The systematic organization of knowledge derived from artistic and cultural objects constitutes both an epistemological and practical challenge of considerable complexity. These challenges are not merely technical; they are deeply entangled with political, cultural, and ideological dimensions. In the contemporary context of museological collection management, three foundational concepts emerge as structural pillars: taxonomy, ontology, and controlled vocabulary. These systems of knowledge organization serve distinct but interdependent functions in the structuring, accessibility, and interpretation of cultural information. Simultaneously, they embed and reproduce specific worldviews, epistemic frameworks, and power relations (Baca, 2016; Tuck & Yang, 2012).
The growing critical awareness of the colonial, Eurocentric foundations of conventional cataloging systems has intensified debates about the epistemological assumptions underlying current museological practices. These debates expose how traditional taxonomic and ontological models not only organize information but also perpetuate structures of cultural dominance and systematically marginalize alternative epistemologies, particularly those rooted in Indigenous, Afro-diasporic, and Global South knowledge systems (Smith, 2012; Mignolo, 2011).
Conceptual Foundations: Taxonomy in Knowledge Organization
Generally speaking, taxonomy may be defined as an organizational system that groups and orders elements within a particular domain, using standardized terms arranged in a hierarchy, where each term occupies a specific position within a logical order (Getty Research Institute, 2017). Each term establishes relationships with other elements through parent/child connections, characterized by broader/narrower, whole/part, genus/species, or instance associations. This hierarchical organization is grounded in logical principles of classification that presume the existence of universal categories and stable ontological relationships between concepts.
In art museums, taxonomy organizes collections through hierarchies that articulate relationships such as whole/part, genus/species, or concept/instance, structuring works according to technical, stylistic, typological, geographical, iconographic, and functional criteria. A painting, for example, is classified as a two-dimensional work, then as painting, oil painting, and finally, oil painting on canvas, while a sculpture may be organized as a three-dimensional object, sculpture, figurative sculpture, and marble sculpture. Similarly, a work may be positioned within chronological-stylistic hierarchy as Modern Art, Expressionism, German Expressionism, and finally associated with Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, or within the geographical-cultural axis as European Art, Italian Art, Italian Renaissance, and Florentine Painting. Iconography follows similar logic, proceeding from broad categories such as religious iconography to specificities such as Madonna and Child, as do controlled vocabulary systems that connect artist, school, movement, and work—for example, Pablo Picasso, School of Paris, Cubism, Les Demoiselles d’Avignon. Additionally, objects may be classified according to their original function, as in the trajectory of Applied Art, Furniture, Chair, and Baroque Ceremonial Chair. This entire structure reflects a classificatory model that presupposes the existence of stable ontological categories and universal relationships between concepts that sustain museological documentation, preservation, and exhibition systems.
The distinctive characteristics of taxonomies include the implementation of hierarchies structured in arboreal format, where comprehensive concepts progressively subdivide into specific concepts through logical subordination relationships. Simplicity constitutes a fundamental attribute, manifesting through relatively shallow hierarchies and less complex structures compared to thesauri, frequently devoid of equivalent terms or associative relationships (Hodge, 2000). This structural simplicity aims to facilitate navigation and information retrieval, although it may result in conceptual reductionism when applied to culturally complex domains.
Controlled Vocabulary: Terminological Standardization and Descriptive Consistency
A controlled vocabulary, in turn, constitutes an informational tool containing standardized words and phrases employed to reference diverse ideas, physical characteristics, persons, places, events, and concepts within the cultural domain. Its primary purpose centers on organizing information and providing terminology for cataloging and informational retrieval, capturing the richness of variant terms while promoting consistency in preferred terms (Getty Research Institute, 2012).
Standardization ensures that catalogers consistently employ the same terms to reference identical entities, persons, places, or cultural objects. Enhanced retrieval assists non-specialized users in locating relevant information even when employing synonyms or more generic terms, providing synonymy control to improve recall in document retrieval. The distinction between display and indexing permits the expression of nuances and ambiguities in informational presentation while indexing utilizes consistent rules and controlled terminology for retrieval efficiency (Harpring, 2010).
