BCC96/SAS/1

Subject Analysis Committee ALA Midwinter Report (Jan. 1996)

The following items of interest to the music library community were discussed at the ALA Subject Analysis Committee meetings on January 20 and 21, 1996 in San Antonio, Texas.

  1. Marbi approved making the 755 field obsolete.
  2. Edition 21 of the Dewey Decimal Classification system will be published 6/96; new numbers will be applied after that time; a Windows version of DDC will be available in the summer; OCLC is developing an end-user, internet browser version of DDC to be first tested on NetFirst.
  3. Highlights from the LC report given by Lynn El Hoshy include: the existing configuration of the Cataloging Division will remain at LC with Beecher Williams as head; SACO introduced 1,954 new subject headings and 246 new class numbers in 1995; 8,000 new subject headings were added to SAF in 1995; uniform titles for all works of art and contests will be transferred from SAF to NAF; more scope notes are being added to subdivision headings in SAF; the 19th edition of LCSH will be issued in soft cover in the summer of 1996; a Form/Genre Working Group has been established at LC; 655/$v will not be used until application and system issues have been resolved; OCLC will not turn on use of $v with LCSH.
  4. The final recommendations of the SAC Subcommittee on the Order of Subdivisions were accepted (among these: when syntactically correct, the subdivision HISTORY AND CRITICISM be considered a form subdivision for music); the overall conclusion was that the Airlie House recommendations for order of subdivisions cannot be satisfactorily implemented; status quo seems to provide the best current solution.
  5. Agreement and satisfaction was expressed with the Core Record Report recommendations that, if appropriate, at least 1-2 subject headings from a standardized thesaurus should be assigned, along with a classification number from either DDC or LCC.
  6. Brad Young's report on the SAC Subcommittee on the MTP included a description of the joint project between this subcommittee and the MLA Subject Access Subcommittee in which selected subject headings and subdivisions were examined for possible recoding from 650's to 655's/$v's in MARC records; recommendations to the MTP were made in the areas of construction, internal and external evaluation and application. A final report will be submitted to SAC at the 1996 annual meeting.
  7. Greg Wool's report on the SAC Subcommittee on Subject Relationships and Reference Structures described the subcommittee's review of the existence, recording and display of LC and other headings' relationships and reference structures in various OPAC's and online databases.
  8. Diane Casey's report on the SAC Subcommittee on Subject Authority File Recommendations included a discussion of their investigation of (a) recording the history of heading changes in authority records and (b) identifying changes to authority records for main headings and subdivisions needed to accommodate coding that will allow automatic validation of heading- subdivision combinations.
  9. Mary Charles Lasater reported on the SAC Subcommittee on Form Headings/Subdivision Implementation; this subcommittee will publicize the availability of coded form/genre tagging, will work with involved parties on the use of form data in bibliographic databases, and will encourage its implementation.
  10. Regional Subject Analysis Institutes have reported such success that there are plans to try to continue this program.
  11. SAC discussed the possibility of coordinating a SAC-sponsored session at the 1997 annual meeting on Subject Authorities in the 90's.

Return to BCC 1996 Documents Menu
Return to BCC Historical Documents Menu
Return to BCC Home Page

Last updated February 4, 2000