Abstract
The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of the development of a digital archive for the Min Family Correspondence Collection of the University of Toronto Libraries, the first Korean historical manuscript collection in Canada. This strategic digitization project between the University of Toronto Libraries and the National Library of Korea accomplished the following: content analysis and annotation of manuscripts, metadata creation, and enhanced access to the resources. The results from this paper show that one of the crucial factors in successful digitization projects is building bridges between the two organizations as a partnership. Our main aim in this paper was to build a deeper understanding of how to develop a digital archive for Asian historical manuscripts and to explore how to improve the accessibility of rare historical records.
Keywords
Introduction
Using information technology advances for preserving and accessing rare materials, many institutions such as libraries, museums, and archives have undertaken digitization projects. Over the years, libraries have engaged in numerous initiatives to add to their holdings, and with technological advances, more effort has been made to digitize in order to both to increase access, and to help with preservation efforts. These digitization initiatives have also had the added benefit of helping to strengthen relationships between libraries and the communities they serve. Thus, digitization allows the possibility for the discovery and use of rare and special collections to a greater extent than for general collections. Without digitization, rare and special collections could remain obscure and hidden (International Federation of Library Association (IFLA), 2014).
According to Taking Our Pulse: The OCLC Research Survey of Special Collections and Archives, an OCLC report that provides a thorough, evidence-based appraisal of the state of special collections in the United States and Canada, only 15% of printed volumes are not in online catalogs, while 44% of archives and manuscripts are not (Dooley and Luce, 2010). In 2006, the Library of Congress (LC) organized a team of researchers to begin studying future bibliographic control and in 2008 published a final report, On the Record: Report of the Library of Congress Working Group on the Future of Bibliographic Control. The report recommends five items that the library should focus on in the future. Among them, the second recommendation involves accessibility of rare, unique, and special hidden materials. In particular, this recommendation suggests that cataloging should differ, depending on the type of rare material (LC, 2008).
Diverse manuscripts in different forms and languages have been produced in the past, and these are considered important foundations of information for countries’ histories and cultures. A manuscript is any text, in handwriting, in any field of intellectual endeavor (Cornish, 1970). Ishvari (1993) defines a manuscript as a written document made by hand, in contrast to being printed or copied in some other way. Manuscripts exist in a variety of forms, languages and scripts, covering a wide range of subject matters (Sahoo and Mohanty, 2015). Historical manuscripts are valuable objects of cultural heritage, and digitizing this cultural heritage is a rapidly-expanding field that is crucial for preserving and maintaining rare historical records and leveraging future research by allowing easy access to and navigation of these documents from remote locations. Institutions across the globe are digitizing rare manuscripts in hopes of preserving them and making them available to researchers. In this sense, it is valuable to figure out how to develop a digital archive of historical manuscripts, and to explore how to expand the accessibility of rare historical records.
Considerable ongoing efforts for digitizing Asian historical manuscripts have been conducted in various parts of Asia at different times and in different settings. Haddad (2000) provides background on the development of the rare books and manuscripts collection at the National Library of Australia and describes collections of scarce and unusual works pertaining to the Asia-Pacific area. He states that the rare and special collections will provide an invaluable legacy to scholarship this century and beyond. Kumar and Shah (2004) explain the digitization of UNESCO project entitled, “The Memory of the World” that began in 1993 and the manuscript digitization pilot project, for rare and brittle books, entitled, “Down Memory Lane” at the National Library of India. The authors discuss in detail the process of digitizing manuscripts and present suggestions on various issues of manuscript digitization. As another example in India, Ramana (2005) provides an overview of the India’s largest and old manuscript collections. In his paper, he presents the methods of digitization of manuscripts at the National Library of India and stresses the value of digital preservation. Lertratanakehakarn (2014) discusses the digital preservation and the organizations for creating, storing, and digitizing palm-leaf manuscripts in Thailand. The author addresses that the palm-leaf manuscripts should be preserved in the digital form for long-term use throughout their lifecycle, for the purpose of education, preservation, and research for future generations as the cultural heritage. This paper also examines the process of a digital preservation plan for palm-leaf manuscripts. Although there are many literature reviews discussing the digitization process of Asian rare manuscripts or the importance of digitizing Asian rare manuscripts, few works have appeared on digitizing projects of Asian rare manuscripts or Korean historical manuscripts in cooperation with international organizations. For this reason, we consider the elaboration of this topic as crucial and beneficial to society.
