BCC2002SDC2 MLA 2002 Report
BCC2002/SDC/2
Subcommittee on Descriptive Cataloging
Report from the 2002 Las Vegas Conference
The Subcommittee on Descriptive Cataloging held a joint open
meeting with the Subcommittee on MARC Formats on Wednesday, February 20, during the annual MLA meeting in Las Vegas. This
report addresses only the Descriptive Cataloging sections of the joint meeting.
Nancy Lorimer highlighted items of interest to music catalogers
from her CC:DA Midwinter meeting report (soon available on the BCC web page). She reported that work on the Appendix of
Major Changes has been tabled pending further discussion on where to place the material in AACR2; that revisions to AACR2 to
make the Rule of 3 optional have been tabled, and instead, JSC will spearhead an effort to revise Chapter 21 in its
entirety; and that CC:DA created a new task force, the Task Force on Consistency across Part I in AACR2. All these
documents, including the charge for the new task force, are available on the CC:DA website at
http://www.ala.org/alcts/organization/ccs/ccda/ccda.html.
Nancy then introduced the problem of “conventional
terminology”, a concept that was brought into AACR2 in the new version of Chapter 9 (Electronic Resources—formerly
Computer Files) and for which there is a strong impetus in the cataloging world to extend to other chapters. Brad Young gave
a short talk on problems of conventional terminology for sound recordings—the mixed types of terms, which might describe
size, rpm, material of manufacture, etc.; the possibility of one format having several names; the possibility of change in
the conventional terminology for a format over time; and other difficulties. The general discussion that followed suggested
that the music community was not overly enthusiastic to introduce the concept of conventional terminology into Chapter 6.
But as Nancy stated, and as was generally accepted by those present, we have little choice in the matter, and that we need
to have as much influence as possible in what finally appears in the chapter. Nancy announced that the subcommittee is
working on a rule revision to present to CC:DA for discussion.
The next topic for discussion was about possible new provisions
for Area 5 (Physical Description) in Chapter 9. A CC:DA task force has suggested that Chapter 9 adopt content/carrier SMDs
for direct electronic resources and optionally for remote resources. Thus a cataloger could use SMDs such as “1 score
on CD-ROM” or “1 sound file (mp3)”. These SMDs would make use of conventional terminology from the relevant
chapters. At the mid-winter meeting, a member of CC:DA asked whether these examples should not in fact be put in the
relevant content chapters rather than in Chapter 9. The JSC representative asked for input from the communities involved.
Nancy introduced the topic and asked for comments. Discussion centered on the ability of Chapter 6 to cover all formats of
sound recordings (clearly some changes would be required), the relationship of Chapter 9 to other chapters, and the lack of
direction given in AACR2 about how to combine instructions from multiple chapters when necessary. There was also a
suggestion the content/carrier SMDs for electronic resources should in fact be in Chapter 1. A straw poll was taken on the
question: Do you think that the electronic content/carrier SMDs, if accepted by JSC, should be given in Chapter 9 or in the
chapter relevant to the content (or Chapter 1). The vote was unanimous that it should be in the relevant chapters. Nancy
said that she would relay the results of the poll to CC:DA & the JSC representative.
Submitted by Nancy Lorimer
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Last updated July 30, 2002