Martha Yee's comments sent me back to the FRBR report one more time,
specifically to understand better the FRBR definitions of "work" and
"expression." Based one today's reading, I'd question Martha's
assumption that the original release of a film is properly to be
considered as a distinct "work." FRBR specifies that the "work" is
"an abstract entity" which "exists only in the commonality of content
between and among various expressions of the work." The point of the
example given for "work," Homer's Iliad, is not simply that the text
of a FRBR "work" may be uncertain; it is that FRBR "works" by their
nature do not have fixed "texts." From the discussions of "work" and
"expression" (sections 3.2.1 and 3.2.2) it's generally clear that the
original realization of a work is itself never more than an
expression of the FRBR "work," however privileged the original may be
in critical discussions of the "work" as defined by scholars.
That being the case, the points made about motion picture color,
sound, aspect ratio, etc., as being characteristics of the "work's"
content are not in agreement with the FRBR concepts. At most, they
are all characteristics of expression-level content. What's more, the
FRBR report discusses expression differences in fairly fluid terms.
The statement that "Variant expressions in the same form ... will
often be indirectly identified as different expressions because the
variation is apparent from the data associated with an attribute used
to identify the manifestation in which the expression is embodied
...." That "indirectly" is a bit obscure, but FRBR apparently accepts
the idea that not all differences between expressions are made at the
expression level of the description. So again, using carrier
characteristics in the manifestion description to distinguish between
different expressions is still consistent with the FRBR concepts.
Stephen
At 11:38 AM 3/30/2007, you wrote:
RDA - PART A, Chapters 3 and 4<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns =
"urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />
COMMENTS ON THE MARCH 2007 DRAFT
Submitted by: Martha M. Yee
Cataloging Supervisor
UCLA Film and Television Archive
1015 N. Cahuenga Blvd.
Los Angeles, California 90038
323-462-4921 x27
E-mail address: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: March 30, 2007
SOME GOOD THINGS
There are some good things about this draft:
1) RDA finally admits that online resources still have the content
parts of the old AACR2 "physical description," so they can
potentially be coloured, have a playing time, etc., even when the
carrier has changed to a digital one.
2) Some rules pertaining to content (but not all--see below) have
been moved from Chapter 3 to Chapter 4.
3) 4.12.0.3 is evidence that RDA is beginning to take the more
general "if applicable" approach to rules, rather than tying rules
to the old AACR2 "classes of materials," still evident in many other
places in RDA.
That said, there are still many logical and other problems in this draft.
GENERAL PROBLEMS
[MAJOR ISSUE] p. 4, the phrase "considered to be important for
identification or selection" recognizes a logic that is not
recognized by the fundamental arrangement of the rules in RDA, based
as it is on the FRBR tasks. Since the same piece of data can be
important for BOTH identification (for the user looking for a known
work/expression) and selection (for the user looking for
works/expressions on a subject), the fundamental arrangement of RDA
based on FRBR tasks makes no sense. It would make much more sense
to arrange the rules based on ISBD areas, i.e., placing the elements
that tend to identify the work first, then the elements that tend to
identify the expression, and finally the elements that tend to
identify the manifestation.
[CLARITY] p. 4-5 introduces the concept of recording data in
"structured" or "unstructured" form, yet neither of these terms
appear in the glossary. It is imperative that these two concepts be
defined functionally, or catalogers will not understand why the
distinction is being made. How does "structured" form compare to
the preferred form of name for a FRBR entity in the form of a
heading that can appear in an index independently of the
bibliographic record? Is "structured" form comparable to a
controlled vocabulary in that it is intended to control synonyms and
homonyms for keyword searchers? Or is it structured to take up less
space in the display of the record than a free form note would?
[MAJOR ISSUE] In general, these chapters feel like they were
designed to support the construction of pull-down lists for data
entry. This seems like a fundamental misconception of the nature of
cataloging, which is actually a kind of expository writing. Those
skilled in its practice can concisely and accurately describe
anything unusual collected by a library, archive or museum, even
when there are not specific cataloging rules to cover it. This art
of cataloging can never be reduced to selecting from pull-down
lists. The mechanized combination of terms from pull-down lists
evident in the examples in this draft make us sound illiterate.
[MAJOR ISSUE] The length and complexity of the rules for describing
carriers are staggering. Can anyone seriously think that the
metadata folks are going to plow through this?
ELEMENTS THAT ARE CONTENT (CHAPTER 4) NOT CARRIER (CHAPTER 3)
Many of the data elements still listed in Chapter 3 ("Carrier") are
actually content elements, and should be moved to Chapter 4, specifically:
[MAJOR ISSUE] 3.12, colour: For motion picture and television
works, colour is associated with the work, not the carrier. A film
or program is either made in colour or it is made in black and
white. If a colour film is subsequently exhibited (usually
broadcast) in black and white, or if a black and white film is
subsequently colourized, this is a kind of damage to the work that
should be pointed out to users in a warning note, not even treated
as a new expression of the work, damage comparable to publishing an
Agatha Christie novel without the last chapter. It is certainly
content information, not carrier information, as it is fundamental
to the visual design of the work when it was originally released. I
suspect this same argument could be made for all visual works, but
art librarians, map librarians and others should be consulted about this.
[MAJOR ISSUE] Re "colourized," since it is a kind of damage, it
should be treated the same way incompleteness is treated in 3.4.4.5
(of which more below).
