I agree. The field of activity is "War crimes" or "Punk rock music." What you
actually do in those fields is specified in 374 ("College teachers" "Music
critics"). I don't think subdivisions such as "History and criticism" or "Study
and teaching" are necessarily wrong, but I don't think they're necessary
(unless, as Sara points out, your field of study is the study and teaching of a
particular topic). I'm also not saying that subdivisions are never necessary.
For example, I've frequently added fields of activity for historians
specializing in Ancient Greece, and I do use "Greece-History" and possibly a
subdivision even more specific depending on their specialty.
Bob
Robert L. Maxwell
Ancient Languages and Special Collections Cataloger
6728 Harold B. Lee Library
Brigham Young University
Provo, UT 84602
(801)422-5568
"We should set an example for all the world, rather than confine ourselves to
the course which has been heretofore pursued"--Eliza R. Snow, 1842.
From: Resource Description and Access / Resource Description and Access
[mailto:RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA] On Behalf Of Layne, Sara
Sent: Thursday, November 14, 2013 12:10 PM
To: RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA
Subject: Re: [RDA-L] The meaning of 372 Field of Activity
I think what we may have here is an interesting example of the issue of
"aboutness" vs. "is-ness" as it applies to people (or any Group 2 entity),
rather than to resources.
And we do seem to have conflated the two within Field of Activity.
If one uses "Study and teaching" to try to make the distinction, what happens
when someone's research area*is* the study and teaching of a particular topic?
Rather than the topic itself?
Sara Shatford Layne
Cataloger (Retired but still interested in these problems)
________________________________
From: Resource Description and Access / Resource Description and Access
[RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA] on behalf of Adam Schiff
[asch...@u.washington.edu]
Sent: Thursday, November 14, 2013 10:56 AM
To: RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA<mailto:RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA>
Subject: Re: [RDA-L] The meaning of 372 Field of Activity
You can also add subdivisions to main headings to clarify the context. For
example: War crimes--Study and teaching or Genocide--History or many other ways
to be more specific. I believe that LC is going to be making --Law and
legislation available for use under crimes as well. See the announcement at
http://www.loc.gov/catdir/cpso/crime-law-and-legislation.pdf
Adam
From: Robert Bratton<mailto:rbrat...@law.gwu.edu>
Sent: Thursday, November 14, 2013 5:35 AM
To: RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA<mailto:RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA>
Subject: Re: [RDA-L] The meaning of 372 Field of Activity
Field of activity is pretty broadly defined in RDA 9.15 as a: "field of
endeavour, area of expertise, etc., in which a person is engaged or was
engaged." You could propose that Field of endeavour and Area of expertise be
two separate data elements, but for now they are lumped together.
Being in a law library I have run into this issue because legal academics often
write about unsavory topics. When I put terms like "Rape" or "War crimes" or
"Family violence" in the Field of activity data element I often pause and
think, "Wait, am I making it sound like this person is a perpetrator of these
things?"
Thus:
372 $a War crimes $a Genocide $2 lcsh
374 $a Law teachers $a College teachers $a Authors $2 lcsh
and
372 $a War crimes $a Genocide $2 lcsh
374 $a War criminals $a Generals $2 lcsh
For the punk rock example you could also have:
372 $a Punk rock music $2 lcsh
374 $a Punk rock musicians $2 lcsh
and
372 $a Punk rock music--History and criticism $2 lcsh
374 $a Music critics $2 lcsh
Robert
--
Robert Bratton
Cataloging Librarian
George Washington University Law Library
Washington, DC 20052
On Thu, Nov 14, 2013 at 7:33 AM, Moore, Richard
<richard.mo...@bl.uk<mailto:richard.mo...@bl.uk>> wrote:
Ricardo
All you are doing with "372 Punk rock music", is expressing that the person has
that field of activity. It's the 374 that tells you their occupation, in
relation to that field:
372 $a Punk rock $2 lcsh
372 $a Punk rock musicians $2 lcsh
or
372 $a Punk rock $2 lcsh
372 $a Music critics $2 lcsh
and of course you can put more than one thing in 372:
372 $a Punk rock $a Musical criticism $2 lcsh
372 $a Music critics $2 lcsh
Regards
Richard
_________________________
Richard Moore
Authority Control Team Manager
The British Library
Tel.: +44 (0)1937 546806
E-mail: richard.mo...@bl.uk<mailto:richard.mo...@bl.uk>
From: Resource Description and Access / Resource Description and Access
[mailto:RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA<mailto:RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA>] On
Behalf Of Santos Muñoz, Ricardo
Sent: 14 November 2013 10:07
To: RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA<mailto:RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA>
Subject: [RDA-L] The meaning of 372 Field of Activity
Hello again.
I'm wrangling with some of the 3xx fields for authority records, in order to
produce some policy for using some of them in a coherent and fruitful way. I'm
facing some problems, and neither the MARC field itself, nor RDA instructions,
nor the use I've seen out there gives me a clear view.
The main bump in the road is field 372. Let's say I'm working on Joseph Stalin.
I'd like record and retrieve him as a politician (374), as a member of
Communist Party of the Soviet Union (373), but I'd like to relate him with
communism. So, recording "Communism" in 372 seems perfect for that purpose. But
I would also record Comunism in 372 for a scholar historian on communism.
Summing up, if I record 372 Punk-rock, Am I expressing that the guy is a
musician (374), specialized in doing punk-rock music, or Am I indicating that
he/she is a music critic (374), expert on punk-rock music?
Thanks in advance for opinions and experiencies.
Ricardo Santos Muñoz
Depto. de Proceso Técnico
Biblioteca Nacional de España
Tfno.: 915 807 735
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