searching easter eggs: access points
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Searching for Easter Eggs:Access Points
LIB 630 Classification and CatalogingSpring 2012
Access points?
• access point – A unit of information in a bibliographic record
under which a person may search for and identify items listed in the library catalog or bibliographic database. Access points have traditionally included the main entry, added entries, subject headings, classification or call number, and codes such as the standard number, but with machine-readable cataloging, almost any portion of the catalog record (name of publisher, type of material, etc.) can serve as an access point.
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Plain English, please?
• An access point– is a feature of a work that someone might
be likely to choose in order to be able to find that work• e. g. Title, author, other names associated with
the work (publisher, corporate body, etc.), subject, keyword, classification number, etc.
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Access point: Main entry
• Comes from card catalog days– One card designated as the one to
have all the information about a book• ODLIS:
–“The entry in a library catalog that provides the fullest description of a bibliographic item, by which the work is to be uniformly identified and cited. In AACR2, the main entry is the primary access point.”
• main entry
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Form of the main entry
• Traditionally by author– The most important thing about a book
was that there was a person responsible for it.• Thus, card catalogs were arranged first and
foremost alphabetically by author (where one could be found)
• e.g.
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Main Entry Example
• Siegenthaler, Kathrin– Hopper’s Easter surprise / by
Kathrin Siegenthaler and Marcus Pfister ; illustrated by Marcus Pfister ; translated by Rosemary Lanning. - New York : NorthSouth, 2009, c1993.1 v. (unpaged) : col. ill. ; 30 cm.
See Standard format for a card catalog entry , part of Idaho’s Alternative Basic Library Education (ABLE) Course 5: Introduction to Technical Services and Cataloging for other examples
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A “real” main entry card
OCLC Catalog Cards 8 Card Appearance and Card Packs
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Main entry as source for Cutter
• What is a “Cutter number”?– Cutter numbers primarily distinguish among books
by the same author. A librarian uses a table (e.g., the Cutter-Sanborn Three-Figure Author table that the Cutter family owns) to look up the correct Cutter.
– Cutters usually consist of the first letter of the author’s last name and a series of numbers that makes sure books end up placed on shelves alphabetically, usually by title.• Catalogers decide numbers following the Dewey Deci
mal
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Cutter numbers• Cutter?
Among his other contributions to the wonderful world of librarianship, Charles Ammi Cutter devised a way to assign an alpha-numeric code for authors' last names. Use of this system allows all books within a particular Dewey Decimal number to be arranged alphabetically on the shelf, usually by title.
Catalogers try to assign distinct numbers for each name.
The Cutter Number from Dewey Decimal in the UIUC Bookstacks
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Let’s go Cuttering!• Cutter numbers
The cutter number for a book usually consists of the first letter of the author's last name and a series of numbers. This series of numbers comes from a table that is designed to help maintain an alphabetical arrangement of names.
Conley, Ellen C767 Conley, Robert C768 Cook, Robin C77 Cook, Thomas C773
What if the library has several works by the same author? How do we keep the call number unique? To do that a work mark or work letter is used to distinguish the various works of a single author.
Cook, Robin Acceptable Risk 813.54 C77a Cook, Robin Fever 813.54 C77f
– http://frank.mtsu.edu/~vvesper/dewey2.htm#Cutter
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Do school librarians go “Cuttering”?
• Depends on the size of the LMC– Most often they will use just the 3-letter
abbreviation (or something similar).
Cutter
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Personal names
• How do we write them?– Concise AACR2:
• General Rule: –Rule 31A Choose, as the
basis for the heading [i.e. access point], the name by which the person is commonly known. It may be the person’s real name, pseudonym, nickname, title, name in religion, initials, or any other type of name.
Why do they call it a heading?
Because the “access point” on a catalog card was the heading, or the header on the top of the
card, by which they were filed in the catalog
cabinet.
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A personal subject• Easter Bunny
– People believed that Easter Bunny or Easter rabbit or Easter hare is said to reproduce very quickly and hence, they were the symbols of fertility and fruitfulness.
– In fact, they represented ‘new life’ during the spring festival—Easter. Easter Bunny History has a non-religious face since its conception as a holy celebration in the second century. This festival was celebrated by the ancient Anglo-Saxons, in order to commemorate their Goddess, Eostre or Ostara, of offspring, fruitfulness and of springtime. • Easter Bunny History
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Titles as access points• Problem of varying titles for essentially the same
work:
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Solution?• Create a “uniform title”
– “A uniform title is the specific title by which all variations of a work that has appeared under varying titles and which has no identifiable author are to be referred to for cataloging purposes. A Uniform Title Main Entry search can be useful in finding such works. Examples include the Bible, the Bhagavad-Gita, the Epic of Gilgamesh, Aesop’s Fables, the Arabian Nights, etc.” • Uniform Title Main Entry Search: Help
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Uniform title rule
• Concise AACR2:– Rule 59 Individual Titles
• 59A. If you use a uniform title, choose the title by which the work is best known. Decide this by consulting reference sources (including other catalogues) and other manifestations of the same work. If you are in doubt as to which title is best known, use the earliest title.
• 59B. Choose the title in the original language, unless you are cataloguing an older work originally written in a nonroman alphabet language [Greek, Russian, etc.]
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AACR2 Rule for Uniform Title and Bible?
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AACR2: Summary of rules on personal and geographic names
Other access points
• Keywords vs. subject headings– Keywords: the actual words used in the record
(from the title, author, notes, etc.), where the meaning of the words is less important, just that they’re there.
– Subject headings: Words selected from an official list that indicate what the record is about, where the meaning is important (the words used in the subject headings may not even appear in the record).
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Using a subject heading search• Easter Bunny as the subject
Notice the numbers!
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Geographical Headings• Difficulties with geographical names:
– Firstly, there are a number of homonym geographical proper names • e.g. out of the seven most important cities called London,
three are located in the U.S. [ and one in Ontario, Canada] and there is an island called London too
– Secondly, there is a great variety of types of geographical names
– Thirdly, the same geographical place can have [different] names in different languages• Geographical names as access points for retrieving database records. Th
eory and practices of a library regulation Abstract from Hungarian Library Review.
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An Irish geographical dilemma
• Ireland, Eire or what?– Concise AACR2 rule 46A:
• Give the name of the place found in (in this order of preference):
1) current English-language gazetteers and atlases
2) other current English-language reference sources
–
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Example
• Ireland, not Eire
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Access points in Follett Destiny
• Basic search:
Possible access points
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Access points in Follett Destiny
• Power search:Dropdown boxes enable you to choose or
combine access points of Keyword, Title, Author, Subject, Series, or Note
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Access points in Follett Destiny• Visual, providing selections of topics:
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The End