The distinctions still make sense, but we need to use a different way to
talk about them to make sense of them. I have been trying to get my
thoughts straight on this for a while to write something up, but here's
some things out of my brain at the moment:
Given: A creator (person/corporate body) heading is an identifier for
that creator when it is a 100 in a MARC authority
When we use that heading in a bib 100, we are saying that the identifier
for that work (or manifestation or expression; the distinction is not
clear in our current practice) incorporates this Creator identifier. Ie,
the Work Identifier is: "Darwin, Charles, 1809-1882. On the origin of
species
<https://catalog.library.jhu.edu/ipac20/ipac.jsp?session=Y18425P6178G0.12876&profile=general&uri=link=3100038%7E%21249833%7E%213100001%7E%213100002&aspect=alpha&menu=search&ri=16&source=%7E%21horizon&term=Darwin%2C+Charles%2C+1809-1882.+On+the+origin+of+species&index=PAUTHOR>."
By putting "Darwin, Charles 1809-1882" in the 100 in a bib for "Origin
of Species", we are establishing the manifestation identifier for this
bib, and/or establishing/linking to the work identifier.
This Work (and/or Bib and/or Expression) identifier is important,
because in current practice, it is the only identifier we have for
establishing relationships from _other_ entities (ie, records) to this
one. [The fact that we sometimes have confusion over whether this is a
work or expression or manifestation identifier is a problem, because it
means we can't be clear about which of these entities we are
establishing a relationship to!]
On the other hand, when we include a person heading (that is, the
identifier for a person) in a 700 of a bib, we are establishing a
relationship from the entity represented in the bib (manifestation?
expression? In some cases work!!?) to that person identified. We are in
fact doing this with a 100 too--a 100 serves too purposes. But a 700
serves only one, it establishes a relationship but does NOT define the
identifier for the entity cataloged in the bib.
So the distinction is still important, I believe. But talking about
"main entry" and "added entry" helps nobody actually understand the
important distinction! It leads to confusion not only among students,
but among those teaching cataloging and those doing professional
cataloging as well.
Jonathan
Diane I. Hillmann wrote:
> Suzanne:
>
> I think part of the problem is that the distinctions between a 100
> and a 700 made sense when what we were doing was creating catalog
> cards, but those distinctions are probably no longer the ones we want
> or need to make. We want to know which are authors, which are
> illustrators, which are editors, etc. We may want to distinguish the
> first author from the other 5 (or 50) for citation purposes but
> different tags may not be necessary to do that. If we want computers
> to make the distinctions that we and our users want, we have to give
> them the data upon which to act. Encoding relator information is
> probably a good start, but determining a finer level of
> responsibility may be more difficult (and may indeed be more than our
> users want and more than we can afford to provide).
>
> There's a lot to sort out, no doubt about it.
>
> Diane
>
>
>> And the comment on one of these threads mentions keeping the user in
>> mind
>> not the rules.
>>
>> More and more my user is another computer. Making my work needing more
>> granularity for a computer to know what the data means.
>>
>> Is the main entry used for display mainly or is there something else
>> that
>> the main entry provides? Does it help identify a work? If the
>> computer find
>> the name string in the 100 vs in the 700 is there something the program
>> "knows" about that name string? I guess I can tell a computer would
>> appreciate the name string being in a 600 vs a 100 or 700. But with
>> out, say
>> the relator code with the name in the 700, is the computer have some
>> knowledge that that name is "less" responsible? And would that even be
>> correct!? No. 100 and 700 can both be essentially responsible.
>>
>>
>> On 7/11/07, Sharon Foster <fostersm1_at_gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> And unfortunately cataloging is still being taught like this. My
>>> instructor, who I consider one of the better ones at my school, kept
>>> referring to "main entry" and "added entry," and how long it takes to
>>> search 10,000 records. But, said I, we're not really searching each
>>> record, are we? We're really looking up in an index of all the
>>> records. And what is the significance of a "main entry," when any
>>> field may be defined as an access point in the database? It seems to
>>> me that we are retaining an awful lot of concepts and terminology that
>>> meant something in the card catalog days, but are somewhat less than
>>> useful now.
>>>
>>> On 7/11/07, Suzanne Pilsk <suzanne.pilsk_at_gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> I'm always flummoxed when it comes to the decision : is the
>>>> information
>>> I'm
>>>> putting in just detail vs is it actually providing access.
>>>>
>>>> It comes out when something "interesting" is wanting to be done
>>>> with the
>>>> data and it turns out that details were skipped because they weren't
>>> seen as
>>>> important access points.
>>>>
>>>> Anyone who tries to repurpose metadata sees the inconsistencies
>>>> and can
>>> get
>>>> very frustrated when trying to pull out or pull together data
>>> differently
>>>> than, say, the established index of an ILS.
>>>>
>>>> Case: Whining recently about old old MARC records that had very
>>>> sketch
>>>> titles and often didn't include authors in 100 fields because the
>>>> rules
>>>> didn't make you do it. It was good enough then. Now it isn't
>>>>
>>>> Case: Georgraphic grouping of data but it turns out the fixed
>>>> field for
>>> ctry
>>>> was skipped because the ILS at the time didn't do anything with it
>>> anyway.
>>>> Wasn't an access point - why look up those pesky three letters?
>>>>
>>>> Case: Grouping publishers together with dates to approach for copy
>>>> right
>>>> permissions; whoops, abbreviated publishers get us nowhere. The
>>> Association
>>>> in 260 $b ugh! Well, it isn't an "access point" why bother.
>>>>
>>>> Case: Grouping personal names together - without relator codes -
>>>> is the
>>>> person in the 700 an author of the work or some other "role"? A
>>>> detail
>>> that
>>>> was not used because access was for the name not the role
>>>>
>>>> Anyway, you all get my point. The problem I have is when is a detail
>>>> actually turn into an access point and when is "good enough" now turn
>>> out to
>>>> be useless down the road?
>>>>
>>>> I think what I took away from the meeting at LC was that I need to
>>>> give
>>> up
>>>> on the touch the record once and walk away. Instead, the record
>>>> might
>>> be
>>>> touched and retouched over and over as more data becomes
>>>> available. But
>>>> that sounds very expensive.
>>>>
>>>> Yet still, I go back to my cubical and I do.... what? Go fast and
>>>> hope
>>> that
>>>> what I've decided was good enough is actually okay and that later I
>>> won't be
>>>> cursing myself because I can't provide subset of my data by something
>>> that
>>>> seems so obvious to that future me?
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Sharon M. Foster
>>> [affiliations omitted]
>>>
>>> Any opinions expressed here are entirely my own.
>
--
Jonathan Rochkind
Sr. Programmer/Analyst
The Sheridan Libraries
Johns Hopkins University
410.516.8886
rochkind (at) jhu.edu
Received on Thu Jul 12 2007 - 10:08:36 EDT