National Library of Australia

Promise for the future, or legacy of the past? : cataloguing in a changing world

Presenters

Karen Calhoun

Biographical Information: Karen Calhoun joined OCLC as Vice President, OCLC WorldCat and Metadata Services, in May 2007.  In this role, Karen is charged with charting a course for the future of cataloging and metadata services and extending WorldCat’s global reach.  Karen also worked for OCLC from 1986 through 1996, serving in the OCLC Library Resources Management Division.  From 1996 to April 2007, Karen served in leadership positions at Cornell University Library, most recently as Senior Associate University Librarian for Information Technology and Technical Services. Recently Karen, who is active professionally in research and as a speaker, was principal investigator for The Changing Nature of the Catalog and its Integration with Other Discovery Tools, a Library of Congress-commissioned study that proposed new directions for the library catalog in the digital era. She holds a bachelor's degree from Bucknell University, an M.S. in library and information science from Drexel University, and an M.B.A. from Franklin University.

Abstract of Presentation

Title:  On competition for cataloguers

Abstract: Are cataloguers competing against new methods for students, scholars and citizens to discover the information they need? Some would say yes, perhaps even lamenting the passing of the cataloguer's art. Others might suggest that cataloguers have the opportunity to instigate keen attention to, and even competition for, cataloguers' knowledge and expertise. This presentation explores the context in which cataloguers now work, lays out some challenges to the library's traditional model for metadata, and suggests some additional ways for cataloguers to contribute to the communities their libraries serve.

Gillian Hallam

Biographical Information: Gillian Hallam is Associate Professor and Faculty Fellow in the Faculty of Information Technology at Queensland University of Technology (QUT). She is currently Project Leader for an international research study to investigate the development and use of ePortfolios in education and the professions. Her teaching and research interests focus on the management and evaluation of information services, e-learning and on a range of professional and workforce issues in the LIS sector. Gillian has won a number of university teaching excellence awards. Prior to joining QUT, she worked as a librarian in the corporate sector, managing business and legal information. Gillian is past president of the Australian Library and Information Association (ALIA) and serves on both ALIA’s Education and Professional Development Standing Committee and the Education and Training Standing Committee of the Internation Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA). Gillian is a Fellow of the Higher Education Research & Development Society of Australasia (HERDSA) and a member of the Australian Law Librarians Association (ALLA), the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals (CILIP) (UK) and the Special Libraries Association (SLA) (USA).

Philip Hider

Biographical Information: Philip Hider is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Information Studies at Charles Sturt University. He holds a Master of Librarianship degree from the University of Wales, Aberystwyth, and a PhD from City University, London. Philip worked at the British Library from 1995-1997, and in Singapore from 1997-2003. He is an ALIA representative on the Australian Committee on Cataloguing, and a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals.

Stuart Ferguson

Biographical Information: Stuart Ferguson is Associate Head of the School of Information Studies and a Senior Lecturer at Charles Sturt University. Principal teaching areas are information management, including information organisation, information technology and the online information environment.

Abstract of Presentation (joint presentation)

Title:  The future of cataloguing education and training: input from surveys of the profession

Abstract: There is debate in the profession about whether, and how, cataloguing should be covered in the curriculum of library science and information management courses. Workforce planning is a way of identifying future needs and ensuring that professional education meets these needs. Gillian Hallam will report on relevant results derived from the neXus census, which is a major collaborative research project examining the library and information services sector in Australia, with a focus on workforce planning activities. She will use these results to explore various scenarios in which cataloguing education and training might meet future demands and expectations. Philip Hider will then comment on whether this education and training might be covered by first professional qualifications, or by modes of continuing education, or both, drawing on his own surveys of Australian cataloguers and library managers.

Deirdre Kiorgaard

Biographical Information: Deirdre Kiorgaard works at the National Library of Australia where she is responsible for bibliographic standards and strategy, and represents the Library on a variety of standards-related groups. She is a member of the Australian Committee on Cataloguing (ACOC) and represents ACOC on the Joint Steering Committee for the Revision of AACR (JSC). In October 2005 Deirdre was elected Chair of JSC.