This paper intended to provide an overview of the development of a digital archive for the Min Family Correspondence Collection of the University of Toronto, the first Korean historical manuscript collection in Canada. The Min family is a well-known one in Korean history and included the following two famous historical figures from this family who had a significant influence on Korean history: (1) Queen Min (1851–1895) – wife of King Kojong (1852–1919), the 26th King of the Chosŏn dynasty, and (2) Min Yŏng-hwan (1861–1905), a civil minister and a patriotic martyr in the late Chosŏn dynasty who protested against the Ŭlsa Treaty (also known as the Japan–Korea Treaty), which deprived Korea of its diplomatic sovereignty and made Korea a virtual protectorate of Japan in 1905. For these reasons, original source materials on this family are especially worth preserving. Through this paper, we expect to build a deeper understanding of the nature of a digital archive for Asian historical manuscripts, and to explore the accessibility of rare historical records. In addition, most recent digitization studies have focused on the use of digitized data and open access. Therefore, we have concentrated on the digitization process itself. In particular, we have proposed a method to classify irregular manuscript types by using metadata and accession numbers, so this paper involved the components of metadata, as it turned out that the content of the document in the process of digitization was more political than had been expected.
The ultimate goal of the project was to provide a digital copy of a unique resource and easy access to valuable historical documents for both organizations – the University of Toronto Libraries, and the National Library of Korea. Thus, the major practical contribution of the present research is that it provides an empirical method for the actual job of the digitization process for Korean primary source collections or historical manuscript collections through cooperation between the two organizations. Therefore, many other projects in similar environments may infer similar implications from most of our findings, and this will allow them to design their digitization process accordingly.
Background of the Min Family Correspondence Collection
The Min Family Correspondence Collection consists of rare Korean manuscripts received by the University of Toronto Libraries in 2006 as a donation from Mr Min Sŏk-hong and his wife, Mrs Yun Kyŏng-nam. Min Sŏk-hong inherited the materials from his father, Min Kyŏng-hwi (1903–1978), who in turn inherited them from his mother, Yu Chin-gyŏng (1879–1973) (Kim and Lee, 2015: 4). The Min family included many government officials of high rank, including the Queen of Korea herself. Therefore, when donating these materials, the donors hoped that they would be used as historical data, even though the data was personal, to be made available to academic institutions and researchers.
The Min Family Correspondence Collection consists of 883 physical items (260 envelopes containing 623 pieces of correspondence). Most of the materials in the collection are letters, although there are also other types of materials, such as official gazettes and purchase and sale documents. The letters were all in similar envelopes and sheets, and the writing system used was Chinese cursive script that is not used in Korea nowadays.
Figure 1 shows the initial storage status of the Min family’s historical manuscript collection. Currently, the archives are preserved in letter-sized (8.5” × 11”) folders, and documents that do not fit into these folders are stored in oversize folders. These acid-free folders have unique identifier reference numbers and information sheets in acid-free archival boxes. Figures 2 and 3 show examples of the types of letters and envelopes in the collection.
Initial storage status of the Min family’s historical manuscript collection at the University of Toronto Libraries.
Sample letters.
Sample envelopes.
The donors made the decision to donate the private letters to the library, even though they contained sensitive private information of the family, because they are valuable original period source documents that could be useful for scholars in fields such as local history, history of land tenure, rural sociology, and family history. However, when the National Library of Korea annotated the digitized contents in detail, it was found that the collection mainly contains politically-related subjects, such as the Kapsin Chŏngbyŏn (also known as the Kapsin Coup) and political requests to the Min family, which was at the core of power.
