Genre
Required
Repeatable
A term or terms that designate a category characterizing a particular style, form, or content, such as artistic, musical, literary composition, etc.
Table of Contents
Purpose
- To describe the nature of the content or function of the resource
- To provide a greater level of specificity than Type of Resource using a defined set of values drawn from controlled vocabularies
Guidelines
- Guidance for which Genre terms to use can be found on the work-in-progress Genre + Form + Extent 🔒 spreadsheet
- For all materials excluding audio and moving image (non-AMI), use a Genre that describes what the digitized resource is (e.g. Photographs, Songbooks, Paintings, Correspondence, etc.)
- For audio and moving image (AMI), use a Genre that describes what the sound recording or moving image is capturing (e.g., Interviews, Lectures, Oral histories, etc.) or what kind of sound recording or moving image the resource is (e.g., Demo recordings, Documentary films, Radio commercials, etc.)
- When adding a new Genre element, start by searching within the available controlled vocabularies using the MMS authorities module
- Select the radio button for Authority data search
- Click Select from controlled terms to bring up the authorities module
- Look up the genre you wish to add in the search box
- For non-AMI materials, the order of preference for for adding additional Genre values absent from the Genre + Form + Extent 🔒 spreadsheet is:
- LC Thesaurus for Graphic Materials (LCTGM)
- LC Genre/Form Thesaurus (LCGFT)
- Art and Architecture Thesaurus (AAT)
- For AMI materials, only apply terms from the Genre (AMI) tab of the Genre + Form + Extent 🔒 spreadsheet
- To verify a result is appropriate, click the linked Authorized Term to view the corresponding record in the source authority
- Once you have chosen the controlled term, click the Use this term button
- Do not add Free text values for Genre
Attributes
Primary
Required if Applicable
Used for a repeated element to declare that a particular instance of the element is most important
Guidelines
- Check Primary for one Genre element if more than one Genre element exists for a record
See Also
- Top-level Element: <Genre> for official MODS documentation from the Library of Congress
- Type of Resource for guidelines on adding an element that describes a resource in a more general sense
- Physical Description / Form for guidelines on adding an subelement that describes the more specific physical format of a resource Genre + Form + Extent 🔒 for a draft/work-in-progress reference to inform your selection of a genre term