Welcome to Issue 168 of Catalogue and Index, which takes classification

as its theme. We begin with an account of what it is like to learn

classification; move on to two papers about its practical application in two

very different library services; and then move on again to the

development of classification and some alternative approaches.

We also bring you news of the award of the Wheatley Medal for indexing.

Several of our contributors are recognised authorities, but we are also

pleased to include two articles by recent students. Everyone is welcome

to contribute to Catalogue and Index and we would like to hear as wide a

range of voices as possible, so please don’t hesitate to contact the

editors if you might like to write for us.

Equally, we would be delighted to hear from any of you if there are

themes you would like us to cover in future issues. This is your journal,

after all!

Heather Jardine

(heatherjardine402@hotmail.com)

Cathy Broad

(library@ethicalsoc.org.uk)

Catalogue and Index

September 2012, Issue 168 Contents

2-4 Learning

Classification by Amanda

Riddick

5-10 Classification with

QR Codes by Robert F.

Reid

11-15 Leeward or

Windward ? - the Future

of UDC in the Caird

Library by Gregory Toth

16-18 BDS and Dewey :

Promote, Maintain and

Support by Lesley Whyte

19-22 Folksonomies and

Music Classification:

Sourcing Controlled

Vocabularies from the

Crowd by Andrew Milne

23-25 “I think, therefore I classify” - is it true? by Stella Dextre Clarke

26-28 Indexing

achievements

recognized: Wheatley

Medal 2012 by Ann

Kingdom

Editorial

file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Librarian/Desktop/Cathy/cilip/CIG/C&I168/heatherjardine402@hotmail.commailto:library@ethicalsociety.org.uk

2

Introduction

I am a library assistant for the London boroughs of Haringey and Islington, as well as a part-time student on the

MA course in Library and Information Studies at University College London. In the summer term we covered the

classification half of the course module Cataloguing and Classification 1, and this article describes the practical

learning process and how this relates to my working experience in public libraries.

Classification was not entirely new to me. As a library assistant, I routinely carry out shelving and shelf-tidying

according to alphabetical or numerical order (using the Dewey system), and every so often I deal with books

classified wrongly or with no classmark at all. Previously I had volunteered at Bruce Castle Museum, Haringey’s

local history museum, assisting with classifying and cataloguing its sizable collection of material relating to the

British postal service. I had also come across different classifications as a student at Cambridge University, the

Institute of Education and University College London, and I had heard of the Library of Congress system.

However, I was aware of big knowledge gaps. I had no idea how or why particular classification systems

developed, nor did I know how classification was actually applied, so I was definitely looking forward to this

course.

Learning Classification

A part of the compulsory Cataloguing and Classification module of the MA course in Library and Information

Studies at UCL, Classification was taught to a group of part-time students, including myself, in the summer term

by Vanda Broughton, Senior Lecturer and Programme Coordinator of the Department of Information Studies at

UCL and a specialist in the field of classification.

The sessions took much the same format every week, with lectures in the morning followed by practical

exercises in the afternoon. We started with more general topics, such as classification’s purpose and history, as

well as types and representation ranging from mediaeval and Renaissance classifications to Linnaean and

other taxonomies, the Periodic Table, twenty-first century interpretations, and even some puzzling folk

classifications. We also looked at relationships and organisational structures, and were introduced to

enumerative, analytico-synthetic and faceted schemes of classification.

Then the heat was turned up, as we had to wrangle with not just the theoretical but also the practical aspects of

the most widely used classifications: Library of Congress (LCC), Dewey Decimal (DDC), Universal Decimal

(UDC) and faceted classification. We had already undertaken some practical work creating subject strings,

including ‘homework’ on five existing books or articles that all had the word ‘rabbit’ in the title but were not

necessarily about rabbits.

