Re: [RDA-L] Dagger symbol
Actually, the presence of the dagger would be an indication that a particular manifestation was issued later than a copy without the dagger. So that dagger can be useful for identifying a manifestation. Since it is not unknown for authors/editors to die while a book is in production, the dagger provides an early warning of something that will be explained somewhere in the books preliminaries or a colophon. It is also frequently a signal that someone else has been involved in the editing of the item, which will make some difference for the responsibility for the content of the resource. I am sure that others can think of other uses of the information to an alert user. Larry -- Laurence S. Creider Head, Archives and Special Collections Dept. University Library New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 575-646-4756 Fax: 575-646-7477 lcrei...@lib.nmsu.edu On Thu, September 12, 2013 3:06 pm, Patricia Sayre-McCoy wrote: Please explain why this is necessary to transcribe? At some point, every author will be dead so what's the point of making note of it now? I really don't see that this is vital information for the identification of the manifestation/expression. Pat Patricia Sayre-McCoy Head, Law Cataloging and Serials D'Angelo Law Library University of Chicago 773-702-9620 p...@uchicago.edu -Original Message- From: Resource Description and Access / Resource Description and Access [mailto:RDA-L@listserv.lac-bac.gc.ca] On Behalf Of James Weinheimer Sent: Thursday, September 12, 2013 3:46 PM To: RDA-L@listserv.lac-bac.gc.ca Subject: Re: [RDA-L] Dagger symbol On 9/12/2013 10:13 PM, Schutt, Misha wrote: snip A Friday hypothetical question in the same general area: in Soviet books, if the author is deceased, the name on the title page is generally enclosed in a box. (For this reason, business travelers in Russia are advised that it's offensive to draw a box around someone's name for emphasis, say, in an appointment book or meeting notes, since in effect you'd be wishing them dead.) Would that be reflected in a note somehow, or simply disregarded as extraneous graphic material? /snip See in the Slavic Cataloging Manual: http://www.indiana.edu/~libslav/slavcatman/box.html -- James Weinheimer weinheimer.ji...@gmail.com First Thus http://catalogingmatters.blogspot.com/ First Thus Facebook Page https://www.facebook.com/FirstThus Cooperative Cataloging Rules http://sites.google.com/site/opencatalogingrules/ Cataloging Matters Podcasts http://blog.jweinheimer.net/p/cataloging-matters-podcasts.html
Re: [RDA-L] Extent -- some ideas
I am with you until, The other benefit to treating Pagination as a separate element is that it's unique in that the measurement isn't usually based on the actual number of pages, but on the recording of the last numbered page. How would this be different from recording the complete sequences of pages (whether paginated or not), as one does in the description of early printed materials and in using DCRM(B)? Thank you, Larry -- Laurence S. Creider Head, Archives and Special Collections Dept. University Library New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 575-646-4756 Fax: 575-646-7477 lcrei...@lib.nmsu.edu On Tue, August 20, 2013 1:53 pm, Brenndorfer, Thomas wrote: On the topic of improving the idea of Extent, this discussion paper is on the right track: http://www.rda-jsc.org/docs/6JSC-ALA-Discussion-1.pdf The main problem has its source in cramming too many overlapping ideas into the 300$a field. There are different things being counted. Extent of Expression and Extent of Manifestation are the first distinctions that should be made. Extent of Notated Music is unabashedly an expression level measurement as the terms are pulled from the expression element in RDA 7.20.1.3. Cartographic resources and still images often don't have the same measurement as the number of carrier units (as in 1 atlas (2 volumes) or 1 print on 24 sheets). The norm for Extent should be the number of carrier type units, accompanied by carrier subunits as appropriate: Carrier type: audio disc Extent: 3 audio discs Carrier type: filmstrip Extent: 1 filmstrip (28 frames) I do have an issue with Extent of Text, in that this measurement shouldn't be associated just with text. The other problem is that pagination subunits aren't just associated with physical volumes either. Consider the example in RDA 3.4.1.7.1: 1 computer disc (xv pages, 150 maps) or in RDA 3.4.1.7.4: 3 microfiches (1 score (118 pages)). For those reasons I would treat Pagination as a new independent element under Extent of Manifestation, to be used wherever it is appropriate. To make this work one would have to count out every Extent measurement. To recreate the classic catalog card display as found in 300$a, one would have to follow rules and/or algorithms to collapse some measurements into the original compact displayed form. So for example, a book would be: Carrier Type: volume Extent of Carrier: 1 volume Pagination: xiv, 383 pages Traditional display: xiv, 383 pages But where the units of extent draw in the Carrier Type (from RDA 3.4.5.17), the logic of this arrangement becomes more apparent: Carrier Type: volume Extent of Carrier: 3 volumes Pagination: xx, 300 pages Traditional display: 3 volumes (xx, 800 pages) Such a clean and logical separation would do wonders. Consider atlases in RDA 3.4.2.5 in this way: 1 atlas (1 volume (various pagings)) would be encoded as: Content Type: cartographic image Extent of Cartographic Resource: 1 atlas Carrier Type: volume Extent of Carrier: 1 volume Pagination: various pagings where Extent of Cartographic Resource would be under a new Extent of Expression element. Consider notated music in this way: 1 score (viii, 278 pages) Content Type: notated music Extent of Notated Music: 1 score Carrier Type: volume Extent of Carrier: 1 volume Pagination: viii, 278 pages Another example of multiple things being measured-- here we see Extent of Manifestation, Extent of Expression, and Pagination all together: 3 microfiches (1 score (118 pages)) Content Type: notated music Extent of Notated Music: 1 score Carrier Type: microfiche Extent of Carrier: 3 microfiches Pagination: 118 pages The other benefit to treating Pagination as a separate element is that it's unique in that the measurement isn't usually based on the actual number of pages, but on the recording of the last numbered page. Thomas Brenndorfer Guelph Public Library
Re: [RDA-L] Request for review of standards for ETDs in RDA
Would you be willing to share your document once you have finalized it? We are slowly moving towards ETD, and it sounds like your document would be quite helpful. Thank you, Larry Creider -- Laurence S. Creider Head, Archives and Special Collections Dept. University Library New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 575-646-4756 Fax: 575-646-7477 lcrei...@lib.nmsu.edu On Wed, July 31, 2013 9:31 am, MCCUTCHEON, SEVIM wrote: I've been part of a small task group formed by the OhioLINK consortium (a consortium primarily of academic libraries in Ohio) working on updating standards from AACR2 to RDA for ETDs. We have a document we believe is final or very close to it. However, we'd appreciate extra sets of eyes to confirm where contents are correct, and/or and point out omissions and errors. Is there anyone(s) who is both quite knowledgeable about RDA and familiar with electronic resources cataloging willing to do the reviewing? I estimate it will take less than an hour. And if the review could be done by Friday evening, Aug. 2nd, that would be icing on the cake. We'd be happy to share the final paper with those interested. Please contact me if you are willing to review, and I'll send you the document by email. Thanks! (Ms.) Sevim McCutcheon Catalog Librarian, Assoc. Prof. Kent State University Libraries 330-672-1703 lmccu...@kent.edu
Re: [RDA-L] Authorized Version (6.23.2.9.2)
Authorized Version makes no sense in the USA, except as authorized by a particular non-governmental body. The Jefferson Bible was published by the GPO in 1904, but this was not an authorization. The term Authorized Version does work in the UK. According to the Wikipedia article you cite, it was probably authorized for public use by the Privy Council and its text was authorized for use in the readings in the Church of England's Book of Common Prayer later by Act of Parliament. Larry -- Laurence S. Creider Interim Head Archives and Special Collections Dept. University Library New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 575-646-4756 Fax: 575-646-7477 lcrei...@lib.nmsu.edu On Thu, May 16, 2013 9:09 am, Kevin M Randall wrote: Martin Kelleher wrote: Personally, I'd consider 'Authorized Version' to be a relative term, and always understood the generic, universally recognizable term for the 1611 translation to be the King James Bible. I presume there's an academic (and presumably C of E) understanding of 'Authorized Version' as being the formal term for the KJB, but I doubt it's more universal than that. Still, would you go for the formal designation, even if it's religion specific? There's an interesting article on Wikipedia, giving the origins of the name. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_James_Version Personally, I've always found the name Authorized Version to be very presumptuous. Authorized by whom? A cataloging code aiming to be universal and inclusive should probably refer to the version by a name that implies a more neutral stance. Thus I would prefer to call it the King James Version or King James Bible. Kevin M. Randall Principal Serials Cataloger Northwestern University Library k...@northwestern.edu (847) 491-2939 Proudly wearing the sensible shoes since 1978!
