Cataloging Problems Discussion Group, ARLIS/NA Conference

The Roosevelt Hotel, New York, Sunday, April 18, 2004

 

 

Attendees:

 

Julia Wisniewski, Elizabeth Robinson, Library of Congress; Kay Streng, Minneapolis College of Art and Design; Angela Falsey, Nathaniel Feis, Art Institute of Chicago; Margaret May; Beth Kushner, Brooklyn Museum; Lea Whittington, LACMA/UCLA student; Margaret Ford, MFA Houston; Marianne Cavanaugh, St. Louis Art Museum; Hyosoo Lee, Cleveland Institute of Art; Gladys Markoff, Jonathan Lill, Claudia Hill, Columbia University; V. Heidi Hass, Maria Oldal, Elizabeth O’Keefe, Peter Gammie, Pierpont Morgan Library; John Maier, IFA/NYU; Zimra Panitz, School of Visual Arts; Susan Myerson, Susan Milstein, Harvard FAL;  Abby Bridge, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Jane Collins, Trudi Olivetti, National Gallery of Art; Erin Elliot, Alicia Ackerman, Bard Graduate Center; Ian Goulston, Danny Fermon, Deborah Perotti, MoMA; Jacqueline Cooke, University of London; Laurie Glover, Penny Baker; Angela Sidman, Valerie Krall, Clark Art Institute; Elinor Nacheman, Robert Garzillo, RISD; Deborah Kempe, Mark Bresnan, Rodica Preda, Christina Peter; Amy Schwarz, Frick Art Reference Library; Vicky Bohm, Min Xu,  Dan Lipcan, Meg Black, Emily Roth, Tamara Fultz, Daniel Starr, Evalyn Stone, Metropolitan Museum of Art; Annie Copeland, Penn State University; Linda Martin-Schaff, Philadelphia Museum of Art; Jane Zander, Katherine Reed, Nelson-Atkins, KCMO; Brian Mekis, Canadian Centre for Architecture; Ellen Kempf, UCSB; Peggy Runge, Cincinnati Art Museum;  Michele Turner, Currier Museum of Art; Katheryn Phillips, Smithsonian Institution; Christine Hennessy, Smithsonian American Art Museum; Saeko Sato, Yale University; Charles Egleston; Melanie Seal, Cleveland Museum of Art; Lily Pregill, Marymount Manhattan College; Kay Teel, Stanford University; Janette Rozene, Jennifer Blum, FIT; Eric Wolf, New York School of Interior Design; Sherman Clarke, NYU.

 

 

Minutes of the Meeting:

 

Sherman Clarke chaired the Cataloging Problems Discussion Group.

 

Before the usual discussion, Sherman Clarke invited Lorna Corbetta-Noyes from the Research Libraries Group to bring the group up to date and to take questions regarding the RLG transition from RLIN telnet and RLIN Terminal for Windows to RLIN21 and RLIN21 Tech Services Client.  Most of this information can be found on the RLG website http://www.rlg.org/en/page.php?Page_ID=386.

 

Sherman than began the actual CPDG meeting, bringing the group up to date with the goings on at the various cataloging-centered committees.  For a summary of the Committee on Cataloging: Description and Access (CC:DA) meeting at ALA Mid-Winter he referred the group to the web at http://www.artcataloging.net/ala/mw04/summary.html.  He also has published his report on the Machine Readable Bibliographic Information Committee meeting (MARBI) at http://www.artcataloging.net/ala/mw04/marbi.html.

 

He then addressed the proceedings of the meeting of the Cataloging Advisory Committee (CAC) of ARLIS/NA at the conference.  This included a report on the status of the revised NH classification for Artistic Photography.  This has been revised by Lynda Bunting.  ARLIS will likely issue a publication of this to help standardize classification practices.  The issuing of ARLIS guidelines for architectural subject headings was also discussed.  Other topics included the VRA Cataloging Cultural Objects (available as a document for comment at http://www.vraweb.org), which is an AACR like set of rules or guidelines for cataloging visual images, and the CC:DA taskforce for rules for cataloging early printed monographs (people wishing to be involved in this discussion were referred to Maria Oldal).