For example, when registering a marble sculpture, the term “marble” is selected as the preferred term, while variants such as “metamorphic limestone rock” or “marble stone” are mapped as synonyms, ensuring that any search for these terms leads to the same set of records. In the case of iconographic themes, terms such as “Virgin Mary” are standardized, while variants such as “Our Lady” or “Madonna” are treated as non-preferred terms but redirected. For locations, a controlled vocabulary guarantees that “Florence,” “Firenze,” and “Florence” are recognized as the same geographical entity. Regarding persons, artist names follow authorized forms, such as “Pablo Picasso,” disregarding variants such as “Picasso, Pablo” or “P. Picasso.” In the distinction between display and indexing, the system permits public interface display of terms closer to public language—such as “oil painting”—while internal indexing employs the standardized term “oil on canvas.” These vocabularies also structure museological events, such as “Retrospective Exhibition” or “Acquisition by Donation,” ensuring that different descriptions of museological processes are interpreted univocally within information systems.
Controlled vocabularies manifest in diverse structural configurations, from simple lists of unique terms to complex systems including preferred and alternative terms, terminological hierarchies, and elaborate semantic relationships. They may incorporate elements such as synonym rings, hierarchical taxonomies, and thesauri with complex associative relationships, adapting to the specific needs of different cultural domains (Hodge, 2000).
Ontology: Formal Specification of Conceptual Models
In the field of computation applied to cultural studies, an ontology is a formal representation that organizes, in a structured and machine-readable manner, the concepts of a particular domain, as well as their properties, relationships, functions, rules, and restrictions. This means it transforms knowledge normally expressed in natural language—ambiguous and imprecise for computers—into clear, precise models that can be automatically processed (Gruber, 1993). In this context, the objective is to enable digital systems to understand, organize, and operate on cultural information consistently and rigorously.
In art collections, ontologies allow digital systems to recognize and organize information in a structured manner, defining that a work possesses attributes such as title, author, date, technique, material, and dimensions, while establishing relationships between works, artists, movements, and periods, as in the connection between Pablo Picasso, Cubism, and Modern Art. They also formalize spatial and institutional associations, such as the relationship of a work with a region or museum, and model events such as exhibitions, acquisitions, and restorations. Through vocabulary standardization, they eliminate linguistic ambiguities, treating, for example, “oil on canvas” and “oil painting” as equivalents. This structure enables integration between databases from different institutions, recognizing the same work even when described in distinct ways, while facilitating complex queries, such as identifying all works representing the Virgin Mary, produced in Italy between 1450 and 1550, regardless of textual variation in descriptions.
Machine readability fundamentally differentiates ontologies from traditional controlled vocabularies, configuring as processable and comprehensible representations by automated systems through formal languages such as OWL (Web Ontology Language) and RDF (Resource Description Framework). Strict semantic relationships are characterized by rigor in knowledge representation, making them more precise than data dictionaries or glossaries through formal explication of relationships and restrictions (Guarino, 1998).
The methodology for developing ontologies in cultural heritage frequently adopts a stratified approach, distinguishing between foundational ontologies, domain ontologies, and application ontologies. Foundational ontologies, such as DOLCE, provide high-level and transdisciplinary conceptualizations, while specific domain ontologies, such as CIDOC CRM, extend these foundations to specialized areas of cultural knowledge (Doerr, 2003; Masolo et al., 2003).
CIDOC CRM (Conceptual Reference Model) represents an object-oriented ontology for mediation and exchange of heterogeneous documentation from museological, library, and archival collections. It functions as a central ontology for data harmonization, enabling reasoning and computational modeling through modeling relationships between information objects and their physical supports. It permits semantic integration of data from different institutional sources that may have been cataloged with distinct vocabularies and practices (Le Boeuf et al., 2018).
DOLCE (Descriptive Ontology for Linguistic and Cognitive Engineering) constitutes a foundational ontology specifically adapted to the Humanities and Social Sciences, focusing on particulars and explicating conceptualizations influenced by natural language, human cognition, and social practices. It categorizes reality into endurants (persistent objects), perdurants (temporal events), qualities (observable properties), and abstracts (discourse entities), providing a robust ontological foundation for specialized developments (Masolo et al., 2003).
