Developing an ontology for Greek mythology
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/EL-02-2017-0030 |
| Pages | 119-132 |
| Published date | 05 February 2018 |
| Date | 05 February 2018 |
| Author | C. Syamili,R.V. Rekha |
| Subject Matter | Information & knowledge management,Information & communications technology,Internet |
Developing an ontology for
Greek mythology
C. Syamili and R.V. Rekha
Department of Library and Information Science,
Pondicherry University, Pondicherry, India
Abstract
Purpose –The purpose of this studyis to illustratethe development of ontology for the heroes of the ancient
Greek mythology and religion. At present, a number of ontologies exist in different domains. However,
ontologies of epics and myths are comparatively very few. To be more specific, nobody has developedsuch
ontology for Greek mythology. This paper describes the attempts at developing ontology for Greek
mythologyto fill this gap.
Design/methodology/approach –This paper follows a combinationof different methodologies, which
is assumed to be a more effective way of developing ontology for mythology. It has adopted motivating
scenario concept from Gruningerand Fox, developing cycle from Methontology and the analytico–synthetic
approach from yet another methodology for ontology, and hence, it is a combination of three existing
approaches.
Findings –A merged methodologyhas been adopted for thispaper. The developed ontologywas evaluated
and made to meet withthe information needs of its users. On the basisof the study, it was found that Greek
mythology ontology could answer 62 per cent of the questions after first evaluation, i.e. 76 out of the
123 questions.The unanswered questionswere analyzed in detail for furtherdevelopment of the ontology.The
missingconcepts were fed into the ontology;the ontology obtained afterthis stage was an exhaustive one.
Practical implications –This ontology will growwith time and can be used in semantic applications or
e-learningmodules related to the domain of Greek mythology.
Originality/value –This work is the first attempt to buildontology for Greek mythology. The approachis
unique in that it has attempted to trace out the individualcharacteristics as well as the relationship between
the charactersdescribed in the work.
Keywords Ontology, Greek mythology
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
While it is true that the internet is the biggest invention of this century, its unmanageable
growth has had a negative effecton information retrieval. There still exist many problemsin
the current search engines. Too many hits are produced that are mostly irrelevant. This is
because search engines such as Google and Yahoo! use statistical techniques,including the
frequency of the occurrence of words, the co-occurrence of words and so on. Even though
some search engines usemanually edited entries, the results also give too many hits thatare
incorrect. This situation needs to change. Information retrieval should be more effective to
make Web searches more meaningful. The solution is Semantic Web. The concept of the
Semantic Web was introducedby Sir Tim Berners-Lee (1998):
The web was designed as an information space, with the goal that it should be useful not only for
human-human communication, but also that machines would be able to participate and help.
The Semantic Web would make the Web more meaningful. Information retrieved on the
Web should be based on semantics,not on syntactics. To enable the computer to understand
Ontology for
Greek
mythology
119
Received7 February 2017
Revised17 March 2017
Accepted18 May 2017
TheElectronic Library
Vol.36 No. 1, 2018
pp. 119-132
© Emerald Publishing Limited
0264-0473
DOI 10.1108/EL-02-2017-0030
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