After learning about historical and theoretical developments, we were given the same problem on a more

complex scale. In small groups we had to create LCC, DDC and UDC classifications for books whose title did

not clearly reflect the content. For instance, the cover of Birds of the air implied a book on bird photography, but

closer examination revealed a strong Christian element, with the book a series of the photographer’s spiritual

reflections on nature. So was this book about Christianity, photography or birds – and what should it be

classified under? Ale, beer, and brewsters in England: women’s work in a changing world, 1300-1600 really

made me understand the importance of context in classification. Depending on its use, this book could be

classified under women’s history, the history of work, mediaeval history, or even the history of beer.

C a t a l o g u e a n d I n d e x

Learning Classification

Amanda Riddick MA LIS student, UCL

3

Then there were the classification systems’ idiosyncrasies. LCC in particular but also DDC presented linguistic

and conceptual barriers, and we had to think laterally to find the most closely matching classmarks and subject

headings. Terminology, tools and regulations, such as number building, auxiliary tables and instructions on

combining numbers and letters, applying Cutters, or using symbols in the right order... coping with all these

awkward semantics, processes bordering on algebraic computations and heavy tomes made my head spin.

However, I enjoyed experimenting, and it reinforced the concepts of subjectivity and context. Our independent

work involved choosing a subject and creating LCC, DDC and UDC classmarks and LC Subject Headings for

four different titles under each scheme, i.e. not the same four titles repeated three times. Using ‘bread’ as a

subject and working within the context of a public library, I identified a range of relevant publications, including

recipe books, religion, history, adult and children’s fiction, children’s education and even a science fiction title. ¹

We have been set a similar exercise regarding faceted classification. Covered in the last lecture, this topic

appeared so complex that I feel one day did it little justice. In the morning we were shown quite different ways

of classifying information as developed by Bliss, Ranganathan, the Classification Research Group and others.

The afternoon’s practical work involved classifying a list of objects and processes related to the subject

‘Cookery’ under BC2 categories such as thing or entity, property, or agent. On the whole it struck me as far less

complicated than the three other systems.

Classification and the Public Library

As mentioned at the beginning, active classification is currently a tiny part of my library work. Nevertheless, I

have considered the practical application of the four classification systems we have learned about. DDC is the

most commonly used system in the UK, including the libraries I work at. There are some definite advantages to

DDC. Apart from its familiarity to a high number of library users and staff, it is based on numbers, making it

universally recognisable and removing at least some linguistic barriers. In addition, an informal survey I carried

out in August ² showed that the system has been adapted in several ways to make it more user-friendly. A very

common practice is to exclude fiction from DDC, instead classifying and shelving in alphabetical order of

authors’ surnames. There are often sub-divisions, such as Crime, Romance or Large Print, or children’s books

sorted by readers’ age groups. Indeed, I was surprised to learn that there actually is a DDC section for fictional

works (800-899): I had only come across 821 (English Poetry) and 822 (English Drama), with a smattering of

literary theory.

Specialist collections such as music scores or local history may also be classified differently, often using

systems developed by the library. Some libraries break with numerical order and place related subjects next to

each other, e.g. 635 Plants with 712.6 Landscape Gardening, or 300s Media with 790s Performing Arts, and

signs are also used widely. Many of these adaptations are not what Dewey intended, again underlining the

necessity of considering the context and the functionality of any system.

How would the other systems fare in public libraries? Edinburgh City Library is the only public library in the UK

to use LCC, and there are many critics of this system. One of the most vociferous is the US librarian Sanford

Berman, who, according to Harvard University librarian Matthew Battles, ‘has waged a battle against subject

headings he considers racist, reactionary, insulting to human dignity, and plain confusing’.³ Certainly LCC

seemed to me very rigid and often outdated, demanding that librarians squeeze contemporary subjects into 200

-year-old categories. In addition, the alphabetical subject order worded in an old-fashioned American English

could present linguistic as well as conceptual barriers, a potentially serious problem for UK public libraries with

their strong emphasis on social inclusion and accessibility for all.

4

Personally I am smitten by UDC’s precision and detail about a book’s content: a code or key as spine label!

