Dewey or
Don’t We?
Cataloging for Small Libraries
Melissa Powell
Head of Technical Services
Windsor-Severance Library District
With thanks to Carol Foreman, Englewood Public Library
What Am I Doing Here?
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Why is this so important?
Cataloging Basics
MARC Records
Weird Stuff
Handy Websites
If you leave with only one thing . . .
Why is this
so
important?
Why Bother?
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The Patrons
The Staff
Interlibrary Loan
New Technology
The Patrons
• Your catalog records should be
accurate so that your patrons
have easy, reliable access to
your collection.
• Your catalog may be the first
“look” a new patron gets of your
library. An organized, accurate
catalog indicates an organized,
helpful library.
The Staff
• Records with accurate and
consistent access points make it
easier for your staff to find the
materials or information the
patrons need.
• The more you make the catalog
more useful to the staff, the more
the staff will see how useful an
experienced cataloger is.
Interlibrary Loan
• Accurate records make it easier
for other libraries to access your
catalog to borrow materials.
• SWIFT and other ILL consortium
programs cannot work with
incomplete, inaccurate, or
incorrect records.
• You really don’t want to be the
library that everyone says “Don’t
do it like they do” when referring
to cataloging records.
New Technology
• Clean, complete, and accurate
records transfer to new systems,
upgrades, and databases much
better and smoother than
inconsistent, incomplete records.
• FRBR—new standards to
accommodate new PACs and
search strategy technology.
– Interactive/intuitive searching
New Technology
• Standards changing over to more user
centered search strategies.
• More “Internet look” on PACs.
– Hotlinks embedded in records.
– Interactive interfaces.
• A need for more “inclusive” language.
– More patron-oriented language, i.e. “book”
instead of “item”.
What can we do?
Most ILS’ will program for global change,
allowing for across the board
replacements of outdated headings,
authors, uniform titles, series, call
numbers. Global change doesn’t work
if the records aren’t consistent.
Cataloging
Basics
Librarians love searching.
Patrons love finding.
Rule #1: The catalog is for
the patron.
What may make perfect sense to you can
be horribly confusing to the patron.
Rule #2: Be consistent.
• If you add a series line to one item, make
sure you add it to all in the series.
• Make sure that you are consistent with your
placement of works by a particular author,
including multiple copies.
• Add notes or headings to make it obvious
why an author may appear in more than one
section.
Rule #3: Play well with
others.
Your catalog has to be understood by
other agencies, networks, and catalogers.
What every record should contain:
The International Standard Bibliographic Description or ISBD
is a set of rules produced by the International Federation of
Library Associations (IFLA) to describe a wide range of
library materials, within the context of a catalog. These
rules organize the bibliographic description of an item in
the following areas:
• Area 1: title and statement of responsibility (for example:
author, editor, artist).
• Area 2: edition.
• Area 3: material-dependent information (for example, the
scale of a map or the duration of a sound recording).
• Area 4: publication and distribution.
• Area 5: physical description (for example: number of pages
in a book or number of CDs in the same jewel case).
• Area 6: series.
• Area 7: notes.
• Area 8: standard number (ISBN, ISSN).
Acronyms, the librarian’s friend
ISBN
International Standard Book Number
ISSN
International Standard Serial Number
LCCN
Library of Congress Cataloging Number
LCSH
Library of Congress Subject Heading
GSAFD
Guidelines for Subject Access to individual works of
Fiction, Drama, etc.
Subject Access to Fiction
Used regularly today by Library of
Congress and OCLC. Part of the
move to more user-oriented
searching.
“It was a novel about farmers in Virginia
during the revolutionary war and one of
the daughters was a mistress to
George III.”
Helpful tools for Cataloging
Genre Subject Headings
http://alcme.oclc.org/gsafd
Translating LC call numbers to Dewey
http://www.questionpoint.org/crs/html/help/en/ask/ask_map_lcctoddc.html
Library of Congress Authorities file
http://authorities.loc.gov/
Dewey Decimal System
http://www.oclc.org/dewey/
MARC Records
• MARC stands for MAchine Readable
Cataloging. MARC is simply a
standard for recording bibliographic
information that was once widely
found on catalog cards and putting
that information into machinereadable form. MARC is a world
standard for the recording of
bibliographic information.
Why MARC?
--A standardized system
• You isolate your library if you “invent” your own.
No one else can understand, and often are unable
to read a “homegrown” system
• Using the MARC standard also enables libraries
to make use of commercially available library
automation systems to manage library operations.
• The MARC standard also allows libraries to
replace one system with another with the
assurance that their data will still be compatible.
I outsource my cataloging. Why do I still need
to know about MARC records?
• No source is going to be able to supply you with
pre-cataloged MARC records for everything that
you buy or own. So, you'll need some idea of how
to do original MARC cataloging.
• If you outsource, the vendor will ask you which
field and subfield your local call # is in, you will
need to be able to tell them. You may be asked
which fields you want to have searchable in
keyword searching; will you know what they mean
when they say 6XX?
MARC Record Types
• Authority records -- MARC authority records
provide information about individual names,
subjects, and uniform titles. It establishes an
authorized form of each heading, with references
as appropriate from other forms of the heading.
• Bibliographic records -- MARC bibliographic
records describe the intellectual and physical
characteristics of bibliographic resources (books,
sound recordings, video recordings, and so forth).
• Holdings records -- MARC holdings records
provide copy-specific information on a library
resource (call number, shelf location, and so
forth).
Bibliographic/Holding Record
Title Indicators
First indicator (Tracing/indexing indicator):
• 0=Title as main entry
• 1=Title as added entry
Second indicator (Filing indicator). Tells
the PAC how many letters to skip.
• “The” Skip 4 letters
• “A” Skip 2 letters
• “An” Skip 3 letters
Weird Stuff
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Music CDs
DVDs
Videocassettes
Kits
Books with CDs & DVDs
Software
Equipment
Handy Websites
• Z30.50 Libraries
http://staff.library.mun.ca/staff/toolbox/z3950hosts.htm
• Colorado Association of Libraries Technical
Services and Automation Division
http://www.cal-webs.org/tsad.html
• MARC Specialized Tools
http://www.loc.gov/marc/marctools.html
If you leave here with only one thing . . .
As long as you are
consistent, follow basic
cataloging rules and
MARC standards, your
catalog will be ready for
whatever comes along.