Let me preface this with the fact that I am brand new to the world of TEI
and know next to nothing about the available tags/elements. However, in
archival description, the way we deal with this type of situation is with a
special date field most often referred to as "content date." A description
of an archival unit can have any number of content dates, depending on
whether the person describing the unit thinks they are important and
relevant to note. In short, what the content date does is identify the time
period(s) associated with the intellectual content or subject of the unit
being described. If, for example, you are describing a memoir written in
1840 about the events of the War of 1812, the creation date is 1840, and the
content date is 1812-1814.
~Randy
--
Randy Preston
Project Coordinator, InterPARES Project
The University of British Columbia
Suite 301-6190 Agronomy Road
Vancouver, British Columbia V6T 1Z3 Canada
tel: +1(604) 822-2694 fax: +1(604) 822-1200
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www.interpares.org
-----Original Message-----
From: TEI (Text Encoding Initiative) public discussion list
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Lou Burnard
Sent: 03 April, 2007 3:00 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: encoding creation date vs. date being described
Without thinking about this too much, I can confirm that the <creation>
element is definitely for the date the letter was written, and not the
date of the events described in it. I'd suggest treating the date of
the events described in the same way as any other topic -- for example,
how would you record the fact that the letter described meeting Napoleon
(say)? Are you giving a resume of each letter somewhere? Are you
defining any descriptive keywords in the header? Either of these might
be a good place to record the date of events described. Or, if you think
this kind of access is likely to be very important for your resource,
you might want to define an <index> element for it.
Lou
Holly Hendricks wrote:
> Hi,
> I am interested to know how others encode dates for retrospective =
> autobiographical material when the date that the text was created is =
> very different from the date(s) being described. I am encoding an =
> autobiographical section of a text written at the end of an individual's =
> life. We use the creation date for letters, but for this material I =
> feel that two dates are needed (creation, and event being described) for =
> each section of the text. How are others encoding dates for this type =
> of material?
> =20
> Thank you.
>
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