Most of the letters were written between February 1884 and July 1885. The major historical event in that period was the Kapsin Coup. However, the letters themselves do not have dates (Kim and Lee, 2015: 14–15). A Korean scholar, Yŏng-ho Ch’oe describes the Kapsin Coup as follows: On the night of December 4, 1884, a small group of reform-minded Koreans staged a bloody coup to seize political power in hopes of instituting drastic reforms that would transform Korea into a modern state. However, unfortunately for Korea, these reformers only remained in power for three days, and their attempted coup ended in disastrous failure. This incident is known in Korea as the Kapsin Chŏngbyŏn, the political disturbance of the year Kapsin (1884). (Ch’oe, 1982: 109)
These letters describing one of the most chaotic political incidents in Korean history are powerful and important primary sources for researchers. Letters, as private records, can carry a particular view of a historical event or period that may not be found in other primary sources, in addition to offering insight into the cultural landscape of the time.
This digitization project is a good example of adding value to the digitized collection by making the collection more useable through annotations.
Challenges to digitizing the Min Family Correspondence Collection
Organizations have developed practical guidelines for planning digitization projects (IFLA, 2014). The IFLA (2014) in particular developed strategies for planning and implementing digitization projects and published a set of guidelines titled, Guidelines for Planning the Digitization of Rare Book and Manuscript Collections. The guidelines made recommendations under the following eight key aspects: designing the project; selection of originals; workflow for creating the collection; metadata; display; dissemination, promotion, and reuse; evaluation; and long-term preservation of the digital collection. In particular, the guidelines encourage librarians and archivists to “leverage digitization projects to provide access to collections that have been hidden in the past” (IFLA, 2014). In the Min Family Collection digitization project, the guidelines were used as an essential reference guide for designing the process of the digitization project from the initial strategies and throughout the whole process.
Planning the digitization project
Developing a digitization project generally involves several steps, such as inspecting and preparing the materials for digitization, digitizing the material, and post-capture image processing and system ingesting (IFLA, 2014). Digitizing the Min Family Correspondence Collection was successful because the two project institutions thoroughly considered the above steps throughout the project.
For years, the University of Toronto Libraries had explored finding an external partner in South Korea to cooperate with in digitizing the Min Family Correspondence Collection – mainly in financial aspects and in analyzing the contents of the collection. After initial trouble in finding an appropriate partner for several years, in 2012 the University of Toronto Libraries approached the National Library of Korea. Through ongoing communication with the National Library of Korea, the University of Toronto Libraries arranged a visit of a National Library research team consisting of rare material experts to conduct research on the University’s rare Korean materials. Korean Studies collections overseas are rather limited compared to collections in other East Asian countries such as Japan and China. However, as the study of Korea in North America and other countries around the world has become more active, the importance of Korean materials as research sources for Korean Studies is growing. The National Library of Korea has been undertaking a project of examining, collecting, and digitizing Korea-related materials located overseas in order to preserve Korea’s heritage (Lee, 2012). In addition, the National Library of Korea has already performed digitization projects in the United States with the Library of Congress, Columbia University, Harvard-Yenching Library, and Yale University Library. The materials digitized during this time were traditional stitched binding monographs. However, the Min Family Correspondence Collection at the University of Toronto consisted of envelopes and sheets. Therefore, the process of digitization for these rare and special types of materials is not an easy task in order to preserve them.
