[bksvol-discuss] FW: New Resources for Volunteers - Item # 7 - "How to Read a Book Like a Librarian" by Bookshare's Librarian Amy McNeely
- From: Scott Rains <scottr@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 27 Jul 2010 10:45:44 -0700
How to Read a Book Like a (Particular) (Cataloging) Librarian
by Amy NcNeely
Introduction
To begin with, there are three main types of librarians: the kind who find
things, the kind who build things, and the kind who put things away. The kind
that find things are called public services librarians, and these are the most
widely known of all librarians. They include the reference librarians,
circulation librarians, and kindly (or wicked) children’s librarians some may
remember from their youth who hopefully helped them find the books that made a
difference in their lives. The librarians that build things are called systems
librarians; these librarians often have two master’s degrees, one in library
science, and another in computer programming. They make the database
infrastructure, design web interfaces, plug the journal links in, and do any
and everything computer-related for the library. Some of them aren’t even
degreed librarians. The third type of librarians, the kind that put things
away, are the catalogers, often called metadata librarians in this day and age.
Metadata is simply information about information---tables of contents,
information in iTunes, and Bookshare book records are all metadata. In these
examples, the contents of the book, the songs, and the books themselves are the
actual data.
I am the third type of librarian. I have been trained as a metadata librarian.
I tell you all this because my perspective as a librarian is very much skewed
as a cataloger. I also use the phrases “metadata librarian” and “cataloger”
somewhat interchangeably, though everyone may not. This has more to do with my
generation of librarianship than anything else. I am more of a generalist in
metadata than a straight cataloger, and those who only catalog would most
likely take exception to my fast and loose use of terms. But librarians are a
contentious group---it is hard to find a large group of us who agree on
everything.
Title
After my cataloging training began, I approached books differently. I started
to pay a little more attention to the construction of the book than I used to.
When I have the entire book in hand (this is a phrase that has meaning to us;
one may not catalog a piece without it “in hand,” meaning all catalog records
must be created while actually holding the physical artifact), I look to see
how many times the title disagrees with itself. Is the cover title different
from the dust jacket, the spine, and the title page? For this very reason,
catalogers have agreed on what we call a “chief source of information” for
every piece of metadata in a cataloging record. One can only harvest the title
from the title page, no matter what one thinks the title of the book ought to
be. It makes it simpler, and keeps catalogers from having to make judgment
calls every time the title differs. Still, because the title differs so often,
we have a field in library records to capture varying titles when we feel
someone will look for the book under them. It isn’t necessarily important for
reading the book to see what the “real” title is, but when cataloging the book,
it is very important. It’s just habit now to check the title.
Authorship
I also look to see how complicated the authorship of the title is. In
cataloging, we list the first author as the author of the book. That’s it and
that’s all. There’s a place to list everyone involved with the creation of the
book--it’s called the “statement of responsibility,” and it includes
illustrators, translators, editors--anyone and everyone you can think of. But
we have agreed there is only one author. If there is no clear authorship, or
too many authors, we don’t list an author at all. Any extra authors (or in the
case of too many, all authors), and all translators, editors, illustrators, or
anyone else worth mentioning is listed in another part of the record.
Verso
The next thing I look at is the verso. That’s what we call the back of the
title page. On the verso is a lot of information particular to the craft of
librarianship, but not important to a lot of other people. (If you ever think
of it, look at the verso for A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave
Eggers. I think the verso is the best part of that book.) When a book is
published, oftentimes the publisher will send the galley--that is, the
unfinished, rough book--to the Library of Congress for cataloging. The Library
will create a cataloging record from the piece, which will be sent back to the
publisher. The book will then be published with this information on the verso.
This program is called “cataloging in publication” or CIP. When reading a
book, I look at the CIP information.
What’s included in the CIP is the preliminary record without the physical or
local specifications. The physical information is often blank, because the
cataloger can’t measure the book according to the galley. Sizes change. Why is
size important to a cataloger? Because in every library I’ve worked in besides
Bookshare, shelf space is the most important kind of real estate books take up.
(Here, it’s disk space.) If a book is of very unusual size, say 52 cm tall,
you would really like to know that when you’re looking at the record. If the
book is that tall, or wider than it is tall, it might be kept in a different
place than the other books. Page numbers are also recorded here, as are
illustrations and plates. CIP also can’t record page numbers (page numbers in
galleys often change), but can mention whether or not there are illustrations
in the book. Note that we don’t say how many illustrations there are, just
whether or not there are any.