Re: [RDA-L] a rather than t for ETD
Mac,
With 264 0, the distinction means little in RDA. Only one fixed field
and 264 2nd indicator are affected.
This is not RDA, it is MARC. I have said for some time that I think that
the whole continuum from unpublished to published needs to be rethought in
light of the history of the book (manuscripts to print to e-books).
Cataloging codes have been singularly resistant to rethinking this issue.
A theses [sic] gets more review of the faculty advisor than do most books
these days.
Believe me, that depends on the advisor and the advisor's grasp of
English. We get errors on title leaves, as well as elsewhere.
For consistency we should consider electronic theses as published.
That print ones are not is a fiction, considering printouts from the
online version.
I'm sorry, but unless you are talking about e-theses available on the web
or somehow for download, this is plain wrong. An on-demand printout does
not constitute publication, even if the item should be described as a
physical book rather than an ms or a microfilm/fiche. Your definition
would mean that a word-processed draft printed out for correction by the
author would be considered published. I don't think that either the
printout or the e-version could be considered published unless it was
placed on the web.
Larry
--
Laurence S. Creider
Interim Head
Archives and Special Collections Dept.
University Library
New Mexico State University
Las Cruces, NM 88003
Work: 575-646-4756
Fax: 575-646-7477
lcrei...@lib.nmsu.edu
On Tue, March 19, 2013 2:58 pm, J. McRee Elrod wrote:
Adam said:
Even printed theses by computer have always been considered unpublished
manuscripts rather than published textual monographs
With 264 0, the distinction means little in RDA. Only one fixed field
and 264 2nd indicator are affected.
Theses are produced in one or a very few number of copies, without
editorial review or peer review in the same way
that published monographs are made.
Those available online for printout may be printed more times than you
might expect.
In these days of self publishing, the number of published monographs
with good editing and peer review is declining. Based on the number of
typos I now see in most books, good editorial review seems a thing of the
past. A theses gets more review of the faculty advisor than do most
books these days.
For consistency we should consider electronic theses as published. That
print ones are not is a fiction, considering printouts from the online
version.
__ __ J. McRee (Mac) Elrod (m...@slc.bc.ca)
{__ | / Special Libraries Cataloguing HTTP://www.slc.bc.ca/
___} |__ \__
ii
Re: [RDA-L] a rather than t for ETD
Bernhard, First off, thank you for continuing to contribute. I have learned a great deal from your posts. 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. Some person at some point in time needs to consider that the item needs to be distributed and made available to a public that is more than members of one organization. Even that definition has its problems. I think that catalogers would well to involve historians of the book and other materials in the discussion. Larry -- Laurence S. Creider Interim Head Archives and Special Collections Dept. University Library New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 575-646-4756 Fax: 575-646-7477 lcrei...@lib.nmsu.edu On Wed, March 20, 2013 12:43 am, Bernhard Eversberg wrote: 19.03.2013 21:58, J. McRee Elrod: Theses are produced in one or a very few number of copies, without editorial review or peer review in the same way that published monographs are made. .. For consistency we should consider electronic theses as published. That print ones are not is a fiction, considering printouts from the online version. More generally, we might reconsider the concept of publication and define it as anything fit for public reception. And then, why not get rid of the rather pompous yet less than intuitive term resource in favor of the newly extended version of publication? (Or is it commonplace now that resource is correctly understood and taken for granted by the catalog-using public?) B.Eversberg
Re: [RDA-L] RDA rule interpretations
Very nice post. I've made a comment on your point 3 below. It's always nice to see another medievalist in our profession. -- Prof. Laurence S. Creider, Ph.D. Interim Head Archives and Special Collections Dept. University Library New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 575-646-4756 Fax: 575-646-7477 lcrei...@lib.nmsu.edu On Sun, December 30, 2012 4:09 am, Heidrun Wiesenmüller wrote: 3. The concept of separate bibliographic identities is completely alien to our cataloging tradition. We only have one authority record for e.g. Lewis Carroll, which includes a simple see reference from the real name. This concept is not part of the Anglo-American tradition, but it was included in a revised edition of AACR2. In my opinion, it was an ill-considered attempt to deal with the problem that some authors use different names for distinctly different areas of activities. As Mac pointed out, the solution deals very poorly with the fact that some authors use different names for the same books and essentially dissolves the personal connection between author and work. If the principle were thought through, then a common name that is used by different people writing for a series would be a separate authorial identity. Heidrun -- - Prof. Heidrun Wiesenmueller M.A. Stuttgart Media University Faculty of Information and Communication Wolframstr. 32, 70191 Stuttgart, Germany www.hdm-stuttgart.de/bi
Re: [RDA-L] RDA relationship terminology--Praeses
Mac,
The problem is that there is no modern equivalent to the role of a praeses
in the early modern dissertation or academic disputation. Sometimes the
praeses is responsible for the content of the published dissertation
rather than the student who might be listed as respondent. Even when
called an auctor, the person responsible for the intellectual content of
the printed dissertation might be the praeses. AACR2 follows earlier
rules about the access points for these things and who might best be
considered the author. All of this is to be distinguished from the
praeses as the one presiding at a discussion, such as a church council
(corporate authorship).
While this might be a small and specialized problem, these academic
dissertations are confronted by almost anyone cataloging early modern
materials. I first ran across them when cataloging a 1980s facsimile of
Latin original with a German translation on distilling alcohol. Major
research libraries may have hordes of them, and they are important for the
history of scholarship ranging from astronomy through theology to zoology.
When I was at the University of Pennsylvania, we had large numbers of
them already cataloged but also hundreds cataloged as collections and
unanalyzed. Assuming they are still uncataloged (they were Protestant
dissertations on Scripture, including a good deal of Christian Hebraist
scholarship), those will need to be cataloged in RDA someday.
Please just include praeses with no references. Most people may not know
what it is, but the people who need these items and can use them will
know. For the rest, clarification is a Google search away. Wikipedia
says under Old German academic use, In German academia a doctoral advisor
is called the Doktorvater. However in the 18th century and before, the
doctoral system was quite different. Instead of a Doktorvater, as such,
the candidate had a praeses to act as mentor and who would also head the
oral viva voce exam. In the 18th century the praeses often chose the
subject and compiled the theses and the candidate had only to defend.
Sometimes there were several candidates at the same time defending the
same thesis, in order to save time. The OED quotes from the first
edition of AACR, 1967 Anglo-Amer. Catal. Rules: Brit. Text 27 Enter a
dissertation written for defence in an academic disputation (according to
the custom prevailing in European universities prior to the 19th century)
under the praeses (the faculty moderator) unless the authorship can be
well authenticated.
--
Laurence S. Creider
Interim Head
Archives and Special Collections Dept.
University Library
New Mexico State University
Las Cruces, NM 88003
Work: 575-646-4756
Fax: 575-646-7477
lcrei...@lib.nmsu.edu
On Thu, December 6, 2012 2:21 pm, J. McRee Elrod wrote:
Robert Maxwell said:
Whatever the code definition says, a praeses is not the same thing as a
thesis advisor.
So a term for thesis advisor is missing from RDA?
If the praeses has no role in thesis creation, why would one need a
relationship desinator for him or her? Perhaps for a report of the
disputation? I'll add [thesis advisor] to the list, change consider
to cf. after praeses, and suggest moderator.
__ __ J. McRee (Mac) Elrod (m...@slc.bc.ca)
{__ | / Special Libraries Cataloguing HTTP://www.slc.bc.ca/
___} |__ \__
A praeses is the person who presides at the defense of an academic
disputation, which is not the same thing as a modern thesis defense. An
academic disputation took place as part of the pre-19th century German
procedure for getting a doctoral degree, in which the student defended a
thesis assigned to him but written by somebody else. For an explanation
see AACR2 21.27. Praeses is a technical term and means what it means.
