MODS

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MODS Guidelines by Element

<mods:titleInfo>

Use the <nonSort> subelement to store non-filing characters (A, An, The).

<mods:name>

Authority control for names is still being discussed.

If an authorized form of a name contains terms of address (Junior, Senior, etc.) or a date, move that information to <mods:namePart type="date"> or <mods:namePart type="termsOfAddress">.

Use the subfield <mods:roleTerm authority="marcrelator" type="text"> to describe the entity's responsibility related to the resource. Select from the MARC Code List for Relators the most narrowly defined term, within reason, to use as the value. Capitalize the first word of the term.

Previously used terms: Author, Creator, Contributor

Locally defined acceptable terms: Committee member

<mods:genre>

Use <mods:genre authority="aat"> to encode the genre of the resource. Select the most narrowly defined term, within reason, from the Art and Architecture Thesaurus (AAT) to use as the value. All AAT terms are formatted using lowercase.

Previously used terms: annual reports, articles, data, digital images, dissertations, events, finding aids, masters theses, newsletters, presentations (communicative events), press releases, printed ephemera, proceedings, reports, reviews (document genre), scores, texts (document genres), and theses (honors project?)

<mods:originInfo>

Use <mods:originInfo><mods:copyrightDate encoding="w3cdtf" keyDate="yes"> to encode the date the resource was copyrighted. If no copyright date is available, use <mods:originInfo><mods:dateIssued> to encode the date the resource was issued (aka, published, or made public).

Enter the date using the W3C-DTF standard (YYYY-MM-DD).

Use the <mods:copyrightDate> field as the key date (use <mods:dateIssued> if a copyright date is unavailable).

Identify the encoding authority using the encoding attribute.

ETD Date of Acceptance should be encoded in the <mods:originInfo><mods:dateIssued> field.

<mods:language>

Use <mods:language><mods:languageTerm authority="iso639-2b" type="code"> to encode the languages present in the resource.

Select the language code from the ISO 639-2 standard and use the three-letter code as the field value.

<mods:physicalDescription>

Use <mods:physicalDescription><mods:form authority="marcform"> to encode the form of the resource.

Select the value from the MARC Format term list.

Acceptable terms: electronic

Use <mods:physicalDescription>< mods:digitalOrigin> to encode information regarding the creation of the resource.

Acceptable terms: born digital, reformatted digital, digitized microfilm, digitized other analog

<mods:abstract>

Use this field for abstracts, descriptions, and summaries.

IRis ETD records often include HTML tags ("&lt ; p &gt ;") as markup to separate paragraphs. If the tags were simply striped from the field, the result would be a single, over-long abstract, not a multi-paragraph abstract. Keeping only the first paragraph would truncate the abstract and would be considered too much loss of content. Each paragraph in an IRis abstract field sould be striped of any HTML markup and given its own <mods:abstract> field in the MODS record. The order of paragraphs will be preserved in the MODS record. One possible concern with this decision is that repeating the abstract field each paragraph may mislead users into thinking that the ETD has multiple abstracts.

<mods:note>

If possible, use the type attribute to identify the type of note.

Previously used types: comments, provenance

<mods:subject>

Use <mods:subject><mods:topic> to encode all subjects and keywords.

Use <mods:topic> with no authority for all user and staff-generated keywords.

Use <mods:topic authority="lcsh"> for terms taken from Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH).

Use <mods:subject><mods:cartographics> to encode geographic data about a resource. Use the authorities "massgis" or "decimaldegree" for geographic data encoded using MassGIS or Decimal/Degree coordinates.

  <subject>
   <cartographics authority="massgis">
    <coordinates>233789.485474, 896307.234680</coordinates>
   </cartographics>
  </subject>

 <subject>
  <cartographics authority="decimaldegree">
   <coordinates>E 72°--E 148°/N 13°--N 18°</coordinates>
  </cartographics>
 </subject>

<mods:relatedItem>

Use <mods:relatedItem type="original"> for elements that describe the original physical resource. For example:

<mods:relatedItem type="original">

<mods:typeOfResource>still image</mods:typeOfResource>

<mods:genre authority="aat">black-and-white prints (photographs)</mods:genre>

<mods:physicalDescription>

<mods:extent>6.5 x 4.5 inches</mods:extent>

<mods:extent>1 Black and White print</mods:extent>

</mods:physicalDescription>

<mods:identifier>A007395a</mods:identifier>

<mods:location>

<mods:physicalLocation>M180, Box 1, Folder 3</mods:physicalLocation>

</mods:location>

</mods:relatedItem>

Use <mods:relatedItem type="host"> to for collection information. For example:

<mods:relatedItem type="host">

<mods:titleInfo>

<mods:title>Charles H. Bruce photographs</mods:title>

</mods:titleInfo>

<mods:note type="provenance">Photographs donated by Linda Crichlow White, on behalf of Constance Bruce, daughter of photographer Charles H. Bruce, and other family members.</mods:note>

</mods:relatedItem>

<mods:extension>

MODS extension field

Scholarly Objects

Use the Scholarly Objects schema

<mods:accessCondition>

Use <mods:accessCondition> with attribute type="use and reproduction" for use statements, copyright statements, and other general rights statements.

<mods:accessCondition type="use and reproduction">Copyright (c) Leslie Jones.</mods:accessCondition>

Vocabularies and other standards

The first word of controlled vocabulary terms are capitalized. Uncontrolled terms, such as keywords, are not capitalized.

AAT

Use for genres (discussed using mostly AAT terms, with some NEU specific terms to fill in the gaps for ETDs).

Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH)

Use for controlled subjects

Headings should be constructed following the rules in the Subject Headings Manual, available in Cataloger's Desktop (http://desktop.loc.gov)

MARC Code List for Relators

Use for role terms

MARC Format

Use for the physical description of the resource

Acceptable terms: braille, electronic, microfiche, microfilm, print, large print

MODS Types

Use for resource type

Acceptable terms: text, cartographic, notated music, sound recording-musical, sound recording-nonmusical, sound recording, still image, moving image, three dimensional object, software, multimedia, mixed material

W3C-DTF

Use to format dates

References

Outline of Elements and Attributes in MODS Version 3.4 : http://www.loc.gov/standards/mods/mods-outline.html

ETD-MS v1.1: an Interoperability Metadata Standard for Electronic Theses and Dissertations (via NDLTD): http://www.ndltd.org/standards/metadata/etd-ms-v1.1.html

Texas Digital Library Descriptive Metadata Guidelines for Electronic Theses and Dissertations (PDF)