Subject Headings
The next part of the CIP record to look at is the subject headings. There are
usually two and no more than six. These get to what the book is about. You can
search the subject headings yourself here: http://id.loc.gov/ or here:
http://authorities.loc.gov. (Getting me to talk about the subject headings
themselves is another ball of wax entirely---these are my research interest,
and I have a lot to say about them. I’ll try to keep it to the “news” and not
the “weather.” Some opinion is bound to creep in, though.) Subject headings
are applied in a very particular way, and are not the same thing as tags. A
good portion of the book content must be described by the heading; you can’t
just put a heading on because you think the user will search for the book under
the term. Library of Congress Subject Headings, this particular form of
headings (we call it a thesaurus) also has to be followed out through the
entire string without truncating it. For instance, if the book is of
fictitious sea stories written from the perspective of the British during the
War of 1812, you really need to use this entire heading:
United States --History --War of 1812 --Naval operations, British --Fiction.
You can’t cut out any part of this string, even if you feel it is unnecessary.
Even if it would be more precise without part of a string, you have to add the
entire thing. That’s the way they work. Fortunately, the headings work with
“literary precedent,” which means the more books there are in a subject area,
the more likely they are to add a subject heading for that area. There are
currently over 308,000 headings, and these can very precise. Where a tagging
system would put “oranges” and “lemons” on a book about both, there would
probably be a subject heading called “Oranges and lemons.”
As a trained cataloger (let me say I am still a novice in the field: I am
someone with fewer than three years professional cataloging experience--I mean
out of library school and with a degree--and fewer than eight years total
“quick and dirty” cataloging work), I sometimes disagree with the CIP records.
Record creation is a craft, not a science. That said, I don’t always decide
what headings I would apply to a book. It’s not as if I know them all by
heart. I’ve also worked with several different thesauri over the years
(specifically, the Alcohol and Other Drug Thesaurus and the Medical Subject
Headings, more commonly called the AOD Thesaurus and MeSH, as well as a very
modified form of the Sears Subject Headings), so I’m not a specialist. I
usually just disagree with what’s been applied to the book. It’s always easier
to be the Monday morning quarterback and decide that someone else has done a
poor job than come up with a playbook from scratch.
Colophon
I also usually look to see if there’s a colophon in the book before I read it.
That’s the last page of the book if it contains bibliographic information. It
isn’t that common in English-language books, but sometimes it will have a note
on the typeface or the series the book is a part of.
Reading the book
After examining the book as object and absorbing the metadata as if I were
going to process it, I am finally ready to read it.
It’s worth noting it takes far longer to explain this than it does to do it.
It all this takes less than two or three minutes. I’m used to examining books
this way.
If you have any questions for me about this process or anything else about
cataloging or library science, please don’t hesitate to ask. I like talking
about this stuff.
Scott Rains
Benetech Fellow, Bookshare Volunteer Department
________________________________________
________________________________________
From: Scott Rains
Sent: Tuesday, July 27, 2010 8:52 AM
To: bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: New Resources for Volunteers - A Mini-Celebration of the ADA's
Anniversary
Bookshare Volunteers,
To help us stay in focus during the Manual review I have saved up a few
announcements:
1) An updated list of Bookshare's publisher partners will be posted to the list
and on the wiki by EoD this Friday (Thank you, Carrie!)
2) Bookshare style guidance on recurring format issues affecting Braille will
be clarified by EoD one week from this Friday (Thank you, Judy!)
3) A sneak preview of responses to some of the navigation issues you have
identified in the manual will be included in an update focused on Chapter 3
content by EoD this Friday. (Thank you. Rick!)
4) Language clarifying a more liberal Bookshare policy on volunteers sharing
digital content has been submitted for official approval as policy and is
expected shortly. (Thank you Powers-That-Be!)
5) Marketing meets this week to decide on your request that the books featured
for the ADA anniversary also be made available to you off Facebook. (Thank you,
Cherie!)
6) A summary of responses from the past 11 days review of the online Scanning
and Proofreading manual will be shared with all of you, Collection Development,
and Engineering by EoD one week from this Friday. (Thank you volunteers for
providing the content!)
7) Several new articles have been received or are being written that will
become part of a new welcome document to help train beginning volunteers. You
will get previews over the next several weeks starting with "How to Read a Book
Like a Librarian" by Bookshare's Librarian Amy McNeely (Thank you. Amy!)
8) Strategic planning to clarify and expand the role of the Volunteer
Department is underway spearheaded by Pavi Mehta. A report will follow
completion of the process estimated to be 66 -8 weeks. (Thank you, Pavi)
9) Posting will resume today of the Bookshare Volunteer bios received during
the manual review. (You are welcome to send yours to me at scottr@xxxxxxxxxxxx)
BTW for those new to this list:
The Bookshare Volunteer Discussion List is a forum for discussion of issues
related to scanning and proofreading books for submission to Bookshare. It is
monitored but not moderated by Bookshare staff. Thus volunteer voice has
priority here on non-policy issues. Senior volunteers, many with hundreds of
hours of direct experience, offer their hard-earned advice and wisdom
generously. Out of respect for the commitment and focus of all strive to keep
posts short, to the point, civil, and practical.
Scott Rains
Benetech Fellow, Bookshare Volunteer Department
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