Taxonomy, Controlled Vocabulary and Ontology: Conceptual Differences in Knowledge Organization in Art Museology
In the context of cultural information organization and management, taxonomy, controlled vocabulary, and ontology differ primarily in their degree of formalization, the complexity of relationships they establish, and the specific purposes they serve. Taxonomy represents the most elementary form, based on simple hierarchical structures in which concepts are organized through relationships, being widely utilized to classify and group works, techniques, or styles in museological systems. Controlled vocabulary expands this logic, gathering standardized sets of terms—including synonyms, linguistic variants, and hierarchical or associative relationships—ensuring consistency in cataloging and facilitating information retrieval, as exemplified by Getty Institute thesauri. Ontology represents the maximum degree of formalization, structuring in a logical and machine-readable manner not only terms but also properties, relationships, restrictions, and axioms that define a knowledge domain, enabling computational systems to automatically organize, understand, and infer complex meanings and connections. Thus, while taxonomy classifies, controlled vocabulary controls language, and ontology formally models knowledge, integrating and expanding the functionalities of the first two.
Paradigmatic Examples in Museological Contexts
The Getty vocabularies, including the Art & Architecture Thesaurus (AAT), Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names (TGN), Union List of Artist Names (ULAN), and Cultural Objects Name Authority (CONA), provide specialized terminology for art, architecture, and material culture, establishing international standards for cultural heritage cataloging. The Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH), Iconclass for Western art iconography, and Chenhall’s Nomenclature for Museum Cataloging for manufactured object classification constitute additional examples of structured terminological systems with broad international application (Petersen, 1990; Van de Waal, 1973; Chenhall, 1978).
Cataloging Processes in Museums and Cultural Institutions
Cataloging processes in museums and cultural institutions serve multiple purposes extending beyond systematic structuring, encompassing administrative, preservational, and public access dimensions. The primary objective consists of facilitating discovery and access to relevant information about artifacts and data, even for users without advanced specialized knowledge. Additionally, cataloging creates essential metadata for administration, acquisition, preservation, and collection utilization, including acquisition records, exhibition history, and licensing agreements (Bearman & Trant, 1998).
The Central Role of the Cataloger
The cataloger or iconographer acts as a crucial intermediary between the artwork and the end user, exercising fundamental interpretive function in cultural mediation. The success of information retrieval depends substantially on the quality of interpretive work performed by the cataloger, who must impose formal structure on visual analysis, progressing from general evaluation to detailed analysis of constituent parts. This conscious activity performed by experienced catalogers considers retrieval implications when assigning indexing terms, recognizing that human analysis and interpretation remain essential even in the face of growing use of automated technologies (Shatford, 1986).
Cataloging is guided by standards encompassing data structure, data values, and data content. Content standards, such as Categories for the Description of Works of Art (CDWA) and Cataloging Cultural Objects (CCO), guide term selection and define order, syntax, and form of data insertion. CCO was developed specifically to fill gaps in guidelines for unique cultural objects, distinguishing itself from traditional library standards (Baca et al., 2006).
Decolonial Critique of Traditional Cataloging Systems
The decolonial approach to cataloging artistic and cultural objects emerges as a critical response to the limitations and epistemic violence inherent in traditional knowledge organization systems. This perspective reveals how conventional taxonomic and ontological models continue to reflect and perpetuate Eurocentric epistemologies, marginalizing alternative forms of knowledge and reproducing colonial power structures (Smith, 2012; Mignolo, 2011).
Research and cultural institutions, including museums, anthropology, and archaeology, developed within Western epistemological frameworks with profoundly colonial histories. Western science and its classification systems benefited from the colonization of Indigenous peoples, being employed to “colonize the mind” through imposition of conceptual categories foreign to local cosmologies (Tuhiwai Smith, 2012).
Western knowledge frequently presents itself as “universal knowledge,” available to all and apparently devoid of cultural particularities, concealing its specific origins and its role in legitimizing colonial domination. Data models, ontologies, and controlled vocabularies, while seeking interoperability and standardization, are frequently grounded in concepts and methodologies developed within specific civilizational perspectives.
The prevalence of English language and Anglo-American methodologies in digital and academic environments amplifies particular methodological practices, marginalizing or erasing contributions from other linguistic and cultural traditions, especially from the Global South. This monolingualism in digital knowledge production creates cultural echo chambers that amplify specific hegemonies while delegitimizing alternative knowledge (Fiormonte, 2012).
Colonial data and categories such as “ethnic group” in historical records, while normalized for administrative purposes, reflect a “colonialism-colored vision,” simplifying and distorting the complexity of Indigenous realities. The Western cultural archive, which classifies, preserves, and represents histories and artifacts, contains implicit practice rules that guarantee continued cultural domination.
In the digital context, there remains significant risk of reproducing what has been termed “archival violence” and colonial omissions. In other words, digital archives reinstitute the colonial gaze, perpetuating subordination of colonized peoples and production of distorted truths about their cultures, rather than promoting cultural survival and self-determination.
