Cole J., Suvorova V.M.

THOUGHTS REGARDING THE DEVELOPMENT OF AN INTERNATIONAL CATALOGING CODE
(–азмышлени¤ о развитии международных правил каталогизации)

Today we are heavily dependent on information, so much so that we are said to be living in an Уinformation society.Ф In such an environment, where the dissemination and access to information is increasingly important, library catalogs play an ever-greater role, since they are used to identify and select both print and online information sources for various purposes.

Catalogs have evolved over the ages from their original book format, to the card format, and now to Web-based tools that can provide access to online resources. As they have grown in prominence, the movement towards the international standardization of cataloging has gained momentum. In fact, the first goal of the 2004/2005 strategic plan of the Cataloguing Section of the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions is Уto promote the development of an international cataloguing code for bibliographic description and access.Ф To achieve this goal, a series of International Meetings of Experts for an International Cataloguing Code are being held over the next several years. The first meeting was held in Frankfurt am Main in 2003. That meeting, in which Russian cataloging experts participated, resulted in the issuance of a Statement of International Cataloguing Principles, published online as the УFinal Draft of 19 December 2003.Ф As stated therein, these new principles replace and broaden the Paris Principles that have guided the development of cataloging codes for more than forty years. It is worth noting here that the new document states that Уthe highest principle for the construction of cataloguing codes should be the convenience of the users of the catalogue.Ф

The Paris Principles of 1961 set forth the basic roles of a library catalog as envisioned at that time. They are still valid today. The catalog, whatever its format, is to aid users in locating publications by author and/or title. Users of the catalog should also be able to determine if the library has other works by the same author or if the library has the specific edition of the publication that they need. To help users accomplish these goals, it is not enough for the catalog just to list publications by author and title; it must also describe publications in sufficient detail that the users can decide whether a work with a given author and/or title is actually what they want. Because of this, both bibliographic description and entry are essential parts of cataloging. This paper will look discuss certain aspects of the description and entry of serials in the light of the current work on the development of an international cataloging code.

Bibliographic Description
Descriptive cataloging, or bibliographic description, has evolved over the ages. In the past, libraries and bibliographic centers in different countries used different national standards to describe publications, including serials. However, in the 1970s, the International Federation of Library Associations developed the International Standard Bibliographic Description for Monographic Publications, commonly known as IBBD(M). There followed an entire series of ISBDs, among them one for serials, which recently was revised and given a new title, ISBD (CR) : International Standard Bibliographic Description for Serials and Other Continuing Resources. The ISBDs, now used by many of the libraries around the world, employ consistent special marks of punctuation to identify various elements of the bibliographic description. This punctuation allows users to interpret catalog records accurately even if they cannot read the language in which those records are written. The Russian rules for bibliographic description in general adhere to ISBD rules and utilize ISBD punctuation, thus facilitating the international exchange of information.

The Russian cataloging code has developed a multilevel structure for the description of serials and other multi-volume publications. The rules allow the cataloger to use either of two models for the construction of such data, with the data contained in a single record or in two or more linked records. This multilevel structure works well and is appreciated and understood by our users. As such, it is in accordance with the new Statement on International Cataloguing Principles as discussed above. It, however, is in sharp contrast to the accepted Anglo-American practice. Ever since the first publication of the second edition of the Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules in 1978, chapter 12 of the code, which deals with the description of serials, has made little mention of a multilevel structure. Perhaps the only mention of it has been in rule 12.10, which, to quote from the 1978 publication, says, УDo not use the 'multilevel' structure, described in chapter 13, for the description of sections of a serial.Ф It is imperative, as work goes forward on an international cataloging code, that Russia not abandon its established use of the multilevel record structure.

Entry of serials
One of the more controversial aspects of cataloging is the use of corporate names as main entries for publications. For some publications, especially serials with УgenericФ titles (titles that consist solely of terms indicating types of publications-for example, У∆урналФ, УЅюллетеньФ or У“рудыФ), a corporate name is the best identifying feature. The same is true if the title consists solely of such a term and a statement of frequency; for example, У≈жемес¤чный журналФ. Since catalog users may well first try to look under the name of the corporate body responsible for such a publication, it would seem to make sense that its main access point should be under the heading for that body. However, even for publications such as these, that is not necessarily the case: the ISSN network, for instance, uses the Уkey titleФ as the main access point for all serials, and different catalog codes have adopted alternative philosophical approaches of their own to the entry of serials. Primarily through examples, we shall here compare the use of corporate main entry for serials as prescribed by the German and the Anglo-American cataloging rules.

The German rules (originally entitled Regeln f?r die alphabetische Katalogisierung; most recently entitled Regeln f?r die alphabetische Katalogisierung in wissenschaftlichen Bibliotheken, 2. ?berarb. Ausg., 1993ff.) assign corporate main entries to serials like those above, whose titles are so general that the corporate names are needed for their identification. They also assign corporate main entry to a serial whose title includes the name of the issuing body. The name of the body may appear in full or as an acronym, or a term denoting the body may be found in the title. Other serials are entered under title.

On the other hand, the second edition of the Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules (AACR2; most recently published in a 2002 revision) is much more problematic in its application, since rule 21.1B2 limits corporate main entry to certain categories of publications. Serials assigned corporate main entries are usually those of an administrative nature dealing with the body itself, certain types of legal and governmental publications, works recording the collective thought of the body (for instance, reports of commissions or official statements of positions on external policies), and publications containing reports of the collective activities of events such as conferences, exhibits, and expeditions. The code in fact is so biased against corporate main entry that the rule has, since its original publication in 1978, directed catalogers, УIn case of doubt about whether a work falls into one or more of these categories, treat it as if it does not.Ф Since entry here is based on the content instead of the title, many serials are entered under their titles even though they are Уgeneric.Ф Uniform titles are used to distinguish such serials from each other, but they are also used for other purposes as well (for instance, for translations), and this can affect the type of uniform title that a serial is ultimately assigned. A corporate name used as a qualifier in a uniform title is given in catalog-entry form instead of as it appears on the serial itself-and thus perhaps even in a different language. Below are some examples of AACR2 entries; most diacritical marks have been omitted from the Library of Congress romanization of non-English entries because of difficulty in reproducing them.

The choice of entry for serials is thus much more complex under the Anglo-American code than under the German. The Anglo-American code is more difficult for the cataloger to apply and for the user to understand. Thus perhaps, for the entry of serials, the German code is more in keeping with the Уhighest principleФ found in the Statement of International Cataloguing Principles.

Conclusion
We have tried to demonstrate just a couple of important points where the Russian and German cataloging codes differ from the Anglo-American. Differences are found both in the rules for description and those for entry, or access. In the search for an international cataloging code, no single cataloging code of today holds all the clues. The best of each of the various codes needs to be retained.