <archdesc langmaterial="eng" level="collection"> <controlaccess> <head>Index Terms</head> <controlaccess> <head>Topics</head> <subject encodinganalog="marc650" source="lcsh">Fishery law and legislation--Minnesota. </subject> </controlaccess> </controlaccess> <dsc type="combined"> <c01 level="series" encodinganalog="isad3.1.4"> <did><unittitle>Correspondence</unittitle></did> </c01> </dsc> </archdesc>
The <persname> element is used for a proper noun designation for an individual, including any or all of that individual's forenames, surnames, honorific titles, and added names, as well as birth and death dates:
<persname encodinganalog="600" source="lcnaf"> Ferry, Dexter Mason, 1833-1907.</persname> <persname encodinganalog="600" source="lcnaf" role="correspondent">Mason, Darius.</persname>
The <corpname> element is used for a proper noun designation that identifies an organization or a group of people that acts as an entity. Examples include names of associations, institutions, business firms, nonprofit enterprises, governments, government agencies, projects, programs, religious bodies, churches, conferences, athletic contests, exhibitions, expeditions, fairs, and ships. The <subarea> element can be used to code explicitly the subordinate units of a corporate body, if desired. It is not necessary to repeat the SOURCE attribute within the <subarea> element:
<corpname encodinganalog="610" source="lcnaf" role="subject"> University of Detroit. <subarea encodinganalog="610"> Department of Chemistry. </subarea> </corpname> <corpname encodinganalog="610" source="lcnaf"> University of Detroit. <subarea encodinganalog="610">Department of Mathematics. </subarea> </corpname>
The <famname> element is used for a proper noun designation for a group of persons who form a household or are closely related, including both single families and family groups:
<famname encodinganalog="600" source="lcnaf"> Patience Parker family.</famname> <famname encodinganalog="600" source="lcnaf"> Parker family.</famname>
The <geogname> element is used for a proper noun designation for a place, natural feature, or political jurisdiction:
<geogname encodinganalog="651" source="lcsh"> Chinatown (San Francisco, Calif.)</geogname> <geogname encodinganalog="651" source="lcsh"> Appalachian Mountains.</geogname> <geogname encodinganalog="651" source="lcsh"> Baltimore (Md.)</geogname>
The <name> element may be used instead of one of the four specific name elements when it is not known what kind of name is being described, when a high degree of precision is unnecessary or unaffordable, or if it is not practical to train your encoders to distinguish among the more specific name types. For example, <name> might be used in <indexentry> when it is not clear if the name "Bachrach" refers to a person or a photographic firm. While <name> is technically valid within <controlaccess>, the ambiguous nature of both the <name> element and the data it contains render its use far less powerful than the more specific proper name elements.
<genreform encodinganalog="655" source="gmgpc"> Architectural drawings.</genreform> <genreform encodinganalog="655" source="aat"> Photographs. </genreform>
<function encodinganalog="657" source="aat"> Enforcing law.</function> <function encodinganalog="657" source="aat"> Convicting.</function>
Terms identifying a type of work, profession, trade, business, or avocation that is significantly reflected in the materials are encoded in <occupation>:
<occupation encodinganalog="656" source="aat"> Dramatists. </occupation> <occupation encodinganalog="656" source="aat"> Librarians. </occupation>
<subject encodinganalog="650" source="lcsh"> Alien and Sedition laws, 1798.</subject> <subject encodinganalog="650" source="lcsh"> American Confederate voluntary exiles.</subject> <persname encodinganalog="600" source="lcnaf" role="subject"> Williams, Robert Franklin, 1925- </persname>
Formal names of works such as monographs, serials, or paintings occur in many finding aids, and <title> may be used to encode such information. The RENDER attribute in <title> is particularly useful for specifying how a title should be presented for display purposes, such as in italics or quotation marks. Titles that are topics of correspondence or other materials in a collection should be encoded as <title> with a ROLE attribute of "subject." Subtitles of such works are not separately encoded, but a publication date may be encoded in <date> within <title>.
<title encodinganalog="630" role="subject" render="italic"> Huckleberry Finn</title>
Do not use <title> for the informal titles of units of archival description, such as series or file titles, for which <unittitle> is instead the correct element.