One need only observe that representation of the “human” in artificial intelligence models and natural language processing is almost invariably based on representation of white, masculine, and European subjectivity, perpetuating homogeneous definition of humanity inherited from the Enlightenment and Eurocentric thought, marginalizing all other cultural variables.
Even when efforts have been made to integrate Indigenous and Western knowledge in artistic and cultural collections, they frequently reproduce existing hierarchies, recognizing Indigenous knowledge only insofar as it proves useful to Western scientists. That is, non-Western knowledge may be included but remains subalternized due to taxonomic and ontological models.
For example, it is common to find in Western museums sacred objects (such as masks or ritualistic staffs) cataloged as “primitive art” or “ethnographic artifacts,” limiting metadata to technical descriptions (material, function) and excluding Indigenous cosmological meanings. Controlled vocabularies, such as those of Getty, reinforce this logic by adopting Eurocentric categories—classifying a “manka” (sacred Andean vessel) as “decorative ceramic” erases its spiritual dimension.
Collaborative projects between institutions and marginalized groups also frequently fail at certain points, as excluded communities are usually consulted as sources, not as authors. Exhibitions about medicinal plants, for example, that highlight only “active principles” (which are only of pharmaceutical interest), ignore some of the fundamental epistemic structures of Indigenous narratives about the forest as a living entity.
Thus, it becomes evident that these practices reveal superficial inclusion, where ancestral knowledge is valid only insofar as it serves Western scientific agendas, perpetuating epistemicide. Alternatives exist—such as the Museum of the Indian (Rio), which co-creates metadata with vernacular terms (“ybyrá” instead of “tree”), or Guna protocols (Panama) that restrict digitization of sacred items—but require effective devolution of narrative authority to original peoples, as Linda Tuhiwai Smith (2012) argues: “Decolonization requires Indigenous control over their heritage, not merely its collection.”
Decolonial Proposals for Taxonomies and Ontologies
Decolonial taxonomies must imperatively reject singular and universalizing categories such as those imposed by Western thought which, by presenting itself as “neutral” or “universal,” concealed its exploitative intentions and legitimized hierarchies. Pluriversality, conversely, recognizes that multiple valid knowledge systems exist, especially those of subalternized peoples. For example, while a Western taxonomy would classify a river as a “water resource,” Indigenous peoples may understand it as “relative” or “guardian of life.” As Arturo Escobar (2007) demonstrates, deconstructing the supposed universality of Western knowledge is essential to combat colonial domination and construct truly plural knowledge, where maps, museums, and metadata incorporate diverse voices. Thus, these taxonomies are not merely theoretical: they are cognitive justice tools that require, in practice, that a sacred Andean vessel be called “manka” (its original name), not “pre-Columbian artifact.” Decolonial reconfiguration demands that metadata be generated to state who is producing resources explicitly and for which specific purposes.
Challenges for Implementation of Decolonial Taxonomies and Ontologies
The adoption of decolonial taxonomies and ontologies faces significant technical challenges, particularly in interoperability between systems and data diversity. This occurs because different institutions commonly use proprietary vocabularies, developed internally or through generic software, that were not designed to communicate with each other. Thus, connecting objects from distinct collections becomes complex, as the same concept may be named differently or organized in divergent hierarchies. This heterogeneity, both in representation and conceptualization, complicates automatic information exchange and the construction of coherent data networks (Hodge, 2000).
For a decolonial taxonomy to function, it is essential to reflect on two central questions: what is considered information, and how to decide which resources should be archived. This is because digital tools are not neutral. The code and methods that sustain these systems carry the values and worldviews of those who developed them, potentially reinforcing dominant thought patterns and normative forms of subjectivity. Therefore, it is urgent to recognize that many of these technologies marginalize Indigenous, local, and other alternative knowledge, and that it is necessary to confront these hierarchies to construct truly inclusive systems.
Ontological self-determination is fundamental because it allows each community to define its own concepts, categories, and ways of organizing knowledge, without depending on models imposed by Western science. Those who have the power to name, classify, and give meaning to things also control which ideas are seen as valid or true. This happens because what is considered “real” or “legitimate” always depends on the knowledge system, culture, and power relations within which it is embedded (Haraway, 1988).