However, it may be less practical in public libraries for just that reason. More digits and symbols could make

book searches more difficult for library users unfamiliar with the code, and shelving and shelf-tidying more time-

consuming for library staff. Even in Dewey, public library staff often use three decimals as a cut-off point:

greater detail is considered unnecessarily confusing.

Faceted classification has great potential for use in public libraries, as it provides access to a subject from so

many different angles – ideal for twenty-first century library users from a wide variety of cultural backgrounds

with different perceptions and expectations. It also lends itself well to the digital age: online library catalogues

already offer alternative ways of searching for an item, by subject, title, author, or date of publication, and this

approach can undoubtedly be applied to classification.

Conclusion

Learning classification was both a highly informative and a greatly enjoyable experience. I found the theoretical

and practical introduction to the four largest classification systems particularly useful, as this really made me

focus on the purpose and context of classification in relation to my work in public libraries. Another lesson

learned was: don’t judge a book by its cover!

I would like to thank Vanda Broughton, my fellow students at University College London and the librarians who

responded to my question regarding the use of DDC in UK public libraries, for their encouragement and

support.

References

1. As none of this work has been marked yet, I feel it is not appropriate to display it at this time.

2. Email sent by author to LIS-PUB-LIB online forum for public librarians, 28 August 2012: ‘is Dewey the most

widely used classification system in UK public libraries? What does your library service use?’

3. p. 207, Library: An Unquiet History, by Matthew Battles, Vintage, 2004.

Bibliography

Essential Classification, by Vanda Broughton, Facet Publishing, 2004.

Library: An Unquiet History, by Matthew Battles, Vintage, 2004.

Online discussion on LIS-PUB-LIS forum, 28-29 August 2012.

5

Introduction

With mobile devices offering great potential to revolutionise the delivery of library services and content and the

way in which people access and interact with them in parallel with social networking, libraries are presented

with new opportunities to re-connect with users and open up their collections.

“The ‘quick response’ (QR) codes are one of the tools that could help us to improve the relationship between

the library and its users.” (Pons et al, 2011)

In late July 2011, Highland Libraries were approached by the Scottish Library and Information Council (SLIC)

on behalf of OCLC and DDC23 to take part in a project to enhance resource discovery and to promote the use

of Dewey Decimal Classification in public libraries, utilising new technologies and the multilingual

interoperability of the DDC23 summaries.

The project takes advantage of the recent translation of the DDC summaries into different languages (OCLC,

2012) including Scottish Gaelic, using mobile smartphone technology and printed ‘Quick Response’ codes to

provide a way for users to search the library catalogue by Dewey subject ranges. QR codes were printed onto

Non-Fiction shelf headings and publicity along with corresponding bi-lingual Gaelic and English captions for the

top hundred Dewey divisions.

The Project Team

The project was led by Joan Mitchell, Editor in Chief of the Dewey Decimal Classification, and Assistant Editor

Michael Panzer who provided technical guidance and classification expertise, in collaboration with Elaine

Foulton, Director of SLIC, and Information consultant Gordon Dunsire. As Librarian Data Creator, responsible

for cataloguing and classification of library collections, I took the lead for Highland Libraries, assisted by Senior

Systems Librarian John Dempster who oversaw the implementation of the work and acted as a guide and a

representative for Highland Libraries’ role during presentations and seminars.

QR Codes and their advantages

QR codes are a type of two-dimensional matrix barcode first used in the car industry but can now be seen in all

kinds of shops and magazines. They embed data such as URLs, text, download documents, email messages,

contact information or even video links and augmented reality by reading a two dimensional series of square

patterns using a Smartphone with a QR Code reader application.

C a t a l o g u e a n d I n d e x

Classification with QR Codes

Robert F. Reid Librarian Data Creator, High Life Highland Libraries

6

The advantages of QR codes include their ability to hold more information in two dimensions; that they can be

easily generated at no cost using online QR Code generators such as ‘QRStuff.com’ and that they have been

shown to be a very effective marketing tool since their introduction, bridging physical and online environments.