After reviewing the rare manuscripts, the National Library of Korea agreed to fund the University of Toronto Libraries’ digitization of the collection, and to analyze the collection’s contents. Before the two institutions signed the cooperative project agreement, representatives of the two parties spent eight months evaluating and negotiating project terms. During the negotiation period, they discussed the project schedule, workflow, and digitization standards, and the delivery of the digitized files. In this agreement between the two organizations, the following tasks were involved to create digital copies: (1) creation of a database for the resources, (2) verification of exact letters and envelopes, describing and recording anomalies, (3) scanning of each resource, (4) movement and storage of digital images to server, (5) creation of a metadata to link basic descriptions to images, and (6) editing and organization of files.
The two institutions agreed to cooperate according to their respective fields of expertise, and staff members of the two libraries communicated regularly to review the project’s progress. During the life of the project, the National Library of Korea was responsible for funding the digitization project and publishing an annotated catalog of the Min Family’s Correspondence Collection. The University of Toronto Libraries were responsible for organizing, implementing, and completing the digitization project to produce digital versions of the documents onsite, as well as transferring the scanned images to hard drive, sending the hard drive to the National Library of Korea, and creating core metadata. This international collaborative project has benefits for each party. For the National Library of Korea, it is valuable to have a digital copy of a unique resource, and easy access to valuable historical documents that would otherwise not be available to them or to scholars in Korean studies. In addition, it presented an opportunity to add unique resources to the University of Toronto Libraries’ digital collection to support scholars and students in Korean Studies, and research at the university and in the community.
Digitization – registering accession codes
Based on an interview with the donors in 2006 by the Korea Studies librarian at the time, in developing a metadata structure for the Min Family Correspondence Collection, the University of Toronto Libraries first sorted the donated materials into two categories: (1) landlord and tenant farmer correspondence sets, and (2) personal letter and envelope sets. The donors strongly believed that most of the materials were letters between a landlord and tenant farmers. For each category, subcategories were created. For the landlord and tenant farmer correspondence sets, subcategories were: (1) envelopes with more than one letter in them, (2) envelopes containing both letters and inner envelopes that also contain letters, (3) letters with writing on both sides, (4) envelopes with writing on both sides, (5) letters without an envelope, and (6) envelopes without letters. For the personal letter and envelope sets, two subcategories were created: (1) a general personal collection and (2) personal letters without an envelope. In this paper, we explain how the accession number system was developed to best categorize materials, and report the findings from evaluating the digitization process by examining the quality and extensibility of mandatory metadata elements.
Subsequently, as a first step in creating metadata elements, the following core structural metadata elements were collected: box number, accession code, material type (letter or envelope), letter and envelope pairs, measurements (length and width), and additional notes (see Table 1).
An example of the core structural metadata elements initially collected by the University of Toronto Libraries.
Before considering the letters’ contents, the University of Toronto Libraries determined that preparing the metadata based on physical characteristics was the most appropriate approach and developed an accession number system of unique identifiers that could be assigned to each item in the collection (see Table 2: Accession Number Reference Sheet). Each accession number was comprised of a three-letter prefix (“MFC” for the Min Family Collection), a hyphen, one letter to indicate the type of material (“E” for envelope or “L” for letter), and a three-digit material number: MFC – E – ### or MFC – L – ###. For envelopes and letters that belonged together, the material numbers had to match the envelope numbers.
