Comparison of Cataloguing Codes: Croatian Vs American Cataloguing Practice

Code comparison: Croatian vs. American pg1of35

Comparison of cataloguing codes: Croatian vs. American cataloguing practice

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is, using the methodology of comparative analysis, to examine closely two cataloguing codes: AACR2, used in the USA, American and PPIAK, used in CroatiaCroatian, and find out the similarities and differences in their approaches and solutions of certain bibliographic problems. The comparison with the American codecode used in the United States is particularly significant since the new revised edition of the code, entitled Resource Description and Access, is going to affect the cataloguing community at the global level and it is greatly based on Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules.

The paper concludes with the recommendations for the changes and revisions in the Croatian code.

1. Introduction

The objectives of an alphabetical catalogue have remained more or less the same ever since Charles Amy Ammi Cutter wrote his objectives of the dictionary catalogue in 1876[1].Although one would expect the objectives to change through time with changes in bibliographic world and the advances in technology, Cutter's objectives are still valid, with only one or two more objectives added to them. The only thing that seems to have been changing over time was a shift from the catalogue's emphasis on either providing access to the work or a specific document e.g. manifestation that contains that particular work. Even in today's networked environment of OPACs and WebPACs and the emergence of new conceptual models of organization of information such is the one proposed by the IFLA Study Group on the Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records, the objectives seem basically unchanged, only slightly modified and extended[2]. However, the FRBR model places the focus, once again, on the literary unit e.g. work as was the case in pre-Panizzi's time[3].

The purpose of this paper is not, however, to examine the objectives of the alphabetical catalogue, but to look into how those objectives were met by the cataloguing codes and manuals in two different cultures, American and Croatian, with a particular emphasis on similarities and differences of the approaches.Still, the objectives of the catalogue, their importance and preference of one objective over another, cannot be ignored since it greatly influences the approach the code takes, as will later be demonstrated.

Croatian professional legacy in the area of library science was initially strongly connected to the tradition of German and Austrian libraries and their cataloguing practices[4] e.g. Prussian Instructions, as opposed to Anglo-American, Italian or French.This paper, however, is not going to go so much in the past but focus on the cataloguing manual used today in Croatian libraries, namely, Eva Verona's Pravilnik i priručnik za izradbu abecednih kataloga (PPIAK)[5].

2. Croatia's cataloguing manual: the background

Up until 1961 all the activities connected with the work on cataloguing manuals were carried out within the boundaries of the republics of former Yugoslavia[6] and were heavily relying on Prussian Instructions as well as the library practice of Austrian and German library communities.

During the 1930-ies of the 20th century Croatian librarians started working on a cataloguing code that was supposed to describe the alphabetical catalogue and cataloguing practice of the National and University Library in Zagreb[7]. Work on that code was a continuous effort and although it existed only in a manuscript form, after the World War II it became a model for many other Croatian libraries. However, there was a growing need for a new and modern cataloguing code, designed for all Croatian libraries. Eva Verona[8], as the most knowledgeable and competent library professional in Croatia, was therefore commissioned in 1959 by the Croatian Bord for Culture and Science and the Croatian Library Association to create a new and modern library code, applicable to all libraries in Croatia. Work on the new code was temporarily interrupted in 1960 due to preparations for the International Conference on Cataloguing Principles (Paris, 1961).

At the same time, some Yugoslav republics (e.g. Slovenia and Serbia) published the descriptions of their cataloguing practices, which, often enough, differed in many aspects as well as approaches to cataloguing issues. Therefore, the Paris Conference on Cataloguing Principles could not come at the better time for the Yugoslav library community. Immediately after the conference (December 1961), the Cataloguing Section of the Yugoslav Library Association made a decision to start work on the new Yugoslav cataloguing manual, which would integrate the Paris Principles. That marked an important chapter in the cataloguing history of Yugoslav librarianship because that was the first step toward creating the uniform cataloguing practice for the country as a whole.

Work on the code started in 1962 initially focused on headings, their choice and form, and the draft of the first section was published[9] the very same year. Drafts of three other sections were published in 1963, 1965, and 1967, sent out to library associations of the Yugoslav republics and were open for review and comments. In 1965 it was decided to publish the new manual in two parts: the first part would include the rules about the headings, the second one about the cataloguing description (including the filing rules)[10]. The first part was published in 1970, and in 1987 was revised to incorporate some changes, especially significant in chapters devoted to non-European-type names (III.2.4) and anonymous publications ( III.4) . The second part was published in 1983 and had no later editions.

