No full-text available
To read the full-text of this research,
you can request a copy directly from the author.
Thinking Professionals
Abstract
Cataloguing education has been the focus of definition and debate for over a century. Moving beyond cataloguing theory and the creation of records, to the management and process of producing catalogues, increases the complexity of demands placed on professionals and educators. As this article will argue, graduates need to understand their catalogues and integrated systems holisti-cally. This requires a knowledge of each element, of standards governing the creation and maintenance of records, and of the relationship between the record and the catalogue and/or its constituent network. Moreover, the professional must know these things critically, and beyond mere acceptance of standards, so that the catalogue can effectively perform its mediating function between the collection and users.
Considerando la universalidad una característica intencionada pero no exenta de problemas en los sistemas de clasificación como la Clasificación Decimal Universal (CDU), se presenta una propuesta de aplicación informática que capacite la creación de adaptaciones locales de la CDU, según los intereses de las comunidades de diversos contextos, y que permita una interoperabilidad semántica con otros contextos utilizando para ello un mapeo con las tablas oficiales del Master Reference File (MRF) a modo de lenguaje pivote. El trabajo también presenta recursos científicos y teóricos sobre sesgos estructurales y lingüísticos de los sistemas de organización del conocimiento, haciendo especial hincapié en el caso de la CDU, con la finalidad de presentar herramientas para poder corregirlos en las adaptaciones locales que pudieran realizarse. Se considera que propuestas críticas como la presente constituyen una alternativa a la visión tecnicista y aséptica que pretende impulsar la relevancia de sistemas de organización del conocimiento tradicionales como la CDU en entornos digitales.
Can a catalog “care” about its users? This question, introduced at the first Ethics of Information Organization conference in 2009, asked whether catalogs adhere to the ethic of care, the theory put forward by Tronto (1994) and others that calls for context and flexibility in ethical decision-making. This keynote address for the 4th International Conference on the Ethics of Information & Knowledge Organization expands on that question, adapting the notion of the “uncanny valley” (Mori 1970), where the ability for a catalog to “care” is disrupted by ethical decisions that cause conceptual violence for its users. This keynote address provides an informal summary of the first three Ethics in Information Organization conferences, identifying themes that have been acted upon in practice, ethical challenges knowledge organization continue to face, and new challenges that have emerged, demonstrating that a “caring” catalog is still a work in progress.
Critical cataloguing aims to study cases of social injustice, misrepresentation, negative biases, offensive terminologies, and hegemonic and oppressive hierarchical structures in the representation of communities and identities in knowledge organization systems. The aim of this study is to provide a critical analysis of the representation of sexual orientation in the Portuguese Universal Decimal Classification, grounded in a qualitative content analysis method. The results show that the principle of exhaustiveness does not manifest itself in the representation of sexual orientation. The absence of the term ‘heterosexuality’ mirrors the heteronormative hegemony, while the minoritization of ‘lesbianism’, but not of ‘male homosexuality’, reflects the patriarchal hegemony. The representation of sexual orientation carries the historical pathologization of sexual orientations other than heterosexuality. The Portuguese Universal Decimal Classification conveys negative biases and misrepresents sexual orientation in a way that is irreconcilable with present-day reality. Critical thinking must be encouraged within the library community and the Universal Decimal Classification should be promptly revised and updated.
Purpose: Librarians always use Subject Headings and thesauruses as Controlled Vocabulary. This means that catalogers must select a single subject for a single document when referring to these sources. But by looking at most library catalogs, such an assumption is not confirmed, and, for instance, two catalogers might have attributed two different subjects to a single document. The question is why this happens. Why are two catalogers/indexers who see the exact text and the same Standard Subject Heading or Controlled Vocabulary unable to agree on the subject matter of the document?
Methodology: Since the main problems of the representation of documents are concerned with meaning and language, the subject analysis is explored here from a philosophical perspective. It thereby provides an understanding of the subject analysis process. The presentation of this analysis is based on the framework of Gadamer's hermeneutic and Wittgenstein's interpretive theory.
Findings: The SH indicates or refers to the location of an object/idea/concept. A concept is a unit of thought. The semantic content of a concept can be re-expressed by a combination of other and different concepts, which may vary from one language or culture to another. What the particular body of information is about, in a document, constitutes its subject. A subject can be defined as any concept or combination of concepts representing a theme in a document. The content of a book and the prior knowledge of the catalogers allow two or more possible but unique interpretations to form, and our perception automatically reverses between the content of the book and its subject.
Conclusion: Discussing meaning-making and subject analysis as an epistemological concept and as found, for instance, in cataloging and indexing which reflect expressions of that prejudice, may provide an opportunity to indexers and catalogers to explore the interpretive aspects and hermeneutic uncertainty and consider as a concept in a part of their field of work.
Value: This paper shows a framework for analyzing the document's subject matter and constraints that influence catalogers/indexers.