Accession number reference sheet. (Format of the Min Family Correspondence Collection’s accession numbers)
In the category of the landlord and tenant farmer correspondence sets, six accession number types were created. After reviewing the National Library of Korea’s brief summaries of each letter, it was realized that the initial two categories created – (1) landlord and tenant farmer correspondence, and (2) personal letter and envelope sets – were not appropriate because the letters had been written by various senders such as family members, relatives, friends, and villagers. Within the first category there are six subcategories. The first type is for letters with more than one letter in an envelope. When an envelope contains more than one letter, the letters are labeled with an extra alphabetic letter behind the code material number, and the alphabetic order ascends depending on the number of letters inside the envelope: MFC – L – ###A, MFC – L – ###B, MFC – L – ###C. For envelopes and letters that belong together, the material number must match the envelope number. The second type is for envelopes containing both letters and other envelopes when these inner envelopes also contain letters. The outermost envelope holding the entire set is called E1 (envelope 1). Any envelopes inside E1 have increasing numbers behind the E (e.g. E2, E3, etc.). This additional coding sequence is attached at the end of the whole accession code to indicate which envelope it is. The letters of the entire set all have this additional coding sequence at the end of their individual accession codes to indicate whether they are situated inside E1 but not inside E2, or if they originally belong inside the inner envelopes (such as E2, E3, etc.): MFC – E – ### – E1 (or E2) for envelopes or MFC – L – ### – E1A (or E2A) for letters. The third type is for letters with writing on both sides. In this case, it is indicated in the code with an extra alphabetic letter F or B at the end (“F” for front side and “B” for backside): MFC – L – ### – F or MFC – L – ### – B. The fourth type is for envelopes with writing on both sides. When writing exists on both sides of an envelope, it is indicated in the code with an extra alphabetic letter F or B at the end: MFC – E – ### – F or MFC – E – ### – B. The fifth type is for letters without an envelope. Letters that originally came without an envelope are labeled with LS, where “L” stands for letter and “S” for single: MFC – LS – ###. The sixth type is for envelopes without letters. Envelopes that originally came without letters are labeled with “ES,” where “E” stands for envelope and “S” for single. The accession coding for the personal letter and envelope sets followed a similar pattern, also shown in Table 2.
Digitization process
The entire digitization process took place from 1 April 2013 to 31 December 2013. Except for the physical scanning of the collection materials—carried out by the University of Toronto Libraries’ IT Services—the University’s Cheng Yu Tung East Asian Library, the material-holding library, performed all of the relevant project work.
A total of 883 individual items were digitized, including letters and envelopes, generating 600 dpi, 24-bit color TIFF format scanned images and three types of JPEG files (thumbnails: 100 pixels on the short edge; small: 500 pixels on the short edge; and large: 1000 pixels on the short edge). Each complete object (letters plus envelopes) was assigned with a unique identifier and each scanned image was numbered sequentially (Kim and Lee, 2015: 23).
Designing metadata
The University of Toronto Libraries had no standard policy for cataloging Asian-scripted manuscripts, and therefore, before digitizing the collection, an outline of the basic descriptive elements needed for summary descriptions of the collection’s contents was developed. Although the National Library of Korea did have basic standards for cataloging techniques and metadata elements for Korean rare books, there were no detailed elements and criteria for historical letters. Therefore, several related studies were reviewed to learn about dealing with metadata elements related to letters, such as Oxford University’s Early Modern Letters Online (EMLO) project, and Stanford University’s Mapping the Republic of Letters project, but it was difficult to find appropriate elements suitable for Korean letters. Therefore, the University of Toronto Libraries identified and designed appropriate metadata elements for Korean letters by referring to the elements of International Standard Bibliographic Description (ISBD) as shown in Table 3.
Metadata elements of the Min Family Correspondence Collection.
Since digitization has become a necessity for museums, libraries, and cultural institutions as one way of enhancing public access to materials, assuring the quality of metadata is an essential part of any digitization project (Diao and Hernández, 2014). Therefore, the metadata elements in this collection were evaluated to build a reliable digital collection.
To organize and manage digital objects, libraries and cultural institutions have developed various metadata standards, which are defined as structured encoding tools that describe elements related to the provenance of the data (Riley, 2017). There is a wide range of metadata standards with different focuses by discipline, international standards, and many other pertinent aspects of data sets. Institutions adopt metadata standards based on their local needs, and may group elements in various ways to emphasize themes or functionality unique to their environments.