Abstract of Presentation

Title: Resource Description and Access

Abstract: Resource Description and Access (RDA) is a new standard for description and access which will replace the Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules (AACR) in early 2009. RDA will be based on the FRBR (Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records) and FRAD (Functional Requirements for Authority records) conceptual models, and on the new International Cataloguing Principles being developed by IFLA. RDA will also start to bridge the gap between traditional cataloguing and the metadata community through the proposed development of an RDA Element Vocabulary and an RDA Dublin Core Application Profile. This paper will give you all the background you need on RDA's development as a web based tool, what it will look like and how it will differ from AACR. It will also tell you what you need to do to prepare for RDA's arrival.

Jenny Warren

Biographical Information: Jenny Warren has been a cataloguer for over 20 years with particular emphasis on foreign language cataloguing, training and interfacing with external utilities. She is currently a senior cataloguer at Monash University, Melbourne.

Abstract of Presentation

Title:  Directors' views on the future of cataloguing : a survey

Abstract:  As the discussion continues about the likely shape of the "next generation catalogue", it is a good time to ask directors of information resources departments in Australian and New Zealand libraries how they see cataloguing fitting within the resource discovery frameworks of their libraries. In May 2007, 68 directors (as distinct from head cataloguers), completed a 20-question survey. Colleagues from various libraries contributed ideas for the questions. The survey was intended to gauge views, perceptions and attitudes rather than comprehensive statistics. Topics included the value of original cataloguing, transitioning to metadata work, attitudes to multi-skilling, quality vs. quantity, cataloguing education and "What is the future of cataloguing?" While every individual who reads the full survey results will have his own interpretation, and while not every phenomenon can have a simple explanation, the author offers one reading of the results, finding some trends emerging, and presenting some of the thought-provoking and representative comments made by our directors.

Dianna McClellan

Biographical Information: Dianna’s career in the information and library world has been focused on academia after moving from a specialist botanical library. She has worked as a librarian at La Trobe University’s Bundoora Campus for many years, first with the user in the area of reference and later in technical services in cataloguing. Her responsibilities in the Reference Division were developing the life sciences information area and managing the Online Services Section for online database searching. For some years Dianna was the BIOSIS (Biological Sciences Information Services) Training Representative for Australia. She has served on both cataloguing and online information committees. Today, in the Metadata Services Section of La Trobe University Library Dianna’s responsibilities encompass cataloguing. In her spare time, with a Masters candidature at Monash University, Dianna is researching the topic ‘Metadata for Australian Indigenous collections’.

Abstract of Presentation

Title:  The plight of the library catalogue – where to now?

Abstract:  There is a famous French saying: “Plus ca change, plus c’est la meme chose” - The more things change, the more they stay the same. Can this be said when we look at the ‘state-of-the-art’ of the library catalogue in the context of today’s global information world? Is the current debate fuelled by an opportunistic cost cutting agenda at the Library of Congress? What has really changed in the information environment? Is it attitude and a genuine belief that all physical books and publications can be disposed of as soon as a digitised copy is available online? Does this also apply to museum artefacts? In this paper I am arguing that the challenge of organising information by librarians and the use of the library catalogue remain the same. What has changed is the online vehicle, in particular the WWW and the digitisation of information. I am arguing that the library catalogue is needed to provide access to digitised information in the electronic age. In particular I am basing my comments on the academic community where the ‘quick and dirty’ search and the Googling environment easily satisfy the uninitiated. The library catalogue should provide the authoritative, smart gateway to the information needs of the community it represents. In the academic learning and research environment we have this responsibility to students and staff. As a profession we do need to smarten up. As cataloguers we need to get to know our users so as to efficiently provide for their needs and to understand today’s environment. We need to apply metadata in an intelligent way for our users. We need to provide access to multi-formats via the catalogue so that each user can customise and personalise their searching needs and locate easily information required for essays and research. The library catalogue should be seen as the most useful starting place and the most reliable approach for the location of journal, book, multi-media and other resources at the home library, locally, nationally and globally. It should be so smart that it beats by a long shot the Googling habit. This could be achieved by appropriate cataloguing, the application of metadata featuring available natural language and authorised subject headings, not necessarily LCSH but those which the users, especially the academics, are conversant with in their area of expertise. Cataloguers need to be smart behind the scenes and utilise cataloguing already done, while at variance with local practice satisfying the requirements of discovery. The Library has a responsibility to provide all new acquisitions to the user pronto. Cataloguers cannot afford to be bogged down with detail which has little relevance to the discovery of information. The challenge to organise and manage resources in the most cost effective way via the catalogue has not changed for cataloguers. We are in a more complex and demanding environment with online systems vying for dominance. At our home library we need to care for our users first, keeping in mind the broader community but aware of the tension of providing local metadata which may compromise interoperability in the global arena.

