I believe that Mr Weiss has misunderstood the thrust of several of RLG's
comments. Our concern has not been with uniform title authorities as they
have developed to serve the needs of traditional cataloging, but with the
piecemeal and uncoordinated addition of elements to the authority record to
allow it to serve as a carrier of FRBR-related work and expression
information. As the ultimate source of some of these comments I would like
to expand on them.
Of course we perfectly well aware that work and, to some extent,
expression uniform titles have been included in authority records since
the beginning. This has been warranted by cataloging rules and practices
pretty well "since time immemorial". However, the purpose of constructing
authority records for work uniform titles has almost entirely been to serve
a collocation function in arranging catalog entries. We do not believe
that authority records have heretofore generally been seen as a repository
for the kind of authoritative descriptive and other information about works
and expressions in themselves that the FRBR analysis implies.
We are of the view that the current proposal, while not in itself
objectionable, opens the door to requests to include additional
work-related information in the authority record -- information whose aim
is not to improve the collocating function of uniform titles, but to act as
the authoritative repository of information about the work and the
expression. The inclusion of some of this information would be problematic
and also highly contentious. To give an off-the-wall example, subject
access points are quite clearly a property of the work entity in the FRBR
analysis and not of the manifestation. In a coherent model of
bibliographic information, therefore, it would make sense to associate
subject access points with the work record rather than with the
manifestation record. If the authority is going to serve as the work
record, then it follows that the authority format should be expanded to
enable subject access points to be associated with a uniform title. This
would, of course, entail major changes to the structure of the authority
record and would be highly disruptive. But it is a logical consequence of
the line of thinking implicit in the proposal.
Our view is that the time is opportune to undertake the analysis required
to determine whether the authority can and should serve as the work and/or
expression record and what changes to the authority are required if it is
determined that it should. The current proposal posits that the authority
record is the right and proper place for work information. We contend that
the logical consequences of this assumption have not yet been adequately
examined and verified.
Our issue with the uniform title for the Hebrew edition of Harry Potter is
similar. Of course the uniform title in the example will normally be
adequate to allow a coherent collocation of entries in a catalog. And as
such it is perfectly valid in a "traditional" uniform title authority
record. If, however, the authority is intended to serve as a FRBR
expression record, this uniform title is not sufficient. The uniform title
as given does NOT identify a particular expression. There can (will) be
multiple translations of Harry Potter into Hebrew, each one of which is, by
definition, a different expression. In order to identify the expression
fully, additional qualifiers will be needed for the expression title, the
most obvious one being the translator's name. Thus our suggestion that in
an expression record, subfield s would normally be present and should thus
be shown in the example.
I wish to stress that RLG has been, and remains, a strong supporter of the
FRBR approach to modelling bibliographic data. The point we wished to make
is that, to ensure the continuing utility and coherence of the authority
system, the use of authority records to carry FRBR information needs to be
studied more fully and carefully than the current proposal suggests has
been done.
Johan Zeeman
Senior Analyst
RLG
"Paul J. Weiss"
<[log in to unmask]> To: [log in to unmask]
Sent by: MARC cc:
<[log in to unmask]> Subject: Re: RLG staff comments on MARBI 2003 Annual materials
06/13/2003 07:49
AM
Please respond to
MARC
Although I agree with many of the RLG comments, I am concerned that a
couple of them show a lack of understanding of cataloging rules and
practices.
>Proposal 2003-04
>----------------
>RLG staff would again like to state this change broadens the scope
>of a MARC21 authority record by including FRBR work level
>information (even if only a standard number for a work). This opens
>the door to inclusion of more FRBR work level information.
>Broadening the scope of authority records to "work" authority
>records really does require a more detailed analysis of
>requirements, and RLG staff hope that MARBI recognizes that.
Authority records for uniform titles have encompassed both works and
expressions since the beginning. For example, the heading "Bible. N.T.
Acts" identifies a work, not an expression.
>In the example for the Hebrew edition of Harry Potter and the
>Chamber of Secrets, the heading is missing $s for
>version/edition/translator information. It seems likely that a
>cataloger would include that in the heading, so the MARC 21 format
>example should reflect that.
Catalogers should generally _not_ be making this sort of addition to this
type of uniform title heading.
Paul
_______________________________________
Paul J. Weiss
Head, Monographs Cataloging Division
Catalog Department
UCSD Libraries
858-534-3537
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_______________________________________
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