Portree Library Pilot Site

As a hub of Gaelic library collections, Portree Community Library on the Isle of Skye was chosen as a pilot site

for the project. Although this was useful in terms of promoting Scottish Gaelic, it created some logistical

challenges, and all collaboration was conducted by email and telephone with resident Assistant Librarians, who

provided shelf headings, dimensions and subject requirements. Long distance collaboration was productive in

the beginning, but as the project progressed, it was necessary to use the nearby Dingwall Community Library

as a stand-in for Portree due to logistical and geographical issues. Equal in design and size, it was used to

simulate shelf dimensions and other requirements during the testing stages.

Another consideration was access to usable Wi-Fi or 3G mobile connection at the test site. Due to the remote

location of many Highland Libraries, 3G signal is currently very poor. This remains an obstacle to the success

of the project; however access to Wi-Fi exists through the co-located school network and it is hoped Wi-Fi will

be made available across the libraries network in due course.

Classification search query construction

It was essential to find a way to effectively search across Dewey ranges using the existing library catalogue,

and we were keen to not incur any extra development work at our end to enable the project to function. My

classification skills and technical experience were called upon throughout the project and I was presented with

a unique opportunity to develop and contribute these skills alongside leading classification system

professionals.

Working with the technical expertise of Michael Panzer at OCLC, I provided detailed knowledge about the set-

up of Prism 3 library catalogue and its indexes, and helped construct an effective strategy to interrogate the

library catalogue using Boolean operators and prepared search queries. Having created similar prepared

searches for special collections on the library catalogue, I was able to feed my knowledge into a workable

solution.

Early issues with the indexes

After some initial research and experimentation, we discovered Talis Prism 3 did support a classification index

and that by including the term ‘dewey’ it allowed the construction of search query URLs. However, a number of

issues and limitations arose from using this method including the ability to sort effectively by class number.

There was also some confusion about where in the classification indexes the search query took its classmark,

whether from the 082 field in the MARC record or the class number field at the level of the work.

7

Another issue highlighted by Michael Panzer was that the index search term “dewey” sometimes retrieved

fragments of numbers, for example, a search for 132 retrieves records with the Dewey number 132, but also

620.132. He believed such classmarks were perhaps being read as two words and seemed to be limited for

digits after the point.

After more research, we discovered that an additional index for classification search existed called “class”

which became available after a scheduled update to the Talis Prism 3 indexes. This update was the key to

constructing a more effective search query and appears to take its value from the class number fields at the

work level outside the MARC record itself, greatly improving search results.

By using the index search term “class” instead of “dewey” and followed by each hundred division class number

with a wildcard as a search string, an effective search of the public facing library catalogue could be made

using the existing ‘free text’ search box. The following is an example of the final search strategy used.

440 French and related languages

class:"440*" OR class:"441*" OR class:"442*" OR class:"443*" OR class:"444*" OR class:"445*" OR

class:"446*" OR class:"447*" OR class:"448*" OR class:"449*"

By embedding the resulting search URL into a QR code, library users can scan the corresponding code with a

mobile phone to carry out the search automatically, with the search results displayed on a mobile version of the

catalogue on the user's phone. Search results can be refined further by the user by library location, author, and

date and format type within the mobile site.

The search queries were mapped against their Gaelic and English translations and initially used to manually

generate QR codes. This was a long process and it was agreed a better solution would be needed if it was

going to be successfully adopted across the service. This approach offers a quick and effective way to access

bibliographic information in the library environment. A user is able to locate all the resources on a particular

subject held by Highland Libraries, and make an online reservation of an item for collection at their local

branch.

This process taught me a lot about the nature of the Dewey Classification system, its valuable role for

information retrieval within libraries and its online potential. I have since utilised the knowledge gained during

this stage of the project to implement new prepared search queries for a range of fiction and non-fiction

collections.