The quality of metadata that describe digital objects is considered key to successful and effective access to the resources. Many researchers have explored metadata quality measurement in digital projects and identified criteria for assessing the quality of metadata (Guy et al., 2004; Moen et al., 1998; Park, 2009; Statistics Canada, 2002; Stvilia and Gasser, 2008; Thomas and Hillmann, 2004). The quality of metadata records used in US federal agencies’ implementation of the Government Information Locator Service (GILS) was evaluated through quantitative and qualitative research methods based on three general criteria, namely: accuracy, completeness, and delineation of information resource type (Moen et al., 1998). Six dimensions of information quality as criteria for assessing metadata quality were presented as follows: relevance, accuracy, timeliness, accessibility, interpretability, and coherence (Statistics Canada, 2002). In the library community the following criteria for evaluating metadata quality were presented, namely: completeness; accuracy; provenance; conformance to expectations; logical consistency; coherence; timeliness; and accessibility (Thomas and Hillmann, 2004). Furthermore, an information quality framework was proposed using the three quality dimensions of relational precision, intrinsic naturalness, and informativeness (Gasser and Stvilia, 2001). One study provided an overview of the present state of research on metadata quality, and the authors concluded that the three most important metadata quality criteria are accuracy, consistency, and completeness (Park, 2009).
Based on this literature review, we determined that the most commonly used criteria for assessing metadata quality are accuracy, completeness, consistency, provenance, timeliness, accessibilities, and delineation of information resource type. Based on these identified criteria, we examined the quality of metadata elements used for the Min Family Correspondence Collection, aiming to enhance the quality of metadata and improve the discoverability of the collection.
For this project, library professionals with extensive experience in handling Asian historical materials (particularly those written in Chinese characters) or creating metadata in the United States, Canada, France, the UK, and South Korea evaluated the metadata elements in the Min Family Correspondence Collection. Ultimately, eight participants completed the evaluation sheets. Following the assessment, we made comments and suggestions regarding overall impression, accuracy, and completeness of the metadata elements, as well as any special features or uniqueness of the elements. The assessment outcomes showed that overall, the collection’s metadata quality was appropriate.
Based on the evaluation, we added the following three new metadata elements to the existing metadata set: (1) a physical note to describe the color of the paper or seal information if any and (2) subject, which we considered important for both browsing and retrieval. Table 4 shows the revised metadata set with these new additions.
Recommended metadata features.
These elements did not include all the information that might be beneficial to a researcher, but in developing them, we used the summary descriptions as the preliminary records, with the possibility of expanding the descriptions in the future. The unavailability of annotations or translations of the letters, which are mostly written in cursive Chinese script, was a key limitation. In South Korea, very few people can read Chinese cursive script. One of the terms that the two organizations had agreed upon, was that the experts at the National Library of Korea would annotate the digitized material. Since there was no available expert at the University of Toronto Libraries who could translate the contents of the letters when the project institutions were preparing the metadata, they considered this type of collaboration the best approach. After the digitization was complete, the National Library of Korea went through the digitized material to create brief summaries for each item.
In this project, the most important and time-consuming task was to annotate the contents of the manuscripts which were written in Chinese cursive script. In particular, a professional expert was required to read the Chinese cursive script for this job, and to understand the historical background of Korea. Since there were few scholars who could read Chinese cursive script in Korea, the work was carried out over two years, from 2014 to 2015. Through this lengthy period of work, the project partners were able to come to understand the precise time and contents of the manuscripts as they were written.
Open access to the collection through digitization
Once digitization was completed, the University of Toronto Libraries delivered all digitized images to the National Library of Korea. The National Library undertook the analysis of the contents based on the digitized images and metadata provided. The National Library of Korea is authorized by the University of Toronto Libraries to load the contents of this digital file onto its local web sites and/or databases to make the contents of this project freely accessible to the citizens of Korea. After the National Library of Korea completed its examination and interpretation of the contents, its staff added the collection and its bibliographic information to the library’s Korean Old and Rare Collection Information System (KORCIS) (see Figure 4). A union catalog of rare Korean books and manuscripts, including records from 60 Korean institutions and 42 foreign institutions, KORCIS contains over 450,000 bibliographic records and provides access to over 43,000 full-text images. It is constantly being enhanced with new bibliographic and full-text image data. The digitized Min Family Correspondence Collection in KORCIS provides instantaneous access to scholars and researchers in Korean Studies.