Obviously not everyone knows what a praeses is, but it wouldn't be
helpful to replace it with something that it's not.
Re: [RDA-L] Illustrators as creators, not contributors
And all this helps the public how? -- Laurence S. Creider Interim Head Archives and Special Collections Dept. University Library New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 575-646-4756 Fax: 575-646-7477 lcrei...@lib.nmsu.edu On Mon, November 26, 2012 9:19 am, Brenndorfer, Thomas wrote: The distinction between âartistâ and âillustratorâ currently exists in the choices for main entry heading. Catalogers have to know that an artist can be a main entry heading, and an illustrator can only be an added entry. The distinction comes down to knowing what is the work and what is the expression (that is, in knowing that an illustrator has only contributed to the realization of a work, but is not responsible for the primary intellectual or creative content of the work). These categorizations may seem arbitrary, but they are still the basis for traditional cataloging, and reappear as entity-relationships in RDA. RDA does go a bit further in recognizing that there may be more types of relationships beyond the crude main/added entry distinction. For example, a Creator may also have a Contributor role (as in Composer and Singer). This can be seen in the second RDA/MARC example in http://www.rdatoolkit.org/sites/default/files/6jsc_rda_complete_examples_bibliographic_jul0312_rev.pdf Thomas Brenndorfer Guelph Public Library From: Resource Description and Access / Resource Description and Access [mailto:RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA] On Behalf Of Jack Wu Sent: November 26, 2012 11:08 AM To: RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA Subject: Re: [RDA-L] Illustrators as creators, not contributors And the searcher, in order to search successfully, would have to know this distinction in our use of a different qualifier for the same person under different circumstances, as well, I presume? Jack Wu Franciscan University of Steubenville j...@franciscan.edumailto:j...@franciscan.edu Jenny Wright jenny.wri...@bibdsl.co.ukmailto:jenny.wri...@bibdsl.co.uk 11/26/2012 9:38 AM My understanding is that: If the illustrations are integral to the work, the person who drew/painted them is a creator, or co-creator, and so the relationship designator should be âartistâ. If the illustrations are complementary to the work, and belong at expression level (they contribute to the realisation of the work), then the relationship designator should be âillustratorâ. What is more debatable is how one decides whether the art is integral to the work. Could another artist could draw new comic strips for the same story, or new pictures for a juvenile picture book without changing it to a new work? Jenny Wright Development Manager Bibliographic Data Services Ltd. From: Resource Description and Access / Resource Description and Access [mailto:RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA] On Behalf Of Jack Wu Sent: 26 November 2012 14:30 To: RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CAmailto:RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA Subject: Re: [RDA-L] Illustrators as creators, not contributors Then, in MARC, it can sometimes be using $e illustrator, but at other times $e artist? Or would one be using both terms? It's somewhat confusing to me. Jack Wu Franciscan University of Steubenville j...@franciscan.edumailto:j...@franciscan.edu JSC Secretary jscsecret...@rdatoolkit.orgmailto:jscsecret...@rdatoolkit.org 11/23/2012 8:14 AM Jenny, The LC-PCC PS you cite is in chapter 20, the chapter for contributors, and states the policy requiring an authorized access point for the first illustrator (someone with responsibility for the expression, not the work). If the person involved in your resource has responsibility at the work level as a creator, you would not be consulting chapter 20. Yes, the only creator-level term in appenidx I is artist because illustrator there is the term for a relationship at the expression level. Judy Kuhagen JSC Secretary On Fri, Nov 23, 2012 at 7:36 AM, Jenny Wright jenny.wri...@bibdsl.co.ukmailto:jenny.wri...@bibdsl.co.uk wrote: Hi All I am looking at how to deal with children's picture books using RDA rules, and would like to know what others think. I think of children's picture books as being co-created by the author and the illustrator, and I believe it would be a different work if there were different illustrations, rather than a different expression. My reading of RDA is that if I believe a person to be a co-creator of a work, rather than a contributor to an expression, then the only available relationship designator for the illustrator is artist. However, there is an LC-PCC PS stating Provide an authorized access point in the bibliographic record for an illustrator in all cases of resources intended for children. Give the RDA appendix I designator illustrator in MARC 700 subfield $e. Can anyone help explain this apparent anomaly? Thank you Jenny Wright Development manager Bibliographic Data Services Ltd. Scanned
Re: [RDA-L] First issue v. latest issue - JSC Announcement
I've been thinking about the last couple of paragraphs of Mr. Danskin's message off and on, and I just don't see how allowing for both earliest and latest issue as the basis for description is going to result in anything but chaos in catalogs and discovery of information. That would be true for both the short and the long term. Can someone explain how that would not happen? I'm not fond of the latest issue for continuing resources, but at least there is a conceptual difference between a continuing resource in paper or electronic format and a serial. Thank you, Larry -- Laurence S. Creider Interim Head Archives and Special Collections Dept. University Library New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 575-646-4756 Fax: 575-646-7477 lcrei...@lib.nmsu.edu On Wed, November 14, 2012 4:25 am, Danskin, Alan wrote: JSC Announcement: First issue v. latest issue Recent discussions on RDA-L have high-lighted that in RDA the description of resources issued in more than one part is based on the earliest issued or lowest numbered part.(2.1.2.3) JSC acknowledges that this is not a FRBR requirement and creates a barrier to the adoption of RDA. JSC notes that different approaches have different strengths and weaknesses: the earliest entry approach is considered to be more economical; but the latest entry approach emphasises convenience of the user. JSC takes the view that data created under RDA should be sufficiently flexible to support any approach, without compromising the capability to control and link descriptions of serial resources. JSC invites Deutsche Nationalbibliothek (DNB) to prepare a discussion paper for development of RDA to support a more flexible approach, while sustaining the process of harmonization with ISSN Network and ISBD. The discussion paper should consider changes to RDA guidelines and instructions; evaluate probable impacts, including the effect on bibliographic control and linking of serial descriptions. Stakeholders should be consulted and their views clearly represented. JSC recognises that this is a substantial task, which will take some time to realise. In the interim, agencies following the latest entry technique should continue to do so and may encode their records as RDA. posted on behalf of JSC by, Alan Danskin Joint Steering Committee for Development of RDA The British Library Bldg 25 Boston Spa WETHERBY West Yorkshire LS23 7BQ www.bl.uk http://www.bl.uk/ http://www.bl.uk/email/banner.htm T +44 (0) 1937 546669 Mob 07833401117 F +44 (0) 1937 546586 alan.dans...@bl.uk ** Experience the British Library online at http://www.bl.uk/ The British Libraryâs latest Annual Report and Accounts : http://www.bl.uk/aboutus/annrep/index.htm Help the British Library conserve the world's knowledge. Adopt a Book. http://www.bl.uk/adoptabook The Library's St Pancras site is WiFi - enabled * The information contained in this e-mail is confidential and may be legally privileged. It is intended for the addressee(s) only. If you are not the intended recipient, please delete this e-mail and notify the mailto:postmas...@bl.uk : The contents of this e-mail must not be disclosed or copied without the sender's consent. The statements and opinions expressed in this message are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the British Library. The British Library does not take any responsibility for the views of the author. * Think before you print
Re: [RDA-L] Bibliographic records vs. catalogue building