Gaelic translations and additional headings

The original Scottish Gaelic translation provided the bulk of the Dewey summaries Highland required, however

some topics further down in the summaries needed to be translated from scratch. Utilising the skills of our

in-house Scottish Gaelic translator Jo MacDonald, we were able to generate additional translations in Gaelic to

a high standard, particularly in subject areas such as the 700s, which cover a very broad range of distinct topics

and subject headings in Arts, sports and recreation. It was also difficult to ensure that all subjects present in all

libraries were covered, and this demanded the need for a more flexible solution for individual libraries to be able

to generate their own signage where required to match their own collections.

8

Creation of a library sign generator system

Once the subject headings and search queries for Highland Libraries collections were agreed upon, we

approached our web design team at Dynam to discuss how best to realise the project. After some

experimentation, Dynam opted to create a bespoke on-line system to automatically generate signage labels

using a database of the predefined catalogue search query URLs and their corresponding bi-lingual headings.

QR codes are then generated using a built-in shortened URL functionality derived from Google’s URL

shortening service http://goo.gl/ to make more readable codes, kept up-to-date with the latest search results.

The test image shows a shelving bay heading strip with the QR code, Dewey number and corresponding

bi-lingual subject headings.

The online system allows a library to automatically create signage artwork, generate corresponding QR codes

based on pre-defined searches for both adult and junior collections and customise colours to suit corporate

identities. The generated shelf labels can be matched against shelving dimensions and then sent to a local

printer as PDFs to be produced in batch quantities.

Image from a presentation by Elaine Foulton “Enhancing

Resource Discovery: DDC and Gaelic: The Portree Project”.

http://goo.gl/

9

Although the system significantly added to the project completion time, it is hoped the end product will save

time and money as well as provide a branded consistency across libraries. The system was welcomed by SLIC

and it is expected to be made available for use by other library authorities in Scotland and potentially elsewhere

in the future.

Marketing and promotion

While QR codes are quite well established in magazines and in the retail sector, it was felt that there is still a

relatively low awareness of what a QR code is, especially among younger and older library users and it was

important to inform library staff and customers through promotional posters, bookmarks and online guides.

As part of the partnership with Dynam, promotional posters were created to introduce users to the concept of

QR codes and hopefully lead to improved knowledge of Dewey Decimal Classification and improved resource

discovery.

Promotional

poster aimed

at adult users

produced by

Dynam as part

of the project

marketing

material.

10

The Portree project has been a journey of discovery for Highland Libraries, our partners at SLIC, and the

design team at Dynam. In order to retrieve accurate search results using Dewey Decimal classification, it was

important to establish a good understanding of how our LMS classification indexes are used. Once we had

established a sound strategy for interrogating the database, we were able to build broad searches against

Dewey classification ranges to produce effective prepared searches.

The decision to establish a library sign generator system delayed project timescales; however, we are confident

that time and effort invested will be saved in the long run, providing a reusable product for use by other library

authorities. Elsewhere, the choice of Portree, located as it is on an island, posed logistical considerations for

the project team, yet through online collaboration and perseverance this challenge was successfully negotiated.

The additional dimension of bi-lingual Gaelic and English subject headings created another unique challenge,

calling for collaboration with language translators when additional topics were required and finding a way to

equally represent both languages within printed signage labels and marketing material. The use of parallel

bi-lingual headings presents a positive way for other public authorities to improve people’s awareness of world

languages in their communities within a modern context, while meeting the aims and priorities of parent

organisations and national agendas on equality including those supported by the Gaelic Language Plan. (The

Scottish Government, 2010)

With little input from our LMS suppliers and no additional development of the catalogue required, QR codes and

mobile technologies offer a good value, wide impact solution for improved resource discovery, customer

experience and enhanced communication between libraries and their users. Furthermore, by marrying

innovative mobile technologies with traditional library information retrieval methods, all users can actively

engage with new technology and improve information literacy skills.

