`bibo:contributorRole`

[tombaker]

bibo:contributorRole
  definition  [The agent's responsibility in regard to the resource.]
  domain      bibo:Contribution
  range       skos:Concept

See also #100 (comment) for a comparison of proposals.

[tombaker]

On the call, we discussed:

Tom>   The function provided by the agent who made a contribution to the resource.
Karen> The agent's responsibility in regard to the resource.

I still think we need to use a contrib* word in the definition (and use "with regard to"), like this:

The contributing agent's responsibility with regard to the resource.

[annakasprzik]

Once again, I would say "An agent's responsibility with regard to the resource" because the definite article suggests that there is only one. And maybe "A contributing agent's responsibility with regard to the resource". I am fine with using the "contribut-" word stem in properties, even if we do not do it in the class definition. EDIT: Seems like Tom and I posted at the same time. :-)

[kcoyle]

I assert that most people will interpret skos:Concept too narrowly - that it must be a term that has explicitly been defined as skos:Concept. I also am concerned that in the SRAP community there will be members using local language terms for this rather than an IRI-defined list. @osma do you know more about the actual practice? Thanks.

[osma]

@kcoyle I know of at least two practices in Finland.

1. In institutional repositories, special "qualified DC" style elements are sometimes used to indicate roles. These are generally in English. Examples include dc.contributor.author, dc.contributor.editor, dc.contributor.supervisor. This is somewhat ad-hoc though; new roles are sometimes coined without any coordination.

2. In MARC records, which are probably not the primary source of metadata relevant for SRAP, we use Finnish as the cataloguing language but the terms used in subfield $e come from (the Finnish translation of) RDA. For example the Finnish 2017 edition of Tolkien's The Hobbit, translated by Kersti Juva and wonderfully illustrated by Tove Jansson, has these 100 and 700 fields (among others) in the national bibliography Fennica:

100 	1 		|a Tolkien, J. R. R.,  |d 1892-1973,  |e kirjoittaja.  |0 (FI-ASTERI-N)000147928  
700 	1 		|a Jansson, Tove,  |d 1914-2001,  |e kuvittaja.  |0 (FI-ASTERI-N)000045590 
700 	1 		|a Juva, Kersti,  |d 1948-  |e kääntäjä.  |0 (FI-ASTERI-N)000065229  

Here, "kirjoittaja" means author, "kuvittaja" means illustrator and "kääntäjä" means translator. These match the official Finnish RDA terms, so although they are given as only text strings in MARC, they can rather trivially be mapped to the corresponding RDA properties with URIs.

[kcoyle]

@osma 's first example is evidence that my second concern, the use of local text for roles, is an actual case. Where they use dc.contributor.editor SRAP would ask them to provide "role = editor". (Or the equivalent in their language, potentially.) They may not know of (or choose to use) any formal vocabularies for role.

[tombaker]

DECISION (5 upvotes on June 23rd, 2026)

bibo:contributorRole
  definition  The nature of the agent's contribution to the resource.
  domain      bibo:ContributionContext
  range       skos:Concept
  comment  Values need not be formally defined as SKOS concepts; it is enough that they be inferrable to be such.

[tombaker]

<x> :contribution [ :contributorRole [ rdfs:label "editor" ] ] .
<x> :contribution [ :contributorRole "editor" ] .