The work on the second part of the Manual, the one that dealt with cataloguing description, relied heavily on the first edition of International Standard Bibliographic Description for monographic publications - ISBD(M) from 1974[11]. When the second edition of ISBD(M) appeared in 1978, the work on the Manual adjusted to reflect the changes in the new revision as well as new terminology[12]. The second part contains the introductory chapter that offers general rules for the description of other types of material, however only as an introduction for the main object of the publication, namely, the cataloguing description for monographs and finite series. The Manual states that it is intended for the creation of main alphabet catalogues in all library types in Yugoslavia, therefore excluding the rules for the description of resources such as cartographic material, non-book material, ephemera, etc. Those rules are present only in cases when special materialtypes fulfill the requirements to be included in the main alphabet catalogue. This particular decision was later-on regretted by many Croatian librarians because until today Croatian library community has not been motivated enough to create rules for other types of materials, which are currently being described according to IFLA's ISBD publications for various types of material. What was once meant to be a temporary, eventuallybecame the end solution.

The new code attempted to do away with all the flaws of old cataloguing manuals (e.g. lack of firm foundation, inner coherence, absence of principles, etc.). Also, in the Introductory part the manual defined the object of catalogisation (neglected in the old manuals): the abstract work is clearly distinguished from its manifestation that is being described[13]. The new manual had one more significance for the Yugoslav library community: it contributed to the consequent and widespread usage of cataloguing terminology, which was in its infancy in the formerYugoslavia. However, theterminology used in the manual today is mostly outdated and the manual requires, among other things, serious revision and updating of terminology.

The publication of the Manual was a great achievement for the Yugoslav library community because it incorporated all international recommendations and instructions for the cataloguing practice (created on the basis of the Paris Principles, ISBD(M) and (G), as well as recommendations for a form and structure of corporate headings) which contributed to a high level of standardization of cataloguing description among Yugoslav libraries and created a sound foundation for the initial attempts toward library automation and record sharing. However, after Eva Verona nobody continued the work on the updating of the Manual in Croatia. Verona was a brilliant visionary and the Manual, although outdated, still offers good solutions for many bibliographic problems. However, the Manual was created at the time when computers in libraries and machine readable cataloguing were in their infancy, and lacks solutions for many bibliographic dilemmas cataloguers face today.Those problems might partly be alleviated if in Croatian cataloguing community there were an equivalent to American Rules and Interpretations. But there is not.

Even though Verona's Manualis still the only manual used for the description of the monograph publications, the new and changed environment and new types of material pose greater and greater challenges for Croatian cataloguers, and the fact that the Manual must be revised and updated cannot be ignored any longer.

The problem of an outdated cataloguing manual face many bibliographic communities in the world. Since the Anglo-American cataloguing practice seems to have become dominant on the international level it is fair to conclude that the new revision of AACR2 entitled Resource and Description Access (RDA) will affect cataloguing practice at the international level, even in the library communities that have their own cataloging manuals. At the moment Croatian cataloguing community has not decided which path to take in the revision of the Verona's Manual. Many think it would be prudent to wait for the RDA to come out and to use it as a model for the revisions of the Croatian Manual not only because of the recent purchase of the Voyager Library Management Software System for the National and University Library in Zagreb and the needs of Croatian academic libraries[14] but also because the work on RDA gathered the most prominent authorities in the cataloguing world and their decisions, published in RDA, would have an immense impact on the cataloguing practice at a global level.

Thispaper therefore offers comparison of Croatian and Anglo-American cataloguing codes as a possible contribution to a later revision of Eva Verona's cataloguing manual.

3. Comparison of cataloguing codes

3.1. Manuals

The comparison was carried out on the basis of the following cataloguing manualscodes:

• Croatian code: Verona, E. Pravilnik i priručnik za izradbu abecednih kataloga. Zagreb : Hrvatsko bibliotekarsko društvo, 1983-1986. Dio 1: Odrednice i redalice. 2. izmijenjeno izd. 1986. Dio 2: Kataložni opis. 1983. (Verona, E. Manual for the creation of alphabetical catalogues. Zagreb : Croatian Library Association, 1983-1986. Part 1: Headings. 2nd revised ed. 1986. Part 2: Cataloguing description. 1983)
• American code: Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules. 2nd ed. (2002 revision with 2005 updates) retrieved from Cataloger's Desktop

3.2. Focus of comparison

The starting point for this comparison will be the Croatian cataloguing code. Therefore, this comparison will focus only on the type of materials included in the Croatian code and disregard other types of materials included in the Anglo-American codeAACR2R. In other words, it will concentrate on monographic publications .Also, the comparison does not include special rules for names or materials in certain languages.