Consequences for Curatorial Practice, Historiography and Museology
Decolonial curatorship requires rethinking traditional divisions between “high art,” “crafts,” and ethnographic objects. For a long time, productions by Indigenous peoples were treated as mere crafts or museum pieces, without recognition as art. Taxonomies are central to curatorial work, as they structure the categories that define what is exhibited and how it is interpreted. When curators adopt decolonial taxonomies capable of reflecting non-Western knowledge systems, the result is more plural exhibitions that break aesthetic and epistemological hierarchies, allowing Indigenous artists and other marginalized groups to construct their own visual narratives.
Rewriting colonial narratives is a fundamental step in recovering histories, languages, and proper ways of producing knowledge. In museology, this means recognizing that museums, collections, archaeology, and anthropology were born within colonial logic, serving as tools of control and erasure. These spaces historically functioned as technologies of colonialism, gathering objects and narratives in ways that reinforced hierarchies of power and knowledge, generating political and epistemological tensions that decolonial practice today seeks to confront and transform.
The emergence of museums and cultural centers managed by Indigenous communities illustrates decolonial museology in practice, often supported by academic partnerships. This movement seeks to guarantee Indigenous protagonism and shared curatorial practices, breaking with models that treat cultures as objects of distanced observation. Ontological self-determination is central to this process, allowing these communities to use their own classification and world-understanding systems, without needing to translate them into Western scientific frameworks. Decolonization in the cultural field may originate both from within institutions and from autonomous initiatives, both being essential for generating profound structural changes.
Final Considerations: Toward More Just Knowledge Systems
Rethinking taxonomies, ontologies, and vocabularies in cultural heritage cataloging is essential to confronting the limitations of traditional models which, under technical and neutral appearance, continue reproducing colonial hierarchies and erasing non-Western knowledge. Adopting a decolonial perspective does not merely mean adding new categories or including symbolic representations, but profoundly transforming the epistemological foundations that sustain knowledge organization systems. This transformation is technical, institutional, and political, as information systems reflect power relations and choices about which knowledge is recognized and valued.
Reconfiguring cataloging processes based on plural and situated epistemologies allows construction of more just and representative systems. However, this path involves challenges, from technical interoperability barriers to institutional resistance and disputes over who has authority to define what constitutes knowledge. The future of decolonial cultural cataloging depends on the capacity to create collaborative methodologies that integrate different forms of knowledge, without forcing these differences to fit into universalizing models.
The greatest challenge lies in balancing the need for technical standards—fundamental for information circulation and discovery—with respect for epistemological diversity. This requires flexible systems capable of sustaining multiple ontologies while simultaneously guaranteeing democratic access to knowledge. Cataloging cultural heritage is never a neutral task; it is always a political act that defines which histories, knowledge, and modes of existence are recognized. Therefore, cultural professionals must assume responsibility for constructing more just systems, based on critical reflection, collective work, and commitment to structural transformation.
Baca, M. (Ed.). (2016). Introduction to metadata. Getty Research Institute.
Baca, M., Harpring, P., Lanzi, E., McRae, L., & Whiteside, A. (2006). Cataloging cultural objects: A guide to describing cultural works and their images. American Library Association.
Bearman, D., & Trant, J. (1998). Unifying our cultural memory: Could electronic environments bridge the historical accidents that fragment cultural collections? In Museums and the Web 1998: Proceedings (pp. 141-150). Archives & Museum Informatics.
Cameron, F., & Robinson, H. (2007). Digital knowledgescapes: Cultural, theoretical, practical, and usage issues facing museum collection databases in a digital epoch. In F. Cameron & S. Kenderdine (Eds.), Theorizing digital cultural heritage (pp. 165-192). MIT Press.
Chenhall, R. G. (1978). Nomenclature for museum cataloging. American Association for State and Local History.
Christen, K. (2011). Opening archives: Respectful repatriation. American Archivist, 74(1), 185-210.
Clavir, M. (2002). Preserving what is valued: Museums, conservation, and First Nations. University of British Columbia Press.
Dewey, M. (1876). A classification and subject index for cataloguing and arranging the books and pamphlets of a library. Amherst College.
Doerr, M. (2003). The CIDOC conceptual reference model: An ontological approach to semantic interoperability of metadata. AI Magazine, 24(3), 75-92.
Escobar, A. (2007). Worlds and knowledges otherwise: The Latin American modernity/coloniality research program. Cultural Studies, 21(2-3), 179-210.