 

Then followed the now hallowed CPDG tradition of going around the room introducing ourselves and asking any questions our constituent members may have:

 

Lily Pregill asked about the use and placement of articles indexing the $t in the 505 enhanced contents fields.  Eric Wolf mentioned placing the subfield delimiter after the article.  Heidi Hass clarified this by mentioning that the article is then in placed in the subfield g.  Sherman then brought up the LC discussion of putting the articles in “curly brackets”.  LC’s paper on non-sorting can be found at http://loc.gov/marc/nonsorting.html.

 

Maria Oldal asked who used AACR2 chapter 2 rules for cataloging early printed monographs as she is taking part in CC:DA taskforce on its revision.  She is collecting data and would like to hear from people who have comments and suggestions in the near future.  She can be reached at OLDALM@morganlibrary.org.  She then asked about the new 563 Binding Note Field and whether or not it caused problems that this field is used for both binding information and information regarding containers.  Danny Fermon wondered if a subfield b could be used to separate container information.  Sherman indicated that this would only matter if the two subfields were indexed separately.  Jonathan Lill thought this would be useful for cataloging artists’ books.  Maria said that this field had been used this way in the UK.  Liz O’Keefe felt that this current usage was fine, if it meets our needs.  She enquired what rare book catalogers do.

 

Eric Wolf asked what the ramifications of the recent changes in the Costume and Clothing and Dress scope notes had been for the group, particularly the catalogers at FIT and the Bard Graduate Center.  He also asked if anyone had begun changing these headings in their catalogs.  Sherman mentioned that he had changed some as they had come up.  No one had globally changed them.  Janette Rozene reminded the group that it was not a one for one change and said that FIT was still mulling over how to address this change.  This thought was echoed by the representatives from the Bard Graduate Center.

 

Hyosoo Lee asked the difference in usage between the LCSH Design—Philosophy and Design (Philosophy) as her authoritizing switched Design—Philosophy to Design (Philosophy) it was agreed that this was done in error as the former is the philosophy of design while the other refers to teleology.  It was suggested that she talk to her authorities vendor.  She also asked about the usage for the LCSH Art pottery, as it has a scope note referring to pottery of the Arts and Crafts movement, though it is applied much more broadly.  Sherman suggested that she contact CPSO with this.

 

Jonathan Lill is undertaking a project of cataloging a collection of artists books in his own database and was wondering what information was most essential for this audience.  Sherman suggested talking to the people at “Printed Matter”.

 

Janette Rozene asked if there was any way of easily authoritizing subdivided headings.  The unfortunate answer is that there is currently no simple way to do this.  Debbie Kempe mentioned that there are enough problems with authoritizing non-subdivided headings, citing an example she experienced when a recon vendor switched the unqualified heading Art with Adjustable Rate Mortgages.

 

Lindy Narver asked the group how she should catalog a donation of placemats with images of paintings on them.  Suggestions included cataloging them as archival material or as realia.

 

Julia Converse asked about including biographical information in authority records when cataloging museum objects.  Liz replied that this presented rules compliance problems if using LCNAF and NACO guidelines.  Brian Mekis stated that the Canadian Centre for Architecture uses other fields for this information.  Daniel Starr mentioned that the desire to include such information shows that we are coming full circle, returning to the desire to place the sort of information that used to appear on the header card of the old card catalogs.

 

Mark Bresnan (or some Brooklynite impersonating him) asked when the 041 field is used when a work is not, or does not contain, a translation (indicator 0).  The group responded chiefly when a work is an anthology, such as a conference proceeding, or other collections of collected works published in their original languages.

 

Sherman Clarke asked about how one knows when to establish a name in Castilian or Catalan when the origin of the person is not known.  Vicky suggested that historically Castilian had always been favored.  In the end, this was largely left to the cataloger’s best judgment.

 

 

Recorded by Eric Wolf