The Library of Congress is pleased to make two new vocabularies available as linked data from LC's Linked Data Service, ID.LOC.GOV:  the Library of Congress Medium of Performance Thesaurus for Music (LCMPT) and the American Folklife Society's Ethnographic Thesaurus (AFSET).  The LCMPT is a linked data representation of terminology to describe the instruments, voices, etc., used in the performance of musical works.  The AFSET is a linked data representation of terms that can be used to improve access to information about folklore, ethnomusicology, ethnology, and related fields.  

While LCMPT is relatively small, with fewer than 1,000 entries, AFSET includes more than 16,000 concepts.

Bulk downloads have been made available from the Downloads page for each dataset.   On a related note, a number of bulk downloads - such as those for Children's Subject Headings and Genre Form Headings - have also been updated.

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Please explore them for yourself at

LCMPT - http://id.loc.gov/authorities/performanceMediums
AFSET - http://id.loc.gov/vocabulary/ethnographicTerms

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Contact Us about ID:
As always, your feedback is important and welcomed.  Though we are interested in all forms of constructive commentary on all topics related to ID, we're particularly interested in how the data available from ID.LOC.GOV is used.  Your contributions directly inform service enhancements.

You can send comments or report any problems to us via the ID feedback form or ID listserv (see the web site).

Background:
The LC Linked Data Service was first made available in May 2009 and offered the Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH), the Library's initial entry into the Linked Data environment. In part by assigning each vocabulary and each data value within it a unique resource identifier (URI), the service provides a means for machines to semantically access, use, and harvest authority and vocabulary data that adheres to W3C recommendations, such as Simple Knowledge Organization System (SKOS), and the more detailed vocabulary MADS/RDF.  In this way, the LC Linked Data Service also makes government data publicly and freely available in the spirit of the Open Government directive. Although the primary goal of the service is to enable machine access to Library of Congress data, a web interface serves human users searching and browsing the vocabularies.  The new datasets join the term and code lists already available through the service:

* Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH)
* Library of Congress Children's Subject Headings
* Library of Congress Genre/Form Terms
* Library of Congress / NACO Name Authority File
* Library of Congress / LCC (select schedules)
* Thesaurus of Graphic Materials
* Cultural Heritage Organizations
* MARC Code List for Relators
* MARC Code List for Countries (which reference their equivalent ISO 3166 codes)
* MARC Code List for Geographic Areas
* MARC Code List for Languages (which have been cross referenced with ISO 639-1, 639-2, and 639-5, where appropriate)
* PREMIS vocabularies

The above code lists also contain links with appropriate LCSH and LC/NAF headings.

LC's Linked Data Service is managed by the Network Development and MARC Standards Office of the Library of Congress.


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Kevin Ford
Network Development and MARC Standards Office
Library of Congress
Washington, DC