I have written elsewhere about the fact that our rules and our cataloging
data are already considerably FRBR-ized and that what is lacking for the
creation of true FRBR-ized catalogs is adequate software support.
("FRBRization: a Method for Turning Online Public Finding Lists into Online
Public Catalogs." Information Technology and Libraries 2005; 24:3:77-95.
[also at the California Digital Library eScholarship Repository,
http://repositories.cdlib.org/postprints/715].) We already collocate all of
the expressions of a work using work identifiers (formerly known as main
entries). However, it is still up to the user to look through all of the
various expressions and manifestations of the work and make decisions about
which one is the most useful.
With the proliferation of methods of reproduction in the 20th century, this
set of all of the various manifestations and expressions of a particular
work has become more and more chaotic, however. At the International
Conference on the Principles & Future Development of AACR in Toronto in
1997, I thought I heard a desire to revise AACR to further FRBR-ize the
rules so that catalogers went beneath work collocation and performed
expression and manifestation collocation to aid users in navigating this
chaos. Instead, RDA seems to be headed toward an increase in chaos by
atomizing the bibliographic description into lists of data elements that are
all tied to the FRBR entity manifestation. As Hal Cain so eloquently put it
in his September 6, 2007, post to Autocat, "Compiled bibliographic
information has greater value than just the value of the separate data."
I have been a vocal critic during this process, but it occurred to me that
people might not really understand what I was talking about without a
demonstration code, an alternative RDA, so to speak. Thus, with the help of
many generous and intelligent friends, whom I acknowledge in the
introduction, I have created such a code, which you can view at
http://myee.bol.ucla.edu. Since it is clear that we need to move toward
more standard ways of coding our data within the sphere of the internet, I
have made a stab at creating an RDF model of my cataloging code, as well.
I'm certain that it is currently a very amateurish effort, as it is my first
data model of any kind, but it might encourage more expert data modelers to
help improve it as a group effort. (I should say that I have already
received considerable help from the most generous topic map expert Alexander
Johannesen). The data modelling process has already been valuable to me in
that it has raised a number of issues that I suspect would arise in any
effort to model the bibliographic universe (a discussion of these, including
Alexander's comments and some from Sara Shatford Layne, can be found at:
http://myee.bol.ucla.edu/rdfmodel.html).
It may well be that catalogers do not have enough information to collocate
items at the expression and manifestation levels, and that the designers of
our current Anglo-American cataloging practices were wiser than we seem to
give them credit for these days in limiting collocation to the work level
except in the case of prolific works, which get some expression collocation.
It may also be that our illustrious leaders have so thoroughly
deprofessionalized cataloging that there is no longer any personnel
available to carry out this user service. If either or both of those
propositions are the case, I would suggest that we abandon the current RDA
development process and work instead on designing an effective RDF (or topic
map?) model of our current cataloging rules and our millions of existing
cataloging records.
The Yee rules also contain some suggestions for reforming our practices in
other ways to bring our entity definitions into closer alignment both with
those of our users and with those of our colleagues outside the
Anglo-American world, in order to facilitate better international
cooperation in creating a virtual international authority file.
So, with some trepidation, I put this forth for you all to tear apart
(smile). Please send comments to the RDA, FRBR, and NGC4LIB lists, to my
email address (myee_at_ucla.edu) and/or post them to my blog at:
http://yeecatrule.wordpress.com/
Thanks for your consideration!
Martha
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Martha M. Yee
Cataloging Supervisor
UCLA Film & Television Archive
1015 N. Cahuenga Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90038-2616
323-462-4921 x27
323-469-9055 (fax)
myee_at_ucla.edu (Email at work)
Campus mail:
302 E. Melnitz
132306
http://myee.bol.ucla.edu (Web page)
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
"You have a dollar. I have a dollar. We swap. Now you have my dollar and I
have your dollar. We are not better off. You have an idea. I have an idea.
We swap. Now you have two ideas and I have two ideas. Both are richer. When
you gave, you have. What I got, you did not lose. That’s cooperation"—Jimmy
Durante quoted in Schnozzola, by Gene Fowler, 1951, p. 207-208.
Received on Fri Nov 30 2007 - 11:09:12 EST