NLA at work
European microform sets: a progress report
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Australian libraries have a wealth of unusual older and often out-of-print research material that is quite unknown. These items are the individual titles within large microform sets held in many libraries throughout the country. The European microform sets project is designed to add catalogue records for individual items in large microform research collections to the National Bibliographic Database, thereby making these items known and available to scholars and researchers. The library of the University of Adelaide manages the project, which is funded by the Australian Research Council. Other project members are the Australian National University, the University of Melbourne, Monash University, and the University of Western Australia. The National Library of Australia is also a participating partner in the project. |
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Work commenced in earnest in 1998 and progress is excellent. The project has acquired catalogue records for 150 326 titles which, as parts of microform sets, were previously not individually identifiable on the National Bibliographic Database or in the catalogues of the holding libraries. Catalogue records have been purchased from sources in Australia, Germany and the United States.
The project was originally divided into two major parts. The first was the purchase of existing catalogue records from sources throughout the world, and the second was the commissioning of original cataloguing. The first part is drawing to a conclusion, and has been highly successful in searching out and obtaining records for addition to the National Bibliographic Database.
Details of the catalogue records acquired to date are given below. Those sets marked with an asterisk are held in the National Librarys collection and are available at the Library or on inter-library loan.
Bibliothek der Deutschen Literatur (15 000 records)
British and continental rhetoric and elocution (116 records)
Early British fiction; pre-1750 (600 records)
Early English newspapers (993 records)
*English books: 14751640 (Pollard & Redgrave) (27 959
records)
*English books: 16411700 (Wing) (11 918 records)
Flugschriften des fruhen 16 Jahrhunderts (5000 records)
*French revolutionary pamphlets (5082 records)
*German Baroque literature (2380)
Goldsmiths-Kress Library of Economic Literature (57 438
records)
History of science; a collection of MSS (405 records)
Nineteenth century: childrens literature (450 records)
Nineteenth century: general collection (450 records)
Nineteenth century: linguistics (450 records)
Nineteenth century: publishing, book trade, knowledge (450 records)
Nineteenth century: visual arts & architecture (450 records)
Nineteenth century: women writers (450 records)
Nineteenth century: theatre periodicals (54 records)
Royal Institute of British Architects rare books (157 records)
*Russian history and culture: scarce books on 19th and early 20th
century (4131 records)
Spanish Civil War collection (2226 records)
*Spanish drama of the golden age (410 records)
*Special studies, Europe and NATO 19701980 (119 records)
*Special studies, Soviet Union 19701980 (94 records)
*Thomason tracts (English books: 164061) (9438 records)
*Three centuries of drama: American and English plays (4106 records)
The project will by no means exhaustively catalogue the amount of European research material in large microform collections waiting for bibliographic treatment. However, it has gone a long way towards making many of these materials much more accessible to library users, and is a significant boost for European studies in Australia.
Similar projects in other subject areas would be a most desirable aim for Australian scholarship and research.
Please address any comments and enquiries to The Editor, Gateways: lkirwan@nla.gov.au