[MAJOR ISSUE] 3.17, sound characteristics: For motion pictures,
sound is associated with either the expression or the work, not the
carrier. For sound films, the design of the sound is integral to
the design of the work as a whole; if a sound film is exhibited
without its sound track, it is damaged. For silent films, sound
could or could not be added, so sound is expression
information. Many silent films have been reissued with music tracks
by different composers; each different music track creates a new
expression of the silent film work, and the film shown with no sound
track at all is yet another expression. If a sound film is designed
to have a stereo. track or a quadraphonic track, a release with a
mono. track has also suffered a kind of damage. This may be an
interesting difference between film sound and musical sound, since
the music people seem to conceive of the musical score as being the
work, various performances as being expressions, and perhaps mono.
and stereo. versions of a particular performance as being
manifestations? Not sure, but they should be asked...
[MAJOR ISSUE] 3.18, projection characteristics: For motion
pictures, the shape of the image that is intended to be projected
onto the screen is part of the fundamental visual design of the
work. If the work was intended to be shown in a 1.85:1 aspect ratio
(height 1 to width 1.85) or a 2.35:1 aspect ratio, but it is panned
and scanned or shown full screen with the image cropped, this is a
kind of damage to the work that should be pointed out to users in a
warning note, not even treated as a new expression of the work,
again, damage comparable to publishing an Agatha Christie novel
without the last chapter, since part of the original image is
actually missing. It is certainly content information, not carrier
information.
[MAJOR ISSUE] 3.5.3.3.2 (film length) vs. 4.12.0.3.1 (playing
time): There seems to be a logical inconsistency in considering
playing time to be content related but film length to be carrier
related, since the film length can be translated mathematically into
the playing time. As a related query pertaining to 3.4.2 and 3.4.4,
do we never have expression-linked extent information for works
other than moving images? What about Lubetzky's research at the
Library of Congress in the 1940s that demonstrated the frequency
with which two books containing the same work with the same paging
and different title pages actually contained the same edition (the
same setting of type), and two books containing the same work with
different paging and the same title pages actually contained
different editions (different settings of type)? Doesn't that
indicate that paging in books can be an important clue about changes
in expression (content)?
DAMAGE
[MAJOR ISSUE] 3.4.4.5: Why is there a specific rule for text only
(3.4.4.5) that allows adding the parenthetical (incomplete)? Texts
are not the only type of material that can be incomplete in a
particular collection, making it impossible to report the extent of
a complete copy. Also, if it is possible to input condition
information in parentheticals for texts, why not for other
materials? Logically, this would be the place to put the following
for moving images:
colourized
black and white (if the film was originally released in colour)
full screen (if the film was originally released in wide-screen)
mono. (if the film was originally released in stereo. or quadraphonic)
ARCANE AND INACCURATE LANGUAGE
[MAJOR ISSUE] Okay, I am not a monograph cataloger or a cataloger of
choreographies, but I am a catalog user from time to time. Volume?
Notated movement? Is that the best we can do to try to match our
users' language?
[MAJOR ISSUE] 3.3 and 3.20.0.5: We cannot continue to call DVDs
videodiscs. In the public mind, a videodisc is a different,
obsolete format from that of the DVD. We need to use the language
of our users even when it does not fit into the logical framework we
have set up in which technically DVD is an "encoding format."
[MAJOR ISSUE] 3.12.0.5.2: The AACR2 abbreviation col. should not be
translated as 'coloured' when applied to moving images. There are
rarely used color processes that involve coloring black and white
film stock in order to create a color film, as opposed to the
standard process of using colour film stock to create a colour
film. For moving image users, 'coloured' will imply the use of
those rare processes. Instead, use either 'colour' or 'in colour.'
[CLARITY] 4.2.0.2: The relationship between 'Performed music' and
'Moving image' is ambiguous. If you have a moving image that
records a musical performance, which should you use? Does
'expressed through music in an audible form' exclude cases in which
the music is expressed in audible form accompanied by moving images
of the performers?
[CLARITY] Glossary: 'Audio film reel' is not the language used in
the field. 'Sound track on reel(s)' would be more communicative.
[CLARITY] Glossary: 'Projection' is not 'media.' 'Projection' is
the process of projecting. Use 'Projected media'?
OTHER LOGICAL PROBLEMS
[MAJOR ISSUE] 3.19 vs. 3.20: Cross classification AACR2 style is
creeping back in here. Many things are both video and digital,
specifically DVDs. The glossary definition of video even mentions
the DVD player. Why are DVDs classed as digital when most video
catalogers will be looking for them under video?
[MAJOR ISSUE] 4.18: Awards pertain to work, not expression, don't
they? In our field, at any rate, an Academy Award is awarded to a
film work, not to a film expression (e.g. director's cut).
[MAJOR ISSUE] 4.9.0: The assumption here seems to be that
illustrations appear only in printed texts. What about an audio
spoken word lecture illustrated with musical clips, or a video
spoken word lecture illustrated with video clips?
****************************************************
Stephen Hearn
Authority Control Coord./Database Mgmt. Section Head
Technical Services Dept.
University of Minnesota
160 Wilson Library Voice: 612-625-2328
309 19th Avenue South Fax: 612-625-3428
Minneapolis, MN 55455 E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
