Data Structure Standards
Below is a list of metadata schemes in use by various types of cultural heritage institutions,
with links to more information about each scheme, examples of who is using it, and links to best
practices. This list is not comprehensive but it captures some of the more prominent metadata
schemes in use.
Categories for the Descriptions of Works of Art (CDWA)
Maintained by the Getty Research Institute,
Categories for the
Descriptions of Works of Art (CDWA) is a set of
guidelines for describing works of art, architecture, groups of objects, and visual and textual
surrogates found in art databases. It includes 532 categories and subcategories.
Who Uses CDWA?
CDWA is primarily used in art museums and art and architecture libraries.
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Dublin Core Metadata Element Set (DCMES)
The Dublin Core Metadata Element Set (DCMES)
is an internationally recognized metadata standard that includes 15 basic elements used to describe
a wide variety of digital resources.
Who Uses Dublin Core?
Any institution using CONTENTdm (OCLC's Digital Collection Management software) also uses Dublin Core
to describe their digital content. Visit the CONTENTdm product page for a
list of institutions using Dublin Core and CONTENTdm in the Minitex region.
Best Practices
Used by a large number of institutions (including the Minnesota Digital Library), the
CDP
Metadata Working Group: Dublin Core Metadata Best Practices document
provides guidelines for creating metadata records for digitized resources that are either born digital or
reformatted from a physical resource.
For more information about Dublin Core, consider registering for the Minitex webinar
Dublin Core for Beginners.
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MARC (Machine Readable Cataloging)
A numeric data structure for bibliographic description, authority, classification, and holdings data,
MARC (Machine Readable Cataloging) is used for describing bibliographic
materials to facilitate cooperative cataloging and data exchange between integrated library systems.
Who Uses MARC?
Primarily the library community uses the MARC format. More information about MARC can be found on the
BATS Cataloging Rules webpage.
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Visual Resources Association Core Categories (VRA Core)
Developed by the Visual Resources Association, VRA Core
provides categories for the description of works of visual culture as well as the images that document them.
Who Uses VRA Core?
VRA Core is used by the cultural heritage community and used in art department or art library slide collections.
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Encoded Archival Description (EAD)
Encoded Archival Description (EAD) is an encoding standard for
machine-readable finding aids such as inventories, registers, indexes, and other documents created by archives,
libraries, museums, and manuscript repositories.
Who Uses EAD?
EAD is used in archives, museums, and special collections.
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