Fiormonte, D. (2012). Towards a cultural critique of the digital humanities. Historical Social Research, 37(3), 59-76.
Gangemi, A., Guarino, N., Masolo, C., Oltramari, A., & Schneider, L. (2002). Sweetening ontologies with DOLCE. In Knowledge engineering and knowledge management: Ontologies and the semantic web (pp. 166-181). Springer.
Getty Research Institute. (2012). Categories for the description of works of art. J. Paul Getty Trust.
Getty Research Institute. (2017). Art & Architecture Thesaurus Online. J. Paul Getty Trust.
Gilliland, A. J. (2016). Setting the stage. In M. Baca (Ed.), Introduction to metadata (3rd ed., pp. 1-19). Getty Research Institute.
Gruber, T. R. (1993). A translation approach to portable ontology specifications. Knowledge Acquisition, 5(2), 199-220.
Guarino, N. (1998). Formal ontology and information systems. In Proceedings of FOIS’98 (pp. 3-15). IOS Press.
Guillem, A., Clavaud, F., & Alves, D. (2020). OntoME: Ontology management environment for digital humanities. In Digital Humanities 2020: Conference Abstracts (pp. 234-237). University of Ottawa.
Haraway, D. (1988). Situated knowledges: The science question in feminism and the privilege of partial perspective. Feminist Studies, 14(3), 575-599.
Harpring, P. (2010). Introduction to controlled vocabularies. Getty Research Institute.
Heath, T., & Bizer, C. (2011). Linked data: Evolving the web into a global data space. Morgan & Claypool.
Hillmann, D. (2005). Metadata quality: From evaluation to augmentation. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly, 40(3-4), 5-24.
Hillmann, D., & Westbrooks, E. L. (Eds.). (2004). Metadata in practice. American Library Association.
Hodge, G. (2000). Systems of knowledge organization for digital libraries. Digital Library Federation.
Le Boeuf, P., Doerr, M., Ore, C. E., & Stead, S. (2018). Definition of the CIDOC Conceptual Reference Model. CIDOC CRM Special Interest Group.
Lynch, C. (2002). Digital collections, digital libraries and the digitization of cultural heritage information. In Proceedings of the 2nd ACM/IEEE-CS joint conference on Digital libraries (pp. 3-8). ACM Press.
Masolo, C., Borgo, S., Gangemi, A., Guarino, N., & Oltramari, A. (2003). WonderWeb deliverable D18: Ontology library. Laboratory for Applied Ontology.
Mignolo, W. D. (2010). Desobediencia epistémica: Retórica de la modernidad, lógica de la colonialidad y gramática de la descolonialidad. Ediciones del Signo.
Mignolo, W. D. (2011). The darker side of western modernity: Global futures, decolonial options. Duke University Press.
Mignolo, W. D., & Vázquez, R. (2013). Decolonial aesthesis: Colonial wounds/decolonial healings. Social Text, 31(2), 15-38.
Nadasdy, P. (1999). The politics of TEK: Power and the “integration” of knowledge. Arctic Anthropology, 36(1-2), 1-18.
Noble, S. U. (2018). Algorithms of oppression: How search engines reinforce racism. NYU Press.
Petersen, T. (1990). Developing a new thesaurus for art and architecture. Library Trends, 38(4), 644-658.
Pratt, M. L. (1992). Imperial eyes: Travel writing and transculturation. Routledge.
Risam, R. (2019). New digital worlds: Postcolonial digital humanities in theory, praxis, and pedagogy. Northwestern University Press.
Santos, B. de S. (2007). Beyond abyssal thinking: From global lines to ecologies of knowledges. Review, 30(1), 45-89.
Shatford, S. (1986). Analyzing the subject of a picture: A theoretical approach. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly, 6(3), 39-62.
Smith, L. T. (2012). Decolonizing methodologies: Research and indigenous peoples (2nd ed.). Zed Books.
Stoler, A. L. (2002). Colonial archives and the arts of governance. Archival Science, 2(1-2), 87-109.
Tuck, E., & Yang, K. W. (2012). Decolonization is not a metaphor. Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education & Society, 1(1), 1-40.
Tuhiwai Smith, L. (2012). Decolonizing methodologies: Research and indigenous peoples (2nd ed.). Zed Books.
Van de Waal, H. (1973). ICONCLASS: An iconographic classification system. North-Holland Publishing Company.
Weinberger, D. (2007). Everything is miscellaneous: The power of the new digital disorder. Times Books.