Re: FRBR WEMI and identifiers

On Wed, Nov 11, 2009 at 9:36 AM, Karen Coyle <lists_at_kcoyle.net> wrote:

> The second is that the LCSH at id.loc.gov loses the difference between
> subject heading types (topical-150, geographic-151, etc.), and loses the
> meaning of the subheadings when it flattens the multi-part headings into
> their display form (topic--geographic qualifier).

Only part 2 of this is true.

For your example:
http://id.loc.gov/authorities/sh2008115565.rdf

Note the RDF:

<rdf:RDF>
-
<rdf:Description rdf:about="http://id.loc.gov/authorities/sh2008115565#concept">
<dcterms:created
rdf:datatype="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#dateTime">2008-03-14T00:00:00-04:00</dcterms:created>
<skos:prefLabel
xml:lang="en">Italy--History--1492-1559--Fiction</skos:prefLabel>
<dcterms:source xml:lang="en">Work cat.: The family, 2001</dcterms:source>
<owl:sameAs rdf:resource="info:lc/authorities/sh2008115565"/>
<dcterms:modified
rdf:datatype="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#dateTime">2008-03-15T08:10:27-04:00</dcterms:modified>
<rdf:type rdf:resource="http://www.w3.org/2004/02/skos/core#Concept"/>
<skos:inScheme rdf:resource="http://id.loc.gov/authorities#conceptScheme"/>
<skos:inScheme rdf:resource="http://id.loc.gov/authorities#geographicNames"/>
</rdf:Description>
</rdf:RDF>

And, more importantly, note:
<skos:inScheme rdf:resource="http://id.loc.gov/authorities#geographicNames"/>

This is generated for headings that come from 151s:

http://tspilot.oclc.org/lcsh/sh2008115565.marcxml

All in all, id.loc.gov has conceptSchemes for:
topicalTerms, geopgraphicNames, chronologicalSubdivision,
corporateNames, formSubdivision, generalSubdivision, genreFormTerms,
geographicSubdivision, meetings, personalNames, topicalTerms,
uniformTitles.

So it's possible to do a SPARQL (well, in lcsubjects.org,
id.loc.gov/authorities doesn't have a SPARQL endpoint) for all of the
headings that are for uniform titles:

PREFIX skos: <http://www.w3.org/2004/02/skos/core#>
SELECT DISTINCT ?s
WHERE {
?s skos:inScheme <http://id.loc.gov/authorities#uniformTitles>
}

which gives you something like:

http://api.talis.com/stores/lcsh-info/services/sparql?query=PREFIX+skos%3A+%3Chttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.w3.org%2F2004%2F02%2Fskos%2Fcore%23%3E%0D%0ASELECT+DISTINCT+%3Fs%0D%0AWHERE+{%0D%0A%3Fs+skos%3AinScheme+%3Chttp%3A%2F%2Fid.loc.gov%2Fauthorities%23uniformTitles%3E%0D%0A}%0D%0A

Now, as you can see from my list of conceptSchemes, id.loc.gov /does/
in fact specify subdivisions, but you are right - there is no
association between the, say, geographicSubdivision concept and
*what*, exactly, in the resource is derived from it (nor to the
resource it is derived from).  So you could get a list of resources
that are in the topicalTerms scheme that also have a
chronologicalSubdivision, but not specificity as to what you want the
parameters of those conceptSchemes to be.

As was discussed on the id.loc.gov list, there's not really a facility
within SKOS to model that sort of relationship easily.  So I think
there was a decision made to release URIs for the headings themselves
first and then work out the details of those relationships later (a
decision I definitely support).

-Ross.