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ISSN 1039-3498 | no. 44 | April 2000


Australian representation on international cataloguing standards

Ann Huthwaite

Ann Huthwaite, Australian representative and Chair of the Joint Steering Committee for the Revision of AACR2

Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules
Ann Huthwaite, from the Queensland University of Technology Library, is Australia’s representative on the Joint Steering Committee for the Revision of Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules (AACR ). Ann is also the current Chair of the Joint Steering Committee (JSC) and convened the twentieth meeting, held from 22 to 24 March in San Diego.

Major items for discussion at this meeting included the harmonisation of AACR2 with ISBD(ER); the logical structure of the Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules; the revision of AACR2 to accommodate seriality; and the recommendations concerning the revision of rule 0.24—a rule concerned with methods of procedure for describing physical items.

Other rule revision proposals for consideration included changes to the definition of ‘work’ in uniform titles for music; descriptions of works that report the collective activity of a conference, or other material with a collective author; standard conventions for titles of nobility or terms of honour in headings; and revision of rule 1.4C3, which describes place of publication, distribution etc.

A detailed outline of decisions made by JSC at the previous meeting, held in Brisbane in October 1999, can be found on the National Library of Canada’s web site (http://www.nlc-bnc.ca/jsc/index.htm). Rule changes, once fully developed, will be progressively issued as rule revision packages (possibly online).

Anne Robertson

Anne Robertson, Australia's new representative on the Dewey Decimal Classification Editorial Policy Committee

Dewey Decimal Classification
Following a call for expressions of interest through Catlibs, the Australian Committee on Cataloguing (ACOC) made a recommendation earlier this year to the Dewey Decimal Classification Editorial Policy Committee (EPC) on an Australian representative to replace Giles Martin, who now works for OCLC/Forest Press.

The successful nominee was Anne Robertson, Manager, Technical Services Branch, State Library of Queensland, who will be attending her first meeting of the EPC in May this year. ACOC considered that Anne’s extensive experience with Dewey Decimal Classification (including conducting various external Dewey Decimal Classification courses) and her managerial experience will equip her well for the position. Anne also works with Australiana collections, and so will be particularly aware of issues related to the classification of such material.

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Please address any comments and enquiries to The Editor, Gateways: tford@nla.gov.au

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