The <controlaccess> element is recursive, which permits nested index terms to be grouped and labeled in units that will be meaningful to users in an online display. A repository might choose to group terms by MARC field equivalent (600s as Personal Names, 650s as Topics, 655s as Form and Genre). If the repository creates separate MARC records for different formats of materials that have been physically arranged in distinct series or other groupings, such as photographs or sound recordings, separate nested <controlaccess> elements may be opened to group the terms for each general type of material. The following examples illustrate groupings of <controlaccess> terms based on MARC field equivalents:
<controlaccess> <head>Index Terms</head> <controlaccess> <head>Personal Names</head> <persname encodinganalog="600" source="lcnaf"> Anderson, Jane, 1929-1937.</persname> <persname encodinganalog="600" source="lcnaf"> Smith, Charles Spencer, 1852-1923.</persname> </controlaccess> <controlaccess> <head>Organizations</head> <corpname encodinganalog="610" source="lcnaf"> African Methodist Episcopal Church.</corpname> </controlaccess> <controlaccess> <head>Topics</head> <subject encodinganalog="650" source="lcsh"> Clergy--United States.</subject> <subject encodinganalog="650" source="lcsh"> Education--United States.</subject> </controlaccess> <controlaccess> <head>Contributors</head> <persname encodinganalog="700" source="lcnaf"> Smith, Charles S. (Charles Spencer), Jr.</persname> <persname encodinganalog="700" source="lcnaf"> Smith, Christine Shoecraft.</persname> </controlaccess> <controlaccess> <head>Forms of Material</head> <genreform encodinganalog="655" source="aat"> Photographs.</genreform> </controlaccess> </controlaccess>
The following example illustrates in-depth markup of names, subjects, and form and genre terms within a biographical note and a container list:
<archdesc level="collection"> <bioghist> <p><persname normal="Winchell, Alexander">Alexander Winchell</persname> was professor of <subject> geology</subject> and <subject>paleontology </subject> at the <corpname>University of Michigan </corpname>, director of the <corpname>Michigan Geological Survey</corpname>, and chancellor of <corpname> Syracuse University</corpname>, but he was most noted as a popular lecturer and writer on scientific topics and as a Methodist layman who worked to reconcile traditional religious beliefs to nineteenth- century developments in the fields of <subject>evolutionary biology </subject>, <subject>cosmology</subject>, <subject> geology</subject>, and <subject>paleontology </subject>. ... </p> </bioghist> <dsc type="in-depth"> <c01 level="series"> <did> <unittitle><genreform normal="diaries">Accounts of Geological Expeditions and Travel</genreform> </unittitle> </did> <c02> <did> <container>23</container> <unittitle>Expedition to <geogname>Lake Superior </geogname><unitdate>1867</unitdate> </unittitle> </did> </c02> <c02> <did> <container>23</container> <unittitle>Excursion to <geogname>New England </geogname><unitdate>1867-1868 </unitdate> </unittitle> </did> </c02> </c01> </dsc> </archdesc>
No consensus exists as yet regarding the utility and practicality of doing such extensive markup of proper names in the narrative and container list sections of finding aids. The range of practice includes the following:
Some institutions are encoding access terms without using the NORMAL attribute to provide a standardized version of the name, relying instead on search engines to find combinations of first and last names within a single tag, or simply encouraging users to be creative in constructing searches on variant versions of a name. Tagging every occurrence of a name may actually mislead researchers or search engines that report weighted results. The frequent occurrence of a name in a biographical sketch, for example, may suggest that a collection is more relevant to a search than the overall substance of the collection actually merits. Or the reverse may happen: a collection containing a wealth of information on an individual may be underreported in search results because that individual is referred to by initials rather than full name, or because the individual's name is implicit throughout much of the finding aid.
The value of encoding access term elements in the narrative and container list sections of finding aids is a question that requires more research on user needs and search strategies, the capabilities of search engines, and advances in natural language searching. Ultimately each institution must develop policies on the level to which it will mark up access terms outside of <controlaccess> based on current practice, research value of a collection, and available staff resources. Is it more important to have a few finding aids encoded at great depth, or to have many finding aids online with fewer access points encoded?
Within each of these subelements, generic textual features such as Bibliographic Reference <bibref>, Block Quote <blockquote>, Heading <head>, List <list>, Paragraph <p>, and Table <table> are available. If a tool applies to the entire finding aid, it should be encoded at the end of <archdesc> following all <c>s. If it applies only to one component, however, it may be placed within the appropriate <c>. For example, a file plan may relate to all the components in a finding aid, but an index of correspondents may relate only to a correspondence series.