The irony here is lovely. The MARC fixed fields for country and language codes and the 043 and 041 were originally designed for automated retrieval at a time when there were if any online catalogs. In the computer environment of the 1960s and 1970s, even the 1980s, retrieval by the codes would have been much faster than any searching by text strings. Evidently, it still is. Unfortunately, most people did not bother with the 043 field, in particular, because no online system (including OCLC) made use of it. So now we are finding that we shouldn't make use of the 043 because the information is not in online bibliographic records because the online systems could not be bothered to develop a means of retrieving it? I am upset because, among other reasons, I spent a lot of time inputting 043 fields in the hope that they would be useful. The MARC format has enough limitations without folks blaming it for poor implementation by others. Besides, Heidrun's project is gravy. It does not retrieve everything that is relevant, but I have not met a system yet that does. Her work retrieves more, and that is progress. Larry -- Laurence S. Creider Interim Head Archives and Special Collections Dept. University Library New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 575-646-4756 Fax: 575-646-7477 lcrei...@lib.nmsu.edu On Thu, June 7, 2012 11:31 am, Karen Coyle wrote: On 6/7/12 10:02 AM, Heidrun Wiesenmüller wrote: The country codes have been there in our authority file for two or three decades, but up to now I believe they have never been used for actual retrieval. Perhaps something similar could be done with the geographical area codes in MARC field 043? Definitely, but only if the code is entered into the records. In the studies done by Moen in 2006,[1] it is shown that the 043 occurs in about 30% of the records, but that 84% of the 650's have a geographic subdivision. Those figures can't be directly compared because there can be more than one 650 in a record. What you demonstrate here, though, is something important: coded data can be more easily utilized for this kind of functionality than textual data. But we have a chicken and egg problem: if coded data is entered only sporadically, it isn't good for retrieval, and therefore systems cannot use it; but if systems do not implement features based on coded data then one can argue that there is no use inputting the data since it isn't used. We need to break that cycle, but without giving users bad retrievals for a time before input practices change. kc [1] http://www.mcdu.unt.edu/?p=43 Heidrun -- - Prof. Heidrun Wiesenmueller M.A. Stuttgart Media University Faculty of Information and Communication Wolframstrasse 32, 70191 Stuttgart, Germany www.hdm-stuttgart.de/bi -- Karen Coyle kco...@kcoyle.net http://kcoyle.net ph: 1-510-540-7596 m: 1-510-435-8234 skype: kcoylenet
Re: [RDA-L] Comparison table of extent terms
While I can see how the term Pagination Subunits might be precise for those producing RDA records, I fail to see how it will do anything but produce derision on the part of our users. The term is a bureaucratic one that reminds me somewhat of the form 100 0 Bill, $cBuffalo in the early years of AACR2 before common sense hit. The drive towards greater granularity will make the RDA data more useful to computer manipulation than AACR2. If RDA is to be an improvement on AACR2, however, intelligibility and plain prose should be goals. Larry -- Laurence S. Creider Interim Head Archives and Special Collections Dept. University Library New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 575-646-4756 Fax: 575-646-7477 lcrei...@lib.nmsu.edu On Wed, April 11, 2012 6:18 pm, Brenndorfer, Thomas wrote: I wonder if the element name Extent of Text is a little off. One can use pages for an atlas which consists mostly of cartographic images and little text. Likewise for notated music, and presumably for notated movement, as well as tactile variations on all of these. Likewise for subunits for computer media and microform media, which could be text, but not necessarily, and in these cases a page is a logical subunit, not really a physical subunit. Pages are really subunits, most often of volumes (and sheets too, as in 1 folded sheet (8 pages)). Instead of Extent of Text the element should be called something like Pagination Subunits. Thomas Brenndorfer Guelph Public Library From: Resource Description and Access / Resource Description and Access [RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA] On Behalf Of Adam L. Schiff [asch...@u.washington.edu] Sent: April-11-12 5:15 PM To: RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA Subject: Re: [RDA-L] Comparison table of extent terms Content: cartographic image Media needed to access content: unmediated Carrier: volume Extent: 1 atlas (68 pages) Don't forget that at least some of these kinds of resources will have more than one content type! For example, in addition to maps, atlases often have a good deal of textual content as well. Adam
Re: [RDA-L] Comparison table of extent terms
Yes, point taken. The increased granularity is wonderful. Of course, you have more faith in system vendors and, say, OPAC committees than I have. Larry -- Laurence S. Creider Interim Head Archives and Special Collections Dept. University Library New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 575-646-4756 Fax: 575-646-7477 lcrei...@lib.nmsu.edu On Thu, April 12, 2012 11:50 am, Kevin M Randall wrote: Larry Creider wrote: While I can see how the term Pagination Subunits might be precise for those producing RDA records, I fail to see how it will do anything but produce derision on the part of our users. I think that Thomas was suggesting this term as the name of the RDA element, not as a label to be used for public display of the data. Of course, we will have lots of very unimaginative and/or lazy system developers/vendors who will do nothing more than take the name of the data element as the display label for that element. But it is pointless to try to come up with element names that are public-friendly, since they are not intended for public consumption. (It is no less reasonable to assume that an OPAC display should show the user a term such as Author or Creator instead of the phrase Main Entry-Personal Name or the tag 100. This is really the same issue.) Kevin M. Randall Principal Serials Cataloger Bibliographic Services Dept. Northwestern University Library 1970 Campus Drive Evanston, IL 60208-2300 email: k...@northwestern.edu phone: (847) 491-2939 fax: (847) 491-4345
Re: [RDA-L] Catholic deuterocanonical Biblical books
Part of the problem with these rules is that the deuterocanonical books ARE part of the Roman Catholic canon, so that 18A1 and 18A5 seem contradictory. Another part of the problem is that there are other canons that should be considered in the cataloging rules. The Eastern Orthodox canon contains other books that are in the Septuagint, and many of the non-Chalcedonian churches, such as the Ethiopian and the Syriac Bibles have slightly different canons as well. There is a chart in the Wikipedia article on Biblical canon, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_canon, that shows the position of various groups on the contents of the canon. One thing that the chart does not show is that the vast majority of the world's Christians are part of communities that consider the deuterocanonical book to be part of the canon. The practice in AACR2 seems to reflect the Protestant biases of the founders of the Anglo-American cataloging tradition (I include Anglicanism here on the basis of its stance on the canon in the 39 Articles). Sections listed in the cataloging rules such as the History of Susanna, Song of the Three Children, Bel and the Dragon are portions of the Book of Daniel that are not present in the Hebrew text but were included in the Septuagint, which was the Bible for the early Greek-speaking church. The Western church (Roman Catholic and then Protestant) took a different path from the other churches when it accepted Jerome's insistence that the Hebrew text should be the touchstone for the text of the Old Testament. -- Laurence S. Creider Special Collections Librarian New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 575-646-7227 Fax: 575-646-7477 lcrei...@lib.nmsu.edu On Mon, May 9, 2011 9:38 am, Mark Ehlert wrote: For what it's worth, the RDA text Jay quotes is a mash-up of several .18A rules under AACR2 25.18 with a few tweaks here and there to accommodate the dropping of O.T and N.T and to fold in a footnote. Here are the relevant excepts: 25.18A. Bible 25.18A1. General rule. Enter a Testament as a subheading of Bible. Enter a book of the Catholic or Protestant canon as a subheading of the appropriate Testament. 25.18A3. Books. Use the brief citation form of the Authorized Version. 25.18A5. Apocrypha. Enter the collection known as the Apocrypha (1-2 Esdras, Tobit, Judith, Rest of Esther, Wisdom of Solomon, Ecclesiasticus, Baruch, History of Susanna, Song of the Three Children, Bel and the Dragon, Prayer of Manasses, 1-2 Maccabees) under Bible. O.T. Apocrypha.[5] Enter an individual book as a further subheading. [5] Do not treat an edition of the Bible lacking these books as being incomplete. RDA 6.23.2.9. Parts of the Bible 6.23.2.9.2 Books. For books of the Catholic or Protestant canon, record the brief citation form of the Authorized Version as a subdivision of the preferred title for the Bible. 6.23.2.9.4 Apochrypha. For the compilation known as the Apocrypha (1-2 Esdras, Tobit, Judith, Rest of Esther, Wisdom of Solomon, Ecclesiasticus, Baruch, History of Susanna, Song of the Three Children, Bel and the Dragon, Prayer of Manasses, 1-2 Maccabees), record Apocrypha as a subdivision of the preferred title for the Bible. Do not treat an edition of the Bible lacking these books as being incomplete. [Examples snipped] For an individual book use the name of the book as a further subdivision. Doesn't really answer Jay's question, though. -- Mark K. Ehlert Minitex Coordinator University of Minnesota Bibliographic Technical 15 Andersen Library Services (BATS) Unit 222 21st Avenue South Phone: 612-624-0805 Minneapolis, MN 55455-0439 http://www.minitex.umn.edu/
Re: [RDA-L] FRBR