Keywords: Subject Analysis; Subject indexing; Philosophical Perspective; Meaning-Making; Uncertainty; Epistemological Aspect; Hermeneutics; Gadamer, Hans- Georg; Wittgenstein, Ludwig; Language Issues
چکیده فارسی
یکی از مهم ترین مسائل ذخیره و بازیابی اطلاعات ، سازماندهی مدارک و از جلوه های شناخته شدۀ آن فهرست ها هستند که از قدیم در کتابخانه ها به صورت فهرستبرگه با آن مواجه بوده ایم و در نظام های برخط به صورت پیشینه های کتابشناختی ، چکیده، و نمایه، و مانند آن مورد استفادۀ کاربران قرار می¬گیرد . مروری بر قواعد و استانداردهای فهرستنویسی نشان می دهد که هدف غایی همۀ آنها یکدست سازی کار فهرست نویسی است و بین المللی بودن قواعد نیز حاکی از آن است که یکسانی و همگونی عملکرد فهرستنویسان نه تنها در مقیاس کتابخانه ای واحد یا کتابخانه های یک کشور ، بلکه در مقیاس جهانی حائز اهمیت است . سرعنوان های موضوعی و طرح های رده بندی نیز با این پیش فرض تدوین شده اند که ارائه اطلاعات مشابه از الگویی واحد پیروی کند و بدین ترتیب دستیابی به اطلاعات با جامعیت بیشتری مهیا شود . کتابداران همیشه از سرعنوان های موضوعی و اصطلاحنامه ها به عنوان ابزار کنترل واژگان استفاده
می کنند. بدان معنا که با مراجعه به این ابزارها می بایست برای مدرکی واحد موضوعی واحد انتخاب شود. اما با نگاهی به اکثر فهرستهای کتابخانه ای چنین فرضی تأیید نمیشود و گاه دیده شده که دو فهرستنویس دو موضوع متفاوت را به یک مدرک واحد نسبت دادهاند. پرسش اینجاست که فهرستنویسان چگونه تصمیم می گیرند که موضوعی را به یک کتاب منتسب کنند، چه عواملی بر آن تاثیر می گذارد و چرا دو فهرستنویس یا نمایهساز که متنی یکسان در دست دارند و ابزار استاندارد واحدی را به عنوان زبان معیار مورد وارسی قرار می دهند در مورد موضوع یک مدرک توافق ندارند؟
از آنجایی که مسئله اصلی بازنمایی موضوعی منابع در حیطۀ مطالعات معنا و زبان نیز قابل بررسی است ؛ لذا در این مقاله تحلیل موضوعی از منظر فلسفی بررسی شده و انتخاب موضوع و فرایند تحلیل آن مبتنی بر دو چارچوب تفسیر هرمنوتیکی گادامر و نظریۀ تفسیری ویتگنشتاین مورد مداقه قرار گرفته است. دیدگاههای نظری در حوزۀ فهرستنویسی و نمایهسازی اغلب هم در عمل و هم در آموزش کمتر مورد توجه قرار میگیرند. حال آنکه این گونه مقالات می تواند به دانشجویان علم اطلاعات و دانش شناسی کمک کند تا وقتی به کتابخانه میآیند یا درگیر کار تعیین و تفسیر موضوع کتاب ها و سایر مدارک میشوند فلسفۀ کارشان و عوامل تاثیرگذار را بهتر درک کنند .
This article is based on a presentation from the 2019 North Carolina Serials Conference that described the changing nature of the mentor/mentee relationship in the face of shrinking budgets, downsized technical services departments, and the profession-wide commitment to recruiting librarians at an earlier stage in their professional career. Mentors have had to focus more on the training aspect of said relationships than they did in the past in order to create a fully autonomous colleague. In the presentation, we shared our goals, challenges, and experiences as mentor and mentee in this new paradigm.
This chapter reviews the historical tension between global and local interests in library classifications. More specifically, this chapter presents the concept and characteristics of the reader-interest classifications as they were reported in the literature of the past century, including its alleged advantages and detected shortcomings, in order to discuss their presence and consequences in current cases of reader-interest classifications such as BISAC. Following an implicit post-structuralist approach, issues such as the role of standardization and centralization in these projects, the focus and philosophy underlying the construction of these classifications, and the underlying global interests of the book industry are analyzed in order to determine the social consequences and viability of these local classifications. It is concluded that libraries that consider adopting a reader-interesting classification must really think of the interest of the users (in plural) and not only of the global book industry that dominates the development of the standards.
Cataloging and classification education has been a recurring topic in the library and information science literature since the creation of the first library school toward the end of the nineteenth century. This article examines the literature of the past 20 years, in an era of major changes in the way documents and information transit from their creators to their ultimate users. It concludes by suggesting several aspects of classification education that need to be investigated further, in light of these new circumstances.
This paper presents the results of a study involving graduate students in an accredited library school who had completed a course on monographic cataloging. The purpose of the study was to determine entry-level errors in subject analysis. Records were analyzed for errors in subject cataloging and classification. An examination of the data shows percentages of errors in subject analysis. Strengths and weaknesses in subject analysis and the use of subject analysis tools are addressed. Using the data presented, the author provides insight regarding possible reasons for errors. Recommendations regarding training and education of catalogers are presented.
Future production of qualified first-time catalogers depends on the amount of cooperation between educator/practitioner. Collectively, both educator and practitioner must find common ground in education and preparation for the library student to be fully competent as a cataloger. The proposition of implementing laboratories, curriculum improvement for catalogers, and creation of internships gives the library student a mixture of theory and application, assuring proficiency as a first-time cataloger.