<bibliography> <head>Bibliography</head> <bibref><title>Annual Reports</title>. New York: National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. 1910- .</bibref> <bibref>Finch, Minnie. <title>The NAACP, Its Fight for Justice</title>. Metuchen, N.J.: Scarecrow Press, 1981. </bibref> <bibref>Hughes, Langston. <title>Fight for Freedom: The Story of the NAACP</title>. New York: Norton, 1962.</bibref> </bibliography>
<fileplan> <head>File Index - Central Records - Irvine Campus</head> <note><p>Seventh revision: March 1985</p></note> <table> <tgroup cols="2"> <tbody> <row> <entry>100-149</entry> <entry>University Affairs</entry> </row> <row> <entry>150-299</entry> <entry>Personnel</entry> </row> <row> <entry>300-399</entry> <entry>Administrative Activities and Operations</entry> </row> [...] </tbody> </tgroup> </table> </fileplan>
The element <otherfindaid> describes additional or alternative guides to the described material, such as card files, donor or dealer lists, or lists generated by the creator or compiler of the materials. This element simply indicates the existence of such tools that are external to the finding aid; it does not encode their contents.
<otherfindaid> <p>The donor's card file, which contains descriptions of the individual items in the collection, is located in Box 16.</p> </otherfindaid>
<index> <head>Index of Correspondents</head> <indexentry> <corpname>A.P. Watt & Son</corpname> <ref>47.5</ref> </indexentry> <indexentry> <corpname>Abbey Theatre</corpname> <ptrgrp> <ref>47.5</ref> <ref>55.5</ref> </ptrgrp> </indexentry> <indexentry> <persname>Achurch, Janet</persname> <ptrgrp> <ref>32.5</ref> <ref>32.6</ref> </ptrgrp> </indexentry> <indexentry> <persname>Adam, Ronald, 1896-1979</persname> <ref>32.4</ref> </indexentry> <indexentry> <corpname>American Mercury</corpname> <ref>47.6</ref> </indexentry> </index>
The <relatedmaterial> element encodes information about materials that are neither physically or logically included in the materials described in the finding aid nor are related by provenance, accumulation, or use, but that might nevertheless be of interest to a researcher. A list of related materials might include other collections held by the same repository or by other repositories.
<relatedmaterial> <head>Related Materials</head> <p>Papers of prominent NAACP activists and records of NAACP branches and adjuncts are listed below.</p> <relatedmaterial> <head>Collections of Personal Papers</head> <archref>Ella Baker. State Historical Society of Wisconsin, Archives Division (Papers, 1959-1965).</archref> <archref>Mary McLeod Bethune. Dillard University, Amistad Research Center (Papers, 1923-1942).</archref> <archref>W.E.B. Du Bois. New York Public Library, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture (Papers, 1912-1966, bulk 1942-1948). </archref> <archref>William Hastie. Harvard University, Law School Library (Papers, 1916-1976, bulk 1937-1976).</archref> <archref>Thurgood Marshall. Library of Congress, Manuscript Division (Papers, 1949-1991, bulk 1961-1991).</archref> </relatedmaterial> <relatedmaterial> <head>NAACP Branch and Other Records</head> <archref>NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund. Library of Congress, Manuscript Division.</archref> <archref>NAACP Cleveland Branch. Western Reserve Historical Society. (Records, 1924-1967).</archref> <archref>NAACP Montgomery Branch. New York Public Library, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. (Minutes, 1954-1955). </archref> </relatedmaterial> </relatedmaterial>
The element <separatedmaterial>, on the other hand, encodes information about materials that are associated by provenance to the materials described in the finding aid but that have been physically separated, either by the repository or by some other entity, either before or after the materials were acquired by the repository.
<separatedmaterial> <head>Material Cataloged Separately</head> <list> <item>Selected printed materials have been transferred to the book collection of The Bancroft Library.</item> <item>Photographs have been transferred to Pictorial Collections of The Bancroft Library.</item> <item>Films and sound recordings have been transferred to the Microforms Division of The Bancroft Library.</item> <item>Selected maps have been transferred to the Map Room.</item> </list> </separatedmaterial>
The Other Descriptive Data <odd> element was created to accommodate these occasions. It is recommended, however, that you encode information using a more specific element whenever possible, given the potentially negative consequences of the nonspecific retrieval or display results that may result from use of <odd>.
<odd> <p>Annie Montague Alexander, patroness of the University of California, founded and endowed the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology in 1908. These papers, which the Museum transferred to the Bancroft Library in 1965, consist primarily of letters from Joseph Grinnell, the first director of the Museum, discussing plans for its establishment, the Museum's collecting policy, personnel and expenses, field work, etc. There are also some letters from University officials and other members of the Museum staff, and miscellaneous letters from government officials, collectors and dealers reflecting Miss Alexander's interest in collecting zoological specimens. Related material is to be found in the official records of the Museum, which were transferred to University Archives at the same time.</p> <p>Additional papers received Feb. 1967, have been given the call number 67/121c.</p> </odd>
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