Bibliographic record and image of the Min Family Correspondence Collection on KORCIS.
Discussion and conclusions
Many historical books, manuscripts, and other personal documents that may not have been recorded, but circulated among the people, have important value as primary sources for historical research. In particular, personal letters exchanged between individuals may never have been seen by anyone contemporary, and thus are valuable resources for learning about historical customs and ideologies from a distance. Thus, beyond being personal records, the manuscripts of the Min Family covered in this paper are worthy records of Korea’s political issues.
In this paper, we presented an outline of our digitization of the Min Family Correspondence Collection, consisting of rare Korean manuscripts. Through the digitization project undertaken by the two organizations, they identified the content of the collection, completed the creation of the metadata, and greatly enhanced access to the resources. In addition, the role of experts in the process of digitizing rare Asian materials, and in creating the metadata was discussed. Before beginning this digitization project, the manuscripts of the Min Family, the first Korean archives in a Canadian library, were not available as research data, a common problem with rare Asian manuscripts.
Accordingly, the results of this project have several implications. Firstly, private letters as primary sources can provide an intimate glimpse into the effects of historical events on the lives of individuals who experienced them firsthand. In addition, if these letters were never intended to be read by anyone other than their original recipients, their contents may be more candid and revealing. The letters of the Min Family are in this category, and therefore, they provide an insight into the events, politics, customs, and thoughts of the late Chosŏn era. As the letters addressed to Min Kwan-sik were written mostly between 1884 and 1885, during Min Kwan-sik’s tenure as County Magistrate of Kosan (Chŏlla province) and Chief Clerk of Kongju (Ch’ungch’ŏng province), this correspondence collection is considered to be an important resource providing a window into Korean society during this period. Most of the letters are, in fact, asking for favors involving the civil service exam and requesting official positions, reflecting the social milieu – and corruption – of the late Chosŏn dynasty (Kim, 2016). Moreover, the letters are especially valuable primary sources because they are from the Min Family, who were at the center of political power during the turbulent late 19th century in Korea. The digitized collection is enabling historians to understand political and societal trends of the day, as well as the social networks of the politicians, government officials, and literati in the late Chosŏn dynasty.
Secondly, the strategic cooperative efforts of the two project parties in this partnership – the University of Toronto Libraries and the National Library of Korea – to digitize and analyze the collection, are noted as important factors in its success. The ultimate success of any partnership depends on the available human and financial resources. With the National Library of Korea’s funding, the University of Toronto Libraries was able to embark on digitizing the correspondence collection, and to arrange the contents for analysis by the Korean classics experts at the National Library of Korea. In addition, the National Library was able to enhance its union catalog of rare Korean books and manuscripts, KORCIS, by adding the digitized contents and making them available to the public as easily and completely as possible. Thus, this paper provides a model for a successful strategic partnership.
Another noteworthy accomplishment of the digitization project is the Korean annotations to the digitized contents. The project efforts enabled Korean Studies researchers to effortlessly understand the contents written in Chinese cursive script, which was useful because the number of people in Korean Studies that can read such cursive script is extremely limited. For this research, we also evaluated the current metadata elements used by the University of Toronto Libraries and further developed the quality of the metadata based on the assessment outcomes.
Finally, the results of this paper contribute to the field as a whole by sharing the project institutions’ experience as a case study for processing Asian-script historical manuscripts in the West. In other words, this paper can be a very important example for collaborative projects between different countries or institutions in order to digitize Asian-related materials located in other countries. It is hoped that, in the process of such research and digitization, institutions and researchers may be able to use the case study presented here to work together and share information more effectively.
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This research was supported by the Sookmyung Women’s University Research Grants (1-1603-2030).