Your comments are very interesting, but I have to wonder if there are not additional reasons. I was a copy cataloger for two years before I went to library school in 1981, where the cataloging course consisted of a glossed reading of AACR2, plus some wonderful optional readings and a few exercises. I found that AACR2 made great sense and was a tremendous improvement on previous cataloging, but part of that was because my mind was essentially a tabula rasa when I took the course (I had seen a lot of cataloging of course but had been warned away from the rules before I went to get my MLS). In my first professional job, I had wonderful training. My reviser had been trained on the Red book, but she had made a solid adaptation to the new code, even though some of the problems were apparent to her and others (our Arabic cataloger was not pleased with AACR2 chapter 22). I think RDA will be harder for catalogers to adapt to because it is not really a cataloging code. We will be doing something different, something whose shape is still becoming apparent. But Megan Curran is right; the effort should be made if the result will be better discovery and access for our users. FRBR is a different matter. Even with its faults (the edition vs. manifestation issue, for example), I do think it is fairly intuitive for users as well as catalogers. The questions start when one is actually trying to think through the details for a particular resource that is being cataloged. Even so, I think FRBR and WEMI are great improvements over their predecessors, just as the new Statement of International Cataloguing Principles is a great improvement over the Paris Principles. -- Laurence S. Creider Special Collections Librarian New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 575-646-7227 Fax: 575-646-7477 lcrei...@lib.nmsu.edu On Mon, April 11, 2011 10:30 am, Harden, Jean wrote: My experience leads me to the opposite conclusion. For people who don't already know how to catalog, much of RDA *is* simpler, more transparent, and so forth than AACR2. It's only those of us who have been using AACR2 for years that have so much trouble grasping the new rules. In my job I teach a steady stream of young catalogers, and I was also in the RDA test. Teaching AACR2 while testing RDA gave me a daily side-by-side comparison. I have found that new catalogers very often stumble into doing descriptive cataloging right according to RDA when they come to the end of their AACR2 knowledge. In formal classes, I have taught FRBR for at least a couple of years now. I find that people without previous cataloging experience understand the basics of FRBR within about half an hour. Then we do a couple more hours of exercises to cement the concepts (take books, scores, recordings, videos, etc. from the collection and make cards for the work, expression, manifestation, item, related works, responsible persons, and whatever else suits the particular group of students, putting these cards on the relevant spot on a labeled table or even floor). I haven't yet had a student fail to get a firm grasp on these basic ideas within one graduate-length class session. Jean Jean Harden Music Catalog Librarian Libraries University of North Texas 1155 Union Circle #305190 Denton, TX 76203-5017 jean.har...@unt.edu From: Resource Description and Access / Resource Description and Access [mailto:RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA] On Behalf Of Billie Hackney Sent: Monday, April 11, 2011 10:58 AM To: RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA Subject: Re: [RDA-L] FRBR Every time I see a discussion about how hard FRBR is to understand (which it is), how difficult the RDA Toolkit is to use (which it is), and the fact that RDA will actually increase the amount of work we have to do to each bibliographic record (which it does), I get more and more discouraged. Cataloging as a profession has been gasping for breath. It desperately needed to become simpler, more transparent, and more attractive to library school students, easier for management to understand. Instead, it seems to me that the opposite is happening, and at the worst possible time. It seems to me that our leaders are taking us over a cliff, and they keep explaining to us why what they're doing is very, very important, as we're plummeting to the ground. This is my own personal opinion as someone who has been cataloging for twenty years -- not that of my employer. Billie Hackney Senior Monograph Cataloger Getty Research Institute 1200 Getty Center Drive, Suite 1100 Los Angeles, CA 90049-1688 (310) 440-7616 bhack...@getty.edumailto:bhack...@getty.edu
Re: [RDA-L] Purpose of transcribed imprint (was: Form)
Comments interpolated below. -- Laurence S. Creider Special Collections Librarian New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 575-646-7227 Fax: 575-646-7477 lcrei...@lib.nmsu.edu On Sat, December 18, 2010 8:46 am, Karen Coyle wrote: Quoting Deborah Fritz debo...@marcofquality.com: What I understand from this is that the transcribed title page information serves as a surrogate for the title page for catalogers working separately and having access only to another cataloger's metadata. It has been suggested that a scan of the title page could be used in future systems to perform this function. I don't know how practical that is, but it's an idea. First, the title page information is useful not only for librarians (including collection development and acquisition folks as well as the occasional reference person who still looks at catalogs); it is also necessary for patrons interested in identifying, distinguishing, and selecting a particular edition, state, and issue. Scanning title pages (or chief source of information would be useful if at least the texts scans could be searched. Special Collections librarians have been doing this on a small scale and would do more if more resources and cooperative systems departments were available. The images are useful for identifying and distinguishing amongst editions, states, and issues because sometimes the easiest distinguishing mark is the type used or the layout of the t.p. or sometimes the graphic material. I once cataloged a version of Pope's Dunciad that was distinguished by having a frontispiece with an ass (donkey). All this is, of course, distinct from gathering together the different forms of the name of an entity responsible for making a resource public. A related question is what function this title page information has for catalog users. When I am acting as a user rather than trying to find something for professional purposes, I use the title page information all the time in determining whether I, as a user, want to select and access a particular version of a work, or even access that work at all. For example, Osprey has published number of books on the early middle ages. I don't bother with them, because I know that their intended audience is interested in different things than I am. Books issued by Floris are almost always reprints of 19th century works. Given a choice between a Zondervan or an Oxford work on church history, I will choose the Oxford because it will be more reliable, engage current scholarship more fully, and make me work harder and get more out of the text. Elizabeth's and Erin's comments are right on target. I looked up some publisher ONIX data. Their data distinguishes between the corporate body that produces the books and the imprint under which they are produced (at least in the instances I saw). It appears that library catalog records for modern books carry only the imprint, and unfortunately refers to this as publisher name. In many cases the name of the publisher is not included. I assume that publisher names could be derived from the imprints and/or from the ISBNs, obviously with some degree of inaccuracy. This is hardly news. There is a reason for recording the imprint inasmuch as it helps in the identification and selection by the patron. The corporate identity behind this is of interest primarily to historians of the book or people studying the current marketplace and keeping track of who has eaten whom or who has sold whom. Catalog displays are so inaccurate, I despair of them ever reflecting anything resembling reality. FWIW, our catalog does not say Publisher name, but publisher (and includes place and date of publication under the same label). I don't ever recall an opac using Publisher name. Now the question is: is there a use case for including the publisher identity in the catalog record? Is the publisher a bibliographically significant entity? Are there particular user needs for this data? Or is the *only* purpose for recording this that of identification through a surrogate for the title page? Adam quotes RDA as saying Record a publisher, if considered important for access... but I find that to be rather vague without some idea of what functions the publisher identity could serve (either for user access or for library systems). See above. As for RDA, please make the suggestion to CC:DA. Precision would be useful for a code that falls between the stools by being too imprecise for computer applications and needlessly complex for human beings constructing and using the textual data (as opposed to identifiers of whatever sort). I'm sure I am not the first person to suggest that these should be two separate documents. Regardless of the answers to the above questions, it seems that we may be misleading users when we label this data as Publisher in our systems. I would argue that we are not, because most users, even scholars, use the term publisher. Imprint
Re: [RDA-L] Time and effort
I agree that the testing process is being conducted with careful deliberation, and I have much respect for the way the Library of Congress is handling the process. Still, publishing, charging, and testing an incomplete product with a decision on implementation to come after the testing is finished sounds like rushing to me. -- Laurence S. Creider Special Collections Librarian New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 575-646-7227 Fax: 575-646-7477 lcrei...@lib.nmsu.edu On Wed, September 1, 2010 8:57 am, Bernhard Eversberg wrote: and Laurence S. Creider wrote: Would someone explain to me why we are rushing to implement something that is not even finished? Yes, a first version is available, but there are still major pieces missing. Who is rushing? Everyone who writes here has expressed their lack of intentions of rushing into it. And of course it makes no sense to do *anything* at all before LC have made up their mind. Remember it is still possible they decide against it! B.Eversberg
Re: [RDA-L] Consolidated ISBD and RDA double punctuation
Folks,
Most of your discussions on ISBD punctuation have gone past the point of
considering the wording of the report, but please remember that the
Consolidated Edition of the ISBD is a draft document. Further, the Task
Force report is made to CC:DA and is also a draft that has not yet been
approved by CC:DA but is under discussion pending a vote. Some changes
have already been identified that will be made in the report.
