Is part of the problem that we use published versus unpublished as a dividing line for textual material but not for other types of material? Typescripts or unpublished items produced with a printing press or even Word documents can be coded as "manuscript" though they are not handwritten, but the distinction for other types of material is based on the method of production: manuscript = handwritten, non-manuscript = printed or electronic (see below, and note that electronic notated music is not coded as manuscript notated music). I wouldn't advocate for changing this coding for non-thesis textual typescripts, because researchers are interested in them as artifacts, and the leader code is the only effective way to retrieve manuscripts. But perhaps theses and dissertations could be moved over to the "a" category.
a - Language material Used for non-manuscript language material. Manuscript language material uses code t. Includes microforms and electronic resources that are basically textual in nature, whether they are reproductions from print or originally produced. t - Manuscript language material Used for manuscript language material or a microform of manuscript language material. This category is applied to items for language material in handwriting, typescript, or computer printout including printed materials completed by hand or by keyboard. At the time it is created, this material is usually intended, either implicitly or explicitly, to exist as a single instance. Examples include marked or corrected galley and page proofs, manuscript books, legal papers, and unpublished theses and dissertations. c - Notated music Used for printed, microform, or electronic notated music. d - Manuscript notated music Used for manuscript notated music or a microform of manuscript music. e - Cartographic material Used for non-manuscript cartographic material or a microform of non-manuscript cartographic material. Includes maps, atlases, globes, digital maps, and other cartographic items. f - Manuscript cartographic material Used for manuscript cartographic material or a microform of manuscript cartographic material. Liz O'Keefe Elizabeth O'Keefe Director of Collection Information Systems The Morgan Library & Museum 225 Madison Avenue New York, NY 10016-3405 TEL: 212 590-0380 FAX: 212-768-5680 NET: eoke...@themorgan.org Visit CORSAIR, the Library’s comprehensive collections catalog, now on the web at http://corsair.themorgan.org >>> Bernhard Eversberg <e...@biblio.tu-bs.de> 3/21/2013 4:23 AM >>> 20.03.2013 15:49, Laurence S. Creider: > > Second, I agree that the notion of publication needs reconsideration in > light of a longer consideration of the history of the book from ancient > times until now. I do not think that "anything fit for public reception" > is a workable definition. For our purposes, I think, the question is, "Does it matter?". We simply need a word for the stuff we catalog, and it better be a word that is understood and taken for granted right away. If you think "resource" is the word, and every catalog user is comfortable with it, then fine. But is this the case? Is it not considered catalogese jargon? (Even if considering just the English speaking community.) You see, we *do* catalog lots of stuff these days that is not published in the conventional sense. All of it is, however, made available to the public, in some way or other, or else we wouldn't include it in the first place. So, is not this fact of being "made available to the public" a criterion that we might now simply turn around to mean "published"? Or, in other words, who would be helped if we made a sophisticated distinction, in the catalog, between stuff that is "published" and other stuff that is not, though being available or accessible just as well? For us, I think, a "workable" definition is one that causes us the minimum of work, and esp. so if the effect of it is minimal. B.Eversberg