Karen Stone

Biographical Information: Karen Stone is the Manager, Database Services at the State Library of Queensland where she is responsible for database standards and policies as well as managing the State Library’s contract of preferred suppliers. Karen holds a Bachelor degree from the University of Queensland and a Master of Applied Science degree from Charles Sturt University in the field of library & information management. She has worked in a variety of roles in a range of libraries over the last 16 years with most having both a technical services and a systems focus.

Abstract of Presentation

Title:  Boldly going where no cataloguer has gone before

Abstract: The State Library of Queensland’s strategic direction identifies the need to adopt a web centered rather than a web-marginal focus in the development of all State Library content and services. In response to our strategic direction, the Technical Services unit has been realigned and merged with web delivery to become the Resource Discovery Unit.

This has led State Library’s cataloguers to boldly go outside of their traditional role. No longer are the librarian’s regarded as just creators of original records for use on the bibliographic databases. Their role is evolving as they become managers of data and the data that they manage is evolving in order to expand and enhance the user’s experience.

As part of the Resource Discovery Unit, they contribute to the ‘skeleton’ or infrastructure that is an essential part of the client experience. While the web team manages the structure of the web site, giving a platform for the web authors to display their information, the cataloguers build the skeleton which allows the work of the selectors and indexers to reach their desired audience.

The cataloguers build this skeleton by setting the standards for all types of data. These cover not just the traditional MARC bibliographic records, but those in the digital and original material databases as well. As these use a number of schemas, the cataloguers have moved out of their comfort zone where MARC rules. They have needed to expand their knowledge base, as most of these schemas were unfamiliar to them just a few short years ago.

Not only do they set the standards, they also assist in their deployment and monitor their usage. They have established data entry guidelines including those for Picture Queensland, used by the indexers in the Heritage Collections area. They have also adapted these guidelines to suit the external contributors to the Heritage Outreach program.

Quality control of all databases is managed by the cataloguers. This has become increasingly important with the expansion of federated searching, where consistency across databases is of paramount importance. All records from all sources are randomly sampled for accuracy by the cataloguers giving them insight into areas requiring action or staff who require training. The cataloguers develop and deliver training not only to fellow staff in the Resource Discover unit in traditional cataloguing methods, but also in training the indexers for Picture Queensland and Manuscript Queensland.

Along with the expansion of their role, the change to a web-centred approach has also led to changes in how they create the traditional catalogue record. Records are no longer created with just the physical contents of the book in mind. Records have been expanded to enhance the user’s experience and provide, wherever possible, 24/7 access to as much of the resource as possible. This has been achieved by the addition of links to full text online versions, as well as links to digital objects held in other State Library databases such as digital scores and images and, in some cases, the digital version of the actual resource.