Larry Creider, Chair of the Task Force for the ISBD Consolidated Edition,
Draft 2010
--
Laurence S. Creider
Special Collections Librarian
New Mexico State University
Las Cruces, NM 88003
Work: 575-646-7227
Fax: 575-646-7477
lcrei...@lib.nmsu.edu
On Wed, July 14, 2010 7:47 pm, Ed Jones wrote:
That would be a solution if it weren't for languages like French that
routinely place a space on either side of most marks of punctuation.
Removing the period introduces ambiguity into any optical interpretation
of the punctuation: is it a normal dash or is it a prescribed ISBD dash?
Ed
From: J. McRee Elrod [...@slc.bc.ca]
Sent: Wednesday, July 14, 2010 5:59 PM
To: Ed Jones
Cc: RDA-L@listserv.lac-bac.gc.ca
Subject: Re: [RDA-L] Consolidated ISBD and RDA double punctuation
Ed Jones said:
If USMARC and its successors had been designed to automatically
supply ISBD punctuation, rather than requiring it to be explicitly
entered by the cataloger, the machine would have necessarily supplied it
as _preceding_ punctuation ...
Wouldn't that still give us . -- between ed. and say New York?
Still two periods? Let's consider ending full stops as part of the
element they *end, not introductions to the next.
__ __ J. McRee (Mac) Elrod (m...@slc.bc.ca)
{__ | / Special Libraries Cataloguing HTTP://www.slc.bc.ca/
___} |__ \__
Re: [RDA-L] Rare books - RDA
RDA is leaving more detailed rules for resources such as rare materials and maps to the cataloging communities who are devoted to them. As far as I know (and assuming that RDA is widely adopted), the rare materials community in the US will continue to use the current DCRM series while it revises them to be in agreement with RDA. -- Laurence S. Creider Special Collections Librarian New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 575-646-7227 Fax: 575-646-7477 lcrei...@lib.nmsu.edu On Fri, May 14, 2010 12:58 pm, Márcia Rodrigues wrote: Hello! I'm librarian in Brazil and here we see a few number of professionals and groups discussing the change from AACR to RDA. But I have a doubt that I would like to share: will RDA include DCRB (Descriptive Cataloging of Rare Books) in it's contents? Thanks a lot, -- Márcia Carvalho Rodrigues Setor de Processamento Técnico Biblioteca Central Universidade de Caxias do Sul +55 54 3218 2173 URL: http://www.ucs.br mcrod...@ucs.br
Re: [RDA-L] Rare books - RDA
The DCRM series of manuals for rare materials, (DCRM(B) and DCRM(S) are
published, with DCRMs for music, manuscripts, graphics, and cartographic
materials underway) are for description and do not prescribe forms for
access points, which are currently determined by AACR2, Part II.
So, the rare materials community will undoubtedly adopt the poorly
considered elimination of O.T. and N.T. when the rest of the cataloging
community does. The same is true of the rule of three. Abbreviations
would probably continue to be used where the DCRM rules call for them,
that is, rarely except in non-transcribed Areas such as the physical
description are.
Until the DCRM manuals are revised or the Bibliographic Standards
Committee posts a statement to the contrary, I suggest continuing to use
the current DCRM manuals for describing rare materials and either AACR2 or
RDA for determining the choice and form of access points, depending on
what the national cataloging agencies do.
When we worked on DCRM(B), folks thought about the problem of coordination
with RDA but decided that it was impossible to wait until RDA came into
effect. If that decision had not been made, about 5 years would have been
lost.
--
Laurence S. Creider
Special Collections Librarian
New Mexico State University
Las Cruces, NM 88003
Work: 575-646-7227
Fax: 575-646-7477
lcrei...@lib.nmsu.edu
On Sat, May 15, 2010 5:09 pm, J. McRee Elrod wrote:
.. will RDA include DCRB (Descriptive Cataloging of Rare Books) in it's
contents?
RDA supposes special genre manuals, and does not have chapters devoted
to them. Any special instructions are integrated.
Sometimes instructions are therefore a bit confusing, e.g., motion
picture statements of responsibility.
RDA will contratict some DCRB provisions as they now exisit. There
will probably be a new edition of DCRB, but in the meantime,
abbrevations could be spelled out, the rule of three dropped, O.T.
and N.T. between Bible and name of book dropped, etc., to agree
with RDA.
__ __ J. McRee (Mac) Elrod (m...@slc.bc.ca)
{__ | / Special Libraries Cataloguing HTTP://www.slc.bc.ca/
___} |__ \__
Re: [RDA-L] Introduction
Actually, too early to tell and I'd wait a year until it is clearer what the Library of Congress will do about implementing RDA before ponying up my first $325. You _should_ become aware of the main differences that RDA poses. You can do that by looking at some of the documents at http://www.rda-jsc.org/rda.html. If you have a lot of time on your hands, you can look at the July 2008 draft of RDA and the responses. Since the national libraries will not be comparing their responses to the testing period until early next year, you have some time. While you can implement RDA when it is published in June 2010, I cannot imagine LC implementing it until late spring of 2011. In the meantime, others will be developing training materials that may be helpful if not definitive. -- Laurence S. Creider Special Collections Librarian New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 575-646-7227 Fax: 575-646-7477 lcrei...@lib.nmsu.edu On Mon, February 8, 2010 7:27 am, Miksa, Shawne wrote: Yes. Yes. ** Shawne D. Miksa, Ph.D. Associate Professor Department of Library and Information Sciences College of Information University of North Texas email: shawne.mi...@unt.edumailto:shawne.mi...@unt.edu http://courses.unt.edu/smiksa/index.htm office 940-565-3560 fax 940-565-3101 ** From: Resource Description and Access / Resource Description and Access [rd...@listserv.lac-bac.gc.ca] On Behalf Of Jo Hudson [hudso...@oplin.org] Sent: Monday, February 08, 2010 6:38 AM To: RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA Subject: Re: [RDA-L] Introduction Can you please answer a question for me? Is RDA going to replace AACR2 in cataloging and is changing to RDA from AACR2 something every library cataloger needs to be aware or ready to implement in our library? Thank you. [cid:image001.jpg@01CAA891.BA4181E0] From: Resource Description and Access / Resource Description and Access [mailto:rd...@listserv.lac-bac.gc.ca] On Behalf Of Troy Linker Sent: Thursday, February 04, 2010 11:01 AM To: RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA Subject: [RDA-L] Introduction I would like to introduce myself to the cataloging community as Publisher for the newly created Digital Reference unit at ALA Publishing. The Digital Reference unit is responsible for ALA's co-publisher role in RDA (Resource Description and Access) the digital replacement for AACR2. Some of you may know me from my 12 years experience at ALA Publishing, working on RDA and AACR2 in addition to many other publishing projects. My role with RDA has expanded, from the production and software development responsibility that I have held from the beginning, to include coordinating the full breadth of ALA Publishings responsibilities for RDA. As we approach the launch of the RDA Toolkit, the website that will house RDA in addition to other helpful cataloging resources and tools, we want to increase the direct communication between the co-publishers of RDA and the cataloging community. I am committed to actively reading and, when helpful, posting responses to questions and concerns raised by catalogers in a variety of venues (like this one) regarding the RDA and the RDA Toolkit. We will soon post registration information for an upcoming RDA Toolkit Webinar offering a repeat of the guided tour of the RDA Toolkit beta site given at ALAs Midwinter Meeting. In addition to the Webinar, the co- publishers are drafting an RDA Toolkit FAQ that will address many of the recent questions asked by attendees at Midwinter, posted to lists, or sent to rdatool...@ala.org. We will post the FAQ URL as soon as it is active. To receive RDA Toolkit announcements and news directly from the co- publishers, please email us at rdatool...@ala.orgmailto:rdatool...@ala.org so we can add you to our RDA Toolkit mailing list. These announcements will come out frequently over the next few months as we approach the June 2010 launch of the RDA Toolkit. Kind regards, Troy Linker Publisher, ALA Digital Reference American Library Association (312) 280-5101
Re: [RDA-L] libraries, society and RDA
