Author-Supplied Metadata for Music Composition Dissertations in ProQuest

This study analyzes 910 records in ProQuest Dissertations and Theses (PQDT) for doctoral dissertations in music composition completed 2004-2013, representing PhD, DMA, and DA documents from sixty-six institutions in the United States. Focusing on metadata created by the student authors, questions ad...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:College music symposium 2015-01, Vol.55
Main Author: Belford, Rebecca
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Composing
Dissertations & theses
Indexing
Metadata
Online information services
Online Access:Get full text
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Summary:This study analyzes 910 records in ProQuest Dissertations and Theses (PQDT) for doctoral dissertations in music composition completed 2004-2013, representing PhD, DMA, and DA documents from sixty-six institutions in the United States. Focusing on metadata created by the student authors, questions address to what extent works are identified as compositions or scores, how many keywords are assigned and how they are distributed, what subject categories are assigned, and to what degree titles of musical works are represented in the PQDT metadata fields of title, abstract, and keyword. Findings related to the possible impact of author-assigned metadata on findability indicated that the titles of musical works were not consistently included in ProQuest records, leading to a discussion of ways in which students, departments, and institutions can approach increasing discoverability of music compositions in PQDT. Practices such as crafting abstracts of composition dissertations in the form of program notes, consistently describing works as original compositions, and selecting a set of concise yet accurate keywords may ensure that these critical academic and creative documents can be identified and found in ProQuest, and by extension, any other resources that utilize PQDT metadata.
ISSN:0069-5696
2334-203X