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Before $v was implemented in MARC 6XX fields, the form subdivision went in $x. I remember long ago being told by someone at LC that it was recommended practice to follow a topical $x with something else, e.g. $x History and criticism, when the term in $x would otherwise be last and could be mistaken for a form subdivision. That still seems to me like a wise idea.

Stephen

On Tue, Mar 31, 2020 at 2:49 PM Adam L Schiff <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
I think 
Athena $c (Greek deity) $v Art $v Congresses
COULD be correct if the publication contains a significant amount of reproductions of art depicting Athena.  In other words, if the conference papers have a lot of illustrations with some commentary, then theoretically $v Art could be correct.  But most likely it should be $x Art in the case of a conference proceeding.

Adam Schiff
University of Washington Libraries

From: Program for Cooperative Cataloging <[log in to unmask]> on behalf of Charles Croissant <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, March 31, 2020 9:32 AM
To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: $v Art vs $x Art
 
Dear Yang,

you are so right to point the focus here to the users of our records and away from us as catalogers. Your insight begs the question, Why are we as catalogers making all these subtle distinctions if we have no way of making them manifest to our users?

I guess we have always been cataloging for some utopian future where all the data we so carefully encode will somehow become visible/useful to the users of our records. But I don't know whether we are any closer to realizing that goal today than we were at the inception of MARC. I would definitely be interested to hear whether Bibframe or other linked data initiatives provide a path towards making  such distinctions as $x Art vs. $v Art visible to users.

Charles


From: Program for Cooperative Cataloging <[log in to unmask]> on behalf of Yang Wang <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, March 31, 2020 10:58 AM
To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: [External] Re: [PCCLIST] $v Art vs $x Art
 

Dear Charles,

 

Thanks for sharing your observation and experience in this matter! The hyphenated phrase in your first sentence suddenly dawned on me that the subtle difference between the two is mostly invisible to OPAC users. I say mostly, because a few users may still want to see associated MARC bib records.

 

A few institutions are not using MARC anymore. I don’t know how catalogers distinguish $v Art and $x Art as subdivisions. I was just wondering if those who use bibframe or some other types of programs for cataloging might be able to answer that and solve the “puzzle” for us. How do they convert such text strings to MARC format?

 

Admittedly, for library users’ sake, the use of lcgft in added 655s can help alleviate the problem.

 

Best regards,

 

Yang   

 

From: Program for Cooperative Cataloging <[log in to unmask]> On Behalf Of Charles Croissant
Sent: Tuesday, March 31, 2020 10:59 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [PCCLIST] $v Art vs $x Art

 

Dear Yang,

 

I'm sure you are correct that problems crept in in the course of trying to convert the 650 string Athena (Greek deity) in art to a 600 00 Athena (Greek deity)--Art.

 

An additional thought:

Aside from the text of H1100 which you reference, another problem at work here is that OCLC's validation algorithm is not (yet) sophisticated enough to fully distinguish between correct and incorrect use of $v in the situation you describe.

 

Currently, both strings

 

600 00 Athena $c (Greek deity) $x Art $v Congresses

and

600 00 Athena $c (Greek deity) $v Art $v Congresses

 

will control/validate in OCLC, leading catalogers to assume that the subfielding $v Art $v Congresses is correct.

 

It seems to me that generally, one can only make one statement about form in a given subject string, meaning that it is very rare to have two subfield $v's in succession, and generally, the subfield $v will be the final subdivision in the string.

 

I know that there are some exceptions, such as under --Bibliography, for example sh 99001291 $v Bibliography $v Exhibitions (though I have sometimes wondered if the coding here shouldn't properly be $x Bibliography $v Exhibitions).

 

All of this points up the difficulties catalogers have long struggled with in making the distinction between form and topicality in subject strings.

 

Charles Croissant

Saint Louis University

 


From: Program for Cooperative Cataloging <[log in to unmask]> on behalf of Yang Wang <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, March 31, 2020 9:07 AM
To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: [External] Re: [PCCLIST] $v Art vs $x Art

 

Given that these bibs are rather old. It is entirely possible that catalogers didn’t make such mistakes. It was perhaps caused by OCLC’s quality control algorithms when they tried to convert

 

650 #0 Athena (Greek deity) in art $v Congresses

650 #0 Athena (Greek deity) in art $v Exhibitions

 

to the current headings, resulting in a mixed bag. Just a thought. In any case, I suggest that H 1110 be edited either to list $x Art by itself or insert it in the current instruction.

 

Yang   

 

From: Program for Cooperative Cataloging <[log in to unmask]> On Behalf Of Richard Amelung
Sent: Tuesday, March 31, 2020 9:02 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [PCCLIST] $v Art vs $x Art

 

$v or $x   Art

 

How many times have we been to a museum, looked at an object and said, "But IS it art?"      Unfortunately for Art, we have a code for what it IS and what it's ABOUT, but none recording the critic's eye indicating what it ISN'T!

 

😉

 

Richard C. Amelung, Ph. D., M.A.L.S. 

Professor Emeritus of Legal Research

Vincent C. Immel Law Library

Saint Louis University School of Law

100 N. Tucker Blvd.

St. Louis, MO   63101-1930

Phone:  314.977.2743

Fax:   314.977.3966

 

 


From: Program for Cooperative Cataloging <[log in to unmask]> on behalf of Salisbury, Preston <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, March 31, 2020 7:56 AM
To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: [External] Re: $v Art vs $x Art

 

Maybe someone thought an exhibition was a congress of pictures? That only requires not understanding what a congress is and not knowing that there is a perfectly good subject heading that already exists.

 

Or maybe x and v are just too close on the keyboard and the cataloger pushed the wrong one. We can hope...

 

Preston Salisbury

Assistant Professor and Monographic Cataloger

Mississippi State University


From: Program for Cooperative Cataloging <[log in to unmask]> on behalf of Kuperman, Aaron <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, March 31, 2020 7:44 AM
To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: [PCCLIST] $v Art vs $x Art

 

​$v - is the form/genre; $x - is about the form genre.  How you can have a Congress of $v is beyond me (perhaps the pictures got together at night after the museum closed and started conferring).

 

Aaron Kuperman

LC Law Cataloging Section

This is NOT an official communication from my employer.

 

 

 

 


From: Program for Cooperative Cataloging <[log in to unmask]> on behalf of Yang Wang <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, March 31, 2020 8:37 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [PCCLIST] $v Art vs $x Art

 

What is the difference between the following subject headings (Cf. bib (OCoLC) 52442717) vs (OCLC) 150835830)?

 

Athena ‡c (Greek deity) ‡v Art ‡v Congresses

Athena ‡c (Greek deity) ‡x Art ‡v Congresses

 

And (Cf. (OCoLC) 45539635) vs (OCoLC) 466762391)?  

 

Athena ‡c (Greek deity) ‡v Art ‡v Exhibitions

Athena ‡c (Greek deity) ‡x Art ‡v Exhibitions

 

The SHM instruction under “H 1110 $v Art” seems to have been causing this problem on a massive scale in OCLC. The second part of the sentence where it states “[Use for] … or works for discussing such art” is perhaps the culprit. This part actually refers to the use of “$x Art” (lccn sh 99001934) and not “$v” (lccn sh 99001267).

 

For the sake of clarity, why not insert “$x Art” somewhere in the text?  

 

Yang

 



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