SIG CMR Classification and Metadata Research
What is SIG CMR?
SIG CMR is a special interest group in the Association for Information Science and Technology (ASIS&T) focused on classification and metadata research. Because all of information science relies on metadata, our SIG is relevant to all ASIST members, and all are welcome to join us!
What does SIG CMR study?
SIG CMR studies the fundamental principles, underlying processes, and analytic constructs of classification schemes, metadata, and procedures by humans or automata.
Metadata can be seen as the constituent parts of classification schemes, going beyond classification to include information found in systems for identification, discovery, access, use, categorization, description, and management.
In this way, SIG CMR is concerned with the ethical and efficient organization of information writ large, and includes topics as diverse as access and retrieval, thesaurus construction, classification of information in any form, and testing and evaluating the effectiveness of these products. It is also concerned with the ability to develop abstractions from perceived reality.
Theoretical emphases include, but are not limited to: cognition, grouping and organization of groupings, and linguistics.
Metadata is all around us
SIG CMR acknowledges that none of the technologies that garner headlines today, including AI, data science, social media, and others, can exist without metadata.
Why is there a platypus on your website?
The platypus, or Ornithorhynchus anatinus, is a notoriously difficult animal to classify because it shares many properties with mammals but also lays eggs and has a duck-bill.
Because of these unique properties, the platypus is grouped with echidnas in the order of mammals known as monotremes. SIG CMR loves considering these difficult classification decisions and the processes used to make and reflect them.