Metadata Standards for Museum Cataloguing

Metadata Standards for Museum Cataloguing

All museums create records to manage and describe their physical and digital collections; Metadata Standards for Museum Cataloguing can help with this process. It describes standards that are used to define the units of information needed to document and manage museum collections.

Metadata for Many Purposes

Using metadata standards can help heritage professionals define units of information for:

• collection and digital resource management,
• description or identification of museum objects for retrieval or security,
• retrieval of digital images associated with the collection,
• documentation of the use or condition of the object, and
• tracking the use or changes to the digital image.

A Resource for Collections Managers

This resource outlines the most important metadata or data structure standards used by museums. The standards are divided into categories based on the main function they are intended to perform. For examples of metadata-related projects, explore this resource and read the section on Standards Research and Implementation Projects.