Documenting Performance and Contemporary Data Models: Positioning Performance within FRBR and LRM

Deborah Lee

doi:10.35492/docam/5/1/2

Abstract

Documents relating to the performing arts have proven a complex and somewhat unresolved part of the data models which fuel modern bibliographic cataloguing standards. The model of bibliographic data known as FRBR (Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records), which is now superseded by LRM (IFLA Library Reference Model), underpin cataloguing standards, yet do not easily deal with materials relating to performance. The article introduces FRBR and LRM, and highlights existing literature which explores these models as related to performance documentation. An exposition of an important paper by Miller and Le Boeuf from 2005 is given, and their model forms the basis of discussion. Three particularly rich areas are discussed through a FRBR and LRM lens: the relationship between theater programs and performance; the relationship between performance and recording; and, whether Miller and Le Boeuf’s solutions can and should be extended to all the performing arts. Considering how performance documentation fits into the key bibliographic models of FRBR and LRM, reflects and enriches the general conceptual questions about “what is a performance?” and the idea of performance-as-document.

Highlights

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The article shows how there is a tension between taking a pure FRBR approach which only places traditional ideas of performance documentation within its structure, and the Miller and Le Boeuf (2005) position of performances being the central unit, which could be seen as a proto-realization of performance-as-document
FRBR is a model, its structure is very much enshrined in a real-world cataloguing; while this paper focusses on FRBR, we cannot entirely ignore the treatment of performance materials in Resource Description and Access (RDA), as sometimes this represents the practical realization of performance documentation within FRBR

Summary

Recommended Citation

Deborah (2018) "Documenting Performance and Contemporary Data Models: Positioning Performance within FRBR and LRM," Proceedings from the Document Academy: Vol 5 : Iss. 1 , Article 2. As libraries hold some materials relating to performance (for example, collections of theater programs), understanding how these materials fit into the dominant library models is useful. For those working with performance and its documentation, the FRBR and LRM models provide an alternative way of modelling the performance world and ask interesting questions about the nature of performance documentation. Three specific areas of performance documentation are discussed, describing and questioning the consequences of Miller and Le Boeuf’s (2005) realization: performance ephemera such as programs, and the interplay between performance document and performance-as-document; the relationships between performance and recordings, in particular how the Miller and Le Boeuf model fits (or not) within current realizations of FRBR; the issue of whether all performance (for example, dance, theater, music) can be treated as one within a FRBR or LRM universe. The article shows how there is a tension between taking a pure FRBR approach which only places traditional ideas of performance documentation within its structure, and the Miller and Le Boeuf (2005) position of performances being the central unit, which could be seen as a proto-realization of performance-as-document

Introducing FRBR and LRM

Analyzing Miller and Le Boeuf

Conclusion