This comparison however, does not intend to be entirely detailed and comprehensive, but to offer insight into the main differences between two cataloguing codes.

3.3. Comparison results

3.3.1. Organization

The first obvious distinction between two manuals is that the Croatian manual starts with headings, their choice and form (Part 1), whereas the Anglo-American starts with the cataloguing description. Although, unfortunately, Eva Verona did not leave the written explanation for the reasoning that lay behind that decision, it is our speculation that the idea was that the bibliographic description starts with the choice and formation of the heading as the most important part of the description, and is followed by the description. We must not forget that Croatian manual was created primarily for card catalogues where a cataloguer is prompted to first think about the authorship of the item and the choice and form of the proper heading and then continue with the description of the item. Nowadays in templates offered by various software solutions and formats for machine readable cataloguing this decision tends to be postponed[15] and cataloguer can (and usually does) leave it for the end of the description process. Namely, in situations that require additional checking or work by the cataloguer (e.g. pseudonyms, prefixes, works of mixed responsibility, etc.) many cataloguers may decide to fill in first the elements that are straightforward and easy to detect, leaving the decision on the form and choice of author heading for the end of the cataloguing process.

3.3.2. Objectives of the alphabetical catalogue

Objectives of the alphabetical catalogue are the most important part of the introductory chapter of the Croatian manual. The manual states three objectives derived directly from the Paris Principles[16]:

1. alphabetical catalogue must provide information whether the library possesses the item requested (the Paris principle 2.1)
2. alphabetical catalogue should provide an overview of editions, translations, and transformations manifestations of a specific work (the Paris principle 2.2.b)
3. alphabetical catalogue should provide an overview of all items which contain works of a specific author (the Paris Principle 2.2.a)

The Anglo-American manual, however, does not, in its current edition(nor in the previous one from 1998) include the objectives of the catalogue. The RDA draft, on the other hand, offers the functional objectives of the recorded data used to describe a resource. Those data should enable the user to[17]:

• identify the resource described (i.e., to confirm that the resource described corresponds to the resource sought, or to distinguish between two or more resources with similar characteristics);
• select a resource that is appropriate to the user’s requirements with respect to content, format, etc.

Recommendation: Croatian code should revise and rewrite its objectives to reflect generic tasks performed by users when searching or using both card and online catalogues. Generic tasks, according to FRBR, are: to find, identify, select and access an entity. E. Svenonious adds also the fifth task: to navigate. Only a part of those generic tasks are contained in Croatian code (Objective 1 might correspond to 'find', Objective 2 and 3 to 'select' and identify'), but tasks such as 'access' and 'navigate' should be incorporated in the new, updated version of a code.

3.3.3. Levels of detail in the description

Croatian manualPPIAK does not recommend various levels of description as does its American counterpartAACR2 (1.0D.). The description that Croatian manual sets as a standard description corresponds more or less to the American second level of description. However, although the Croatian manual does not offer various levels of description that does not mean that Croatian libraries do not use fewer details in the description for certain types of material. The only problem is that, without this being explicitly stated in the manual, the details included in the library descriptions differ from library to library. Therefore in 1988 a new publication on shorter cataloguing description was issued[18]. Still, Croatian libraries prefer more detailed cataloguing records and majority of records in Croatian libraries correspond to the Anglo-American second level of description.

Recommendation: Although RDA won't have AACR2's three levels of description but show mandatory elements, it is still considered wise to include two levels of description (shorter and full) for different types of materials (for instance, shorter for non-book material) in a new Croatian manual. Namely, all ISBDs that have heavily been relied on in Croatian cataloguing practice, have always included mandatory and optional elements of cataloguing description and some Croatian libraries still have had problems with deciding when to include optional elements in the description and when to leave them out. Putting those two levels of description in the manual and stating which type of library material they are meant for would hopefully help many of Croatian libraries, especially smaller ones. However, those levels of description would be intended only as a recommendation and libraries would be able to change and adopt the levels of description to their needs (e.g. library of a musical academy would certainly their material fully, and not in a shortened form). Croatian code should follow the American practice and prescribe various levels of description for different type of materials.

3.3.4. Layout of the record

There are differences in the outlook of the record itself. Croatian manual prescribes the following outlook (186/4):

ENTRY word with other heading words or phrases

[Filing aid]

Title and statement of responsibility. – Edition. –

Publication, distribution, etc. – Physical description. –