One valuable use of LCSH in the Semantic Web would be as a source of synonyms for concepts, especially synonyms that represent obsolete or archaic terms for concepts. (Unfortunately, such terms aren't explicitly coded as such in LCSH, though this could be remedied over time.) One example: Today I was looking at a publication on families from the 1930 census, which consistently referred to the "marital condition" of the head of family rather than the "marital status". Sure enough, LCSH had a UF reference from "marital condition". While LCSH is only a century old, the practice of "literary warrant" helps guarantee that terms from any period get incorporated into the scheme as they are discovered in works being cataloged.
Ed Jones
PS: the Wikipedia entry for LCSH is embarrassingly spare. A useful project for LIS students would be to enhance LIS-related topics in Wikipedia.
Received on Wed Nov 18 2009 - 11:19:10 EST