State Library’s cataloguer’s will continue to boldly go beyond their comfort zone and their traditional role into the future. With the advent of folksonomies & social tagging, it is anticipated that the role of the cataloguer will continue to evolve. These new concepts will require new standards to be developed and new methodologies to be employed. There are plans to involve the cataloguers in performance evidence based work which will see them analyzing what people are looking at in the databases and using this information to improve the database. As a first step towards this, cataloguers have been spending some of their time working in Reference Services and assisting library clients.

Alison Dellit

Biographical Information: Since joining the National Library of Australia in 2006, Alison Dellit has worked on a number of projects, including the relevance ranking of bibliographic records; investigating the use of hand-held scanners in bibliographic record creation; the development of index-level map records; and improving the collection control of the Library's poster collection. She is currently working as senior librarian, resource discovery services in the Collaborative Services Branch of the National Library.

Wan Wong

Biographical Information: Wan Wong is currently working in the bibliographic standards area in the National Library of Australia. She has been a cataloguer for over 15 years with particular emphasis on Chinese language cataloguing.

Abstract of Presentation (joint presentation)

Title:  Subject cataloguing : faster, better, cheaper

Abstract: Catalogue records enable users to find and access resources relevant to their needs. As the volume of born-digital materials increases, and the workforce changes, there is a growing need to find ways to allow faster and better ways to create or collect catalogue data. In this environment, many libraries are looking for ways to catalogue more efficiently, and some are even asking fundamental questions like whether subject analysis is necessary at all, particularly for full-text electronic materials. The National Library of Australia is actively investigating ways to make cataloguing more efficient, while preserving the consistency and integrity of the data. Some of the projects that the National Library has investigated include using online forms to generate basic MARC records, and improving our documentation. In this paper, we will discuss one of those projects, the development of a new tool designed to assist subject cataloguing.

Subject cataloguing is often a time consuming process. Finding the correct, most specific subject headings is not necessarily straightforward. Subject cataloguers need to understand and apply complex instructions to allocate the correct subject headings and Dewey Decimal Classification numbers. In most libraries, cataloguers need to deal with publications from a variety of subject areas, many of which may be unfamiliar to them. They also need to consult a range of tools, such as Cataloguers' Desktop, Classification Web, Web Dewey, and LC authorities online.

The new tool currently being developed will pull some of these existing tools together to facilitate the cataloguer's search for the most appropriate and up-to-date subject heading. Cataloguers will be able to check the currency of bibliographic records using a particular heading, and its scope notes if available. It could also potentially be a tool for authority control when the discrepancy between the data from the local database and LCSH is shown. The tool is intended to fit in with, and offer improvements, to the way cataloguers perform subject cataloguing. Underlying the tool's development are the assumptions that subject analysis using a controlled vocabulary still has a central role to play in resource discovery, that the trained judgement of a cataloguer as to what an item is "about" is the most effective method of subject analysis, and that efficiencies can be achieved by developing better computer-based authority look-up systems.

Anne Beaumont

Biographical Information: Anne has been working in libraries since 1969, when she started work in the Commonwealth Parliamentary Library. The early part of her careen was in Special Libraries – CSIRO, Coopers & Lybrand (now PWC) and ACI. At ACI her job title was ‘Information Scientist’ and she wrote abstracts of articles of interest to company staff, and assigned keywords to them for a computer-produced current awareness bulletin. Possibly as a result of this experience, she then became the first Business Information Librarian at the State Library of Victoria. After 5 years in that position and a further 10 as Reader Services Librarian, during which time she participated in the selection of the Library’s first ILMS Anne moved into the Technology Services Division. She remained there from 1990 until early 2006 when she moved into the newly created Office of eStrategy and Innovation.

Abstract of Presentation

Title:  Tags, Tagging, Social_tagging, the good and bad of “user assigned keywords”.

Abstract: What are tags? Are they useful? Will they replace structured subject headings? Is inconsistency of use a problem? Are tags OK for sites like Flickr and del.ic.ious, but not OK for library catalogues? Or do they have a place and librarians just need to ‘get over it’ and work out how to make the best use of them and suggest ways of overcoming some of the existing problems highlighted in the title of this talk?