The project is in its early stages and we will need to monitor how the public responds. With the pace at which

mobile technology advances and users’ expectations change, it is expected that QR codes may be surpassed

by something else in the near future. New innovations pose new challenges as libraries begin to reinvent

themselves in the digital age, yet the flexibility provided by the online solution devised as part of the Portree

project demonstrates a successful approach to accommodate new ways to deliver content and communicate in

the modern library environment.

References

DDC Translations, 2011. Online Computer Library Center (OCLC) [online] Available at:

http://www.oclc.org/dewey/about/translations/default.htm [Accessed 25 July 2012].

Fulton, Elaine, 2012. Classification: leveraging the power of hidden knowledge. Enhancing Resource

Discovery: DDC and Gaelic: The Portree Project. 26 April 2012. Boston Spa: The British Library.

Gaelic Language Plan, 2010. The Scottish Government. [online] Available at:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2010/07/06161418/0 [Accessed 25 July 2012].

Pons, David et al. 2011. QR codes in use at the UPV Library. Serials. 3 (24) supplement, p47-56.

http://www.oclc.org/dewey/about/translations/default.htmhttp://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2010/07/06161418/0

11

During a recent conference, Vanda Broughton pointed to the essence of classification when she compared it to

tagging a pair of children’s trousers. When one mistake is made, the clothing will never be found again.¹ By

bringing examples from the Caird Library’s online catalogue, I hope to show how we classify printed items in

Greenwich and demonstrate some of the advantages and disadvantages of our classification system: the

Universal Decimal Classification (UDC).²

The foundation of the UDC is down to the enormous endeavour of Paul Otlet and Henri La Fontaine at the end

of the nineteenth century.³ They embarked on an ambitious plan to produce a comprehensive listing of

everything that had ever been written since the invention of printing.4. Subsequently, they sought an

appropriate bibliographical classification, and were attracted to Dewey’s Decimal system which had recently

published its fifth edition. Otlet and La Fontaine expanded this existing scheme to accommodate their

requirements and added a number of synthetic devices and auxiliary tables which, over time, turned the

enumerative structure of the Decimal classification into a much more flexible and detailed UDC. The first

complete edition of this new classification was published between 1905 and 1907 as Manuel du Répertoire

Bibliographique Universel.

UDC was first used in the Caird Library in the 1970s, at the same time as computers were introduced to the

National Maritime Museum (NMM). Surprisingly, librarians worked with no classification system prior to this;

one would rely on card catalogues arranged by author and title, as these had press numbers and shelving

references written on the top right hand side. No one seems to have documented the order books were shelved

in following the opening of the NMM in 1937 or when the collection came back from safekeeping after the war;

nevertheless, new acquisitions were added to the original layout using fairly broad subject areas. In 1976 each

of the four librarians, who were responsible for a particular subject area, began classifying and cataloguing

existing stock, taking it section by section. At this point UDC was chosen because it had already been in use in

the Royal Naval College Library. Compatibility between the two libraries was very important since the NMM’s

first director, Sir Geoffrey Callender, was previously a Professor of History at the Royal Naval College. The

decision was also influenced by the system’s flexibility for modifying subjects by place and by time; an

advantage that the library makes the greatest use of.

Subject 355.49

Battle at sea : from man-of-war to submarine / John Keegan. – London : Pimlico, 2004. subject is modified by time 355.49"1650/1850"

War at sea in the age of the sail : 1650-1850 / Andrew Lambert. – London : Cassell, 2000. subject is modified by place 355.49(42)

The British Navy : a concise history / Oliver Warner. - London : Thames & Hudson, 1975.

C a t a l o g u e a n d I n d e x

Leeward or Windward? – the Future of UDC in the Caird Library

Gregory Toth Assistant Librarian, Caird Library, National Maritime Museum

12

subject is modified by time and place 355.49"1939/1945"(42)

Citizen sailors : the Royal Navy in the Second World War / Glyn Prysor. – London : Viking, 2011.

UDC is a hierarchical classification, which means that knowledge is divided into ten main classes (also called

the 'schedules'