As I have followed the posts on this thread over the last few days and, indeed, as I have read posts over the past several months, I find there is a relatively small group of individuals who have moved the discussion away from RDA to the future of libraries and cataloging. Some of this is thought-provoking, sometimes the posts are just annoying. The group is good at pointing out the thought-provoking qualities, so I would like to complain a little bit about the annoying characteristics of these posts. First, there is the question of specifics. I hear words like imagine or references to current experiments. Those of us who have lived with computers for a while know how big the gap between vision and reality can be. The devil is indeed in the details. So, I would like more specific proposals to bridge us to the new world. The work that Diane Hillman is doing with vocabularies and scenarios is an example of that sort of specificity. One of the biggest problems that the group I will call futurists have not dealt with is how we will be able to combine controlled data and uncontrolled data in the world of the internet or even in the catalog in ways that will be useful for our users. What use will the controlled data be in a sea of chaos? Conversely, will we take the metadata produced by publishers and toss it into our catalogs and then expect our users to be able to find things? Automated production of metadata seems to get better and better, but there are limits to what can be done without human intervention. When I hear complaints that catalogs are hidden from internet users, I have to say that library catalogs are more accessible through the web than bibliographic and full-text databases. We can and should do better. I look forward to seeing local catalogs and bibliographic data more easily accessible through web searching. I also look forward to finding less junk on the web. On a more personal note, I have spent my career embracing change in technology and cataloging, and I find the attitude of someof the futurists on this list insulting. In the last year, catalogers have been told to Get off Autocat and that they are creating covered wagons when users want jet planes (actually we are making Duesenbergs when people want Vespas or Skegways). Above all, the cry is largely that we are becoming irrelevant. My reaction is to tell the futurists to 1) come down to earth and start specifying the steps needed to get from our current situation to one in which libraries and controlled metadata will be of more use to our users and 2) stop insulting people for trying to figure out how to do their current jobs as well as plan for the future. If you are saying that we do not know enough specifics to outline that future clearly, then do not disrespect the present. Talk about ways to improve the present (this can include abandoning parts of the present) and preparing for change. I realize that the work we do needs to change in ways that I cannot even envision. MARC needs to be replaced, hopefully by something more useful. I view XML as an intermediate step to something else not because of any technical knowledge but because of my experience with change. Revolutions, however, are never complete replacements of the past or beginnings from a new base point; witness the French and Russian revolutions. The old needs to be incorporated into the new and gradually what is less useful in the new situation will fade away. This happened with the transition from manuscript to print and is happening now as we move to a digital world. The advocates of change on this list need to realize this feature of change and plan for it in the _details_ of how we change. When historians look back at the developments of the last 40 years, they will see many people who resisted change because they were worried about their jobs and about the meaningfulness of their work. They will also see people who adapted to change and moved into new worlds. Finally, they will see people who made careers by decrying the old and advocating, even prophesying, change. I think most of us have no choice but to try to be in the middle category. The others need to very thoughtful about how they present their arguments, for their rhetoric will play a large part in determining how seriously their ideas are taken by others. -- Laurence S. Creider Special Collections Librarian New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 575-646-7227 Fax: 575-646-7477 [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Mon, November 10, 2008 12:42 pm, Diane I. Hillmann wrote: Thank you, Karen, for expressing this so succinctly (which I obviously haven't been able to do). And let me just point out that we have to be able to get that data out on the web without an intermediary that wants to control all our interactions with the outside world (if you don't know who I'm talking about, you haven't been paying attention!) Diane Karen Coyle wrote: Miksa, Shawne wrote
Re: [RDA-L] libraries, society and RDA
John Myers has done an excellent job of summarizing why we need to pay attention to developments beyond MARC and XML and why we need to worry about getting our records out for others to use. In the long run, this is a matter of survival. Karen Coyle refreshingly admits how far there is to go before we have something workable. Like other participants in this list, I have been cataloging for 30 years or so. What I distinctly remember about the introduction of MARC and then OCLC is the cheerful optimism that everything would be digital and that we would no longer need catalogers. I went into the profession anyway. We are finally getting to something like the point that was foretold, and we will still need someone to create metadata (perhaps even catalogers) foreseeable future. The notion that everything will be online was warped out of recognition by the arrival of the web. The same has been true of the notions that all information will be easily accessible and that libraries as physical spaces will wither up and disappear. In fact, those of us attached to educational institutions (especially we humanists) will be stuck with paper for a long time and will need physical spaces to consult physical objects. What all of this adds up to is that 1) the future takes longer to get here than the prophets tell us it will and 2) when it does arrive, that future may resemble the prophecy only in the most general outline. This is what is most frustrating about the direction RDA (this is a list for RDA, is it not?) is taking. RDA seems intent on being something that will be hospitable to all sorts of development but which will provide adequate guidance to none of them. If RDA is published and adopted, it will not be radical enough to cope with new technologies and the web and not be specific enough to be usable by existing libraries without at least one volume of instructions. -- Laurence S. Creider Special Collections Librarian New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 575-646-7227 Fax: 575-646-7477 [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Mon, November 10, 2008 5:38 pm, Myers, John F. wrote: The issue is that we hide our catalog records in our catalogs. While the public face of those catalogs is a WebOPAC, this is only an html based interface to the catalog data, an interface that is inherently self contained. The actual records are not searchable via a search originating on the open web. That is, I can't google or yahoo Gone with the Wind along with my locale to discover that my local library has a copy of the book or the movie available. If I have understood anything that Diane Hillmann has said over the past few years it's that this segregation of our catalog records from the larger web is possibly the greatest threat to our relevance in the future. We will be like that island in Dr. Doolittle that breaks off from the mainland and floats, lost, unknown and locked in time, while the rest of the world moves forward. Second to that is the insistence on creating catalog records that, at their core, are still only visually parsable. This needs to be rectified by the creation of cataloging standards and data structures that offer the ability to use programming to machine harvest data, then manipulate and insert it into well formed catalog record shells. This is necessary, not only to address the productivity issues surrounding the explosion of digital resources, but also to keep cataloging current with evolving information management practices which have grown more sophisticated than the essentially linear data structures we inherited from the card catalog and that we use MARC to recreate. We made a huge stride when we went from reproducing a description for each access point in a card catalog to using online systems to build indexes that pointed to a single copy of that description, but where each description holds copies of the access points. It is time to evolve to the next level, where there is a single copy of each of the access points and then the descriptions point to them (and probably more that I haven't quite comprehended yet). Of course half the time I don't quite follow all the ins and outs and another third of the time I'm afraid that my profession is going to morph beyond recognition (and possibly my abilities). But the sixth of the time that I really get it, I'm excited enough to hope. (With apologies if I've wandered somewhat from the initial premise or if I've misrepresented Diane.) John Myers, Catalog Librarian Schaffer Library, Union College Schenectady NY 12308 [EMAIL PROTECTED] 518-388-6623 From: Resource Description and Access / Resource Description and Access on behalf of Miksa, Shawne [snip] This idea of hoarding and hiding is difficult to understand as it makes it sound as if librarians, and especially those who catalog, are cave dwellers who can't speak.
