EHRI presented as a case study on Symposium Metadata Exchange in Mechelen

image
Wednesday, 3 June, 2015
New EHRI Fellowship Programme also invites archivists and curators

On Thursday 30 April 2015, the Vlaamse Vereniging voor Bibliotheek, Archief en Documentatie (VVBAD, the Flemish library and archives association), organised a symposium on Metadata Exchange. The VVBAD, founded in 1921 and representing approximately 3,500 information professionals, is a non-profit organization for professionals working in libraries, archives and documentation centres in Flanders, the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium.

Basics of metadata exchange

Archivists and librarians are more and more confronted with terms such as open access, portals, open data, metadata enrichment, API’s, and sharing of metadata. Databases and online applications are widespread. However, the institutions safekeeping and describing the records are confronted with many questions on best-practices, standards and interoperability of systems. The symposium started with a general introduction to the basics of metadata exchange and the current state of affairs by Karin van der Heiden, a consultant who advises archivists about digital tools and applications for librarians, archivists and museum data managers.

Practical considerations

Afterwards, three cases illustrated how archives and museums can put this into practice. The three cases presented were APex, EHRI and the Zilvermuseum Antwerp. Tim Veken (NIOD, Amsterdam) and Veerle Vanden Daelen (Cegesoma, Brussels) presented the case of the European Holocaust Research Infrastructure (EHRI). All presentations addressed practical considerations on how archival institutions can respond to the trends in the digital world and to the constantly evolving demands of the archive user. What are the pitfalls? Attention was also given to the opportunities the requests for metadata sharing and exchange offer to the archival institutions themselves as these requests often result in a critical analysis of metadata registering tools, standards, procedures and quality control used in the respective archival institutions.

Interest of archivist

For EHRI, the explicit interest of archivists for our project, is heartwarming and very important. Indeed, the European Holocaust Research Infrastructure can only be successful when we are having a dialogue not only with historians and IT developers, but certainly also with archivists and information specialists at all the institutions which preserve, describe and open up the sources for research.

New EHRI fellowship programme

The new EHRI fellowship programme will therefore invite applications not only from historians and holocaust researchers, but also from archivists and museum curators. Soon more information will follow on this website.

On the photo: Q&A time.