Title

As archival material is “unpublished”, most collections lack formal titles and therefore archives staff will usually supply the title. Main source of information: materials themselves, accession and donor records

Content reference:

• DACS 2.3

 Output fields:

• EAD: The <unittitle> element is comparable
• MARC: 245 $a

AS user manual: The title assigned to the resource.

MIT Practice: Most resource records for MIT are at a “collection” level with any description applying to an aggregate of materials. However, since archivists describe at all levels, a resource record occasionally could theoretically represent only an item. Titles also need to be transcribed or supplied at other levels (for series, folder (file), and item components in a container list and standards for all these levels are listed below.

Title is required for resource records at the collection level. At the collection level, the title is usually a concatenation of the creator name and a term describing the form of materials, whether general (papers, records) or specific (correspondence, diaries).

Titles are used in the resource record in three places - all three should match:

• The title describing the resource
• The title in the citation to the collection
• The title of the published finding aid

A title at the collection level has two parts; it is a combination of creator name and a term describing the form of materials.

•  In general: use "personal archives" for faculty (MC) collections

•  In general: use "records" for MIT administrative or office material

Examples:

• John Smith diaries

• Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Office of the President, Paul E. Gray records

• Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Oral History Program, Oral History collection on the Recombinant DNA controversy

• Mildred Dresselhaus personal archives

Capitalize official name of a body or entity, or person, but not the document type. Separate elements with a comma and use a comma after first part of corporate body, but not between the last word in the office and the word "records."

• Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Office of the Provost records

• Jay W. Forrester personal archives [creator plus type of material]

• Oral history interview with Tim the Beaver [no single "creator" so use type of material plus topic]

• Oral history collection on Francis Otto Schmitt [collection of oral histories about one person]

• Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Office of Minority Education records

• Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Oral History Program, oral history interviews on ocean engineering

If there is a set of administrative records created by a person who has a distinct responsibility in a large office, add that name in this way:

• Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Office of the Provost, Assistant Provost Walter Rosenblith records

• Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Office of the President, Paul E. Gray records

Specific form

If the collection consists of specific forms of material use the more specific form name in the title such as: correspondence or diaries

• Theodore Grover collection of autographs, signatures, and images of Massachusetts Institute of Technology faculty members, administrators, and alumni

• Holliday C. Heine student notes

Content reference:

• DACS 2.3.6

If the Archives is the collector or assembler of the collection, use MIT Libraries as the creator.

Use the word “collection” to denote an assemble set of materials.

• MIT Libraries collection on student life

• MIT Libraries collection of websites of student life

Actual title: if a collection is an item with a defined title, use that.

• The Log of the Dorian

  
  

The title of a series may (but does not have to) consist of two parts, a descriptive word and a term describing the form of materials (correspondence, diaries).

Style: use parallel construction, if Series 1 ends in a type of format then use a format for other series titles in the collection also:  (Reports, Diary, Background Material).

Examples:

• Series 1        Personal correspondence
• Series 2        Scrapbooks
• Series 3        Research and writings

Common series:

ADD FROM ARRANGEMENT SECTION

At the series level avoid using the more general “papers,” “records,” or “miscellaneous.”

Use the folder title given by the creator of the collection. For analog folders: if there is no folder title, supply one that is brief and concise.

Examples:

Capitalizations

 Capitalize only the first word of the folder heading unless it is the official name of a body or entity, or the title of a book, movie, or journal article.

 If it is the name of a body or entity, or a book or journal title: capitalize the first letter of all words (except a, an, the, and prepositions) but capitalize the first letter of the title and subtitle no matter what the word. If original folder title supplied by the donor/creator is capitalized and is not the name of a body or entity, or a book or journal title, ignore their formatting.

Examples:

• Office of the President correspondence
• A Peril and a Hope: The Scientists’ Movement in America 1945-47 by Alice Kimball Smith
• Meeting minutes and agendas

Name order:

•  First name and then last name, even if this does not match the creators title
• Example: Written on folder “Campbell, Tony” in AS enter as “Tony Campbell” 

Dates in titles:

This is usually the case when the title is an event such as a conference or meeting. Use for such events when the title of the folder does not match the dates of the materials.

Examples:

• Carnegie-Mellon Symposium, Visual Perception and Cognition in Infancy, June 1-2, 1989
• 1995-1996 fiscal year budget

Numbers in title:

Style: Spell out numbers that begin folder title if from one to nine (except for course numbers). For all other numbers not at beginning of title, use digits.

Example:

• 6.53 Fall 2001
• Two experiments on something (instead of 2 experiments, even if that is original title)
• Experiments version 2

Multiple folders

If you are foldering materials, maybe from a large binder, that fit into more than one folder, folders should be marked “1 of 2,” “2 of 2,” as necessary. Dates should be for the content in each folder.

 Add date span for all folders.

Under Extents indicate how many folders.

Colons

• Avoid using colons in titles, especially for purposes of adding categorization.
• If used by creator keep.

• If part of proper title keep.

See Style Guidelines and Format & Materials for further guidance. LINK

Item level...