Re: [RDA-L] Library of Congress response to LCWG
On Mon, July 21, 2008 9:37 am, Ed Jones wrote: I don't know how many others see the future this way, but when I think about FRBR and RDA a decade down the road, it's as a structure for linking resource descriptions and, increasingly, resources. ... In other words, I can see FRBR/RDA thriving, but I don't see library catalogs (other than possibly as linking mechanisms to data about a subset of offline resources). Ed Jones National University (San Diego) I think you are way too optimistic. Knowledgeable researchers, particularly in the humanities, will continue to prefer controlled searching when possible. The offline resources may be a subset, but they will remain an important subset for humanists who need monographs, unique archival materials, scholarly journals in certain fields, rare materials whose physical nature is important, and the many, many materials that will remain undigitized, particularly from the developing countries, that will remain important for scholars of all types. If you want to find out about Kenya or Panama, you will need much more than e-resources until those countries have a sufficiently large e-infrastructure and sufficient economic development to enable many people to have access to that e-infrastructure. Without those conditions, anyone who wishes to disseminate information in those cultures will need paper means. Eventually, material that has not been digitized will be lost as part of our cultural heritage, as material that did not make the transition from scroll to codex was lost. That will not be in our lifetimes, however. -- Laurence S. Creider Head, General Cataloging Unit Special Collections Librarian New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 575-646-7227 Fax: 575-646-7477 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [RDA-L] Comments from Martha M. Yee on the April 10, 2008 version of the STATEMENT OF INTERNATIONAL CATALOGUING PRINCIPLES 1 of 2
Jonathan Rochkind and Kevin Randall are correct. I was simply not thinking clearly. Laurence S. Creider On Mon, June 2, 2008 3:30 pm, Jonathan Rochkind wrote: Robert Maxwell wrote: [R Maxwell] I do not agree that authority records in some form will still be needed in a FRBR-ized catalog. If each entity has one and only one entity record in the database, then that one entity record serves all the purposes of the current authority records. When cataloging an edition of Homer's Iliad in English I would need at least: one work entity record (Iliad) one person entity record for the author (Homer) I think perhaps when Laurence Creider says authority records in some form will still be needed, he was thinking of this person entity record and work entity record. That is perhaps an authority record in some form. Laurence, can you confirm? This is certainly how I've seen people talk about this sort of thing before, assuming that the person entity _is_ the evolution of the person authority record, and thus considered some form of authority record. Jonathan -- Laurence S. Creider Head, General Cataloging Unit Special Collections Librarian New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 575-646-7227 Fax: 575-646-7477 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [RDA-L] Comments from Martha M. Yee on the April 10, 2008 version of the STATEMENT OF INTERNATIONAL CATALOGUING PRINCIPLES 1 of 2
I think that I understand what Bob Maxwell is saying, and I agree with him that 4.1 and 4.2 could be construed to mean that only manifestation-level records should be made. A statement to the effect that other levels of the FRBR hierarchy should or could be represented in catalogs would be a good idea. The problem is that the ICP have to look backwards as well as forwards because some countries and probably many libraries will not be able to make use of the World Wide Web and developments in computer software that the Anglo-American cataloging community can. The ICP should also refrain from committing itself to particular technological solutions, just as the Paris Principles tried to do. After all, the relational database is probably not the last word in computer systems. Still, since the ICP are so clearly based on FRBR principles, some bow to the entity-relationship model's impact on the form of catalogs would be a good idea. I think that Jonathan Rochkind made a better reply to Bob's point about authority records than I could. I am learning a great deal from the comments of others. Thanks. -- Laurence S. Creider Head, General Cataloging Unit Special Collections Librarian New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 575-646-7227 Fax: 575-646-7477 [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Mon, June 2, 2008 3:14 pm, Robert Maxwell wrote: Like Larry, I apologize for sending this to two lists, but my response to the original (sent to RDA-L), has a lot more to do with FRBR than RDA ... -Original Message- From: Resource Description and Access / Resource Description and Access [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Laurence Creider Sent: Monday, June 02, 2008 2:28 PM To: RDA-L@INFOSERV.NLC-BNC.CA Subject: Re: [RDA-L] Comments from Martha M. Yee on the April 10, 2008 version of the STATEMENT OF INTERNATIONAL CATALOGUING PRINCIPLES 1 of 2 [M Yee] Secondly, 4.2 carves into stone the approach to the multiple versions problem that has created so much havoc in existing catalogs. 4.2 is completely contrary to the general objective of the convenience of the user. [L Creider] Insofar as I understand this point, I disagree with it. A separate record for each manifestation is a good idea for both user and librarian because the practice more clearly represents what is held by a library. The problem with so many current catalog displays is not the rules, but the display. More adequate displays or better use of qualifiers would allow users to pick the manifestation they need without having to guess from incomplete data. FRBR at least allows records at the works level would allow users to then search for the manifestation they need by going down a level in the hierarchy. For example, our catalog, like others, contains runs of serials that are in paper, microfilm, and electronic formats. These different expressions need adequate description, but the user would be better served by encountering first a work-level record that would provide the call numbers of the various parts of the run. [R Maxwell] I, too, am greatly concerned that 4.1 and 4.2 carve into stone the current method of doing things, i.e., single records that cover all of the FRBR entities. In an entity-relation database, we would not have a bibliographic description ... based on the item as representative of the manifestation ... [including] attributes inherited from the contained work(s) and expression(s). It is my contention that we would instead have separate work, expression, manifestation, and item records, and separate records for all the other entities as well, all linked by specified relationship links. This is NOT the scenario described in 4.1 and 4.2. The problem with 4.2 is NOT that it doesn't call for a separate record for each manifestation-it obviously does-but that, in combination with 4.1, it sounds a great deal like that is ALL it calls for, with no separate work or expression records or for that matter, no records for any of the other FRBR entities. [M Yee] Thirdly, the existing principles are also preferable to the proposed new principles because they are not nearly as tied down to existing catalog technology as the proposed new principles are. The new principles make explict reference to concepts such as authority records which may not even exist any more in a FRBR-ized catalog designed to exist on the semantic web in which each entity is represented by a URI. [L Creider] The Paris Principles with its reference to uniform heading, entry, conventional name, reflect the cataloging terminology of their time. Authority records in some form will still be needed even in a FRBR-ized catalog. Bare URIs will not be adequate because there will still need to be references from variant forms. I think that the ICP strike a good balance between reflecting current conditions (which internationally range from book and card catalogs to experimental catalogs making use of the latest
Re: Application profiles and RDA
With all due respect, I don't think your reply deals with Jay Smith's point, But we should not abandon what we are already doing well because some intriguing slide presentation seduces us into thinking we should offer the entire universe. What worries me most about RDA is that it will be so broad that I will not be able to use it to do the cataloging I need to do to perform basic user tasks such as finding, selecting, navigating, collocating, let alone new tasks. Of course, what we hear from Diane Hillman is that RDA won't allow us to take advantage of the new ways of gathering and processing information either. The other point I worry about is that some of what you have talked about with RDA does not seem like it will enable me to distinguish one edition from another or one work from another without careful examination of texts. The library catalog allows me to do that without examining the text (or sound recording or visual work) itself. When I add this sort of confusion to the behavior of research library administrators who are buying into the notion that cataloging and the tasks it serves are irrelevant, I come close to despair about the future of the organization of information. -- Laurence S. Creider Head, General Cataloging Unit Special Collections Librarian New Mexico State University Las Cruces, NM 88003 Work: 505-646-4707, 505-646-7227 Fax: 505-646-7477 [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Thu, October 11, 2007 6:16 pm, Karen Coyle wrote: How do we measure what we are already doing well? It's one of the questions that is coming up in the LC work on the Future of Bibliographic Control. I had hoped to find some answers in user studies, and even got a copy of: Donald O. Case. Looking for Information: A survey of research on information seeking, needs, and behavior. 2nd edition. This is mainly about studies of how people seek information (not how they use library catalogs, and I was hoping for more of that latter). There are some interesting conclusions, however, such as one analysis that identifies these behaviors: starting, chaining, browsing, differentiating, monitoring, extracting (p. 260) Then someone adding these on to that list: accessing, networking, verifying, information managing (p.261) Someone else came up with this: identifying, locating or accessing, consulting or reading (p. 263) In other words, when research is done, there are a variety of models that arise for information seeking. There's nothing to say that they are more legitimate than the FRBR tasks, but that really begs the question, which is: what is our unit of measure? And where is our evidence? What I do like about this survey is that it is about information seeking and not just catalog use, although I would like to see a good discussion of how the two intersect. In any case, I do recommend the introductory chapters of this book as a review of theory -- kind of a refresher course. kc Jay Smith wrote: I would say two things. One is that, as regards the Statement of Responsibility, its direct use to the libary user is unclear in most cases; rather, it is needed by a cataloger to help make distinctions among similar authors and aimilar titles, so that library users can find what they want and FIND LIKE THINGS TOGETHER. Another is that we cannot possibly satisfy all users' information needs. We may be able to identify means of satisfying MORE of them, or we may in fact find that with the needs clearly stated we ALREADY DO go some way toward satisfying them. But we should not abandon what we are already doing well because some intriguing slide presentation seduces us into thinking we should offer the entire universe. Jay Towne Smith Senior Cataloger San Francisco Public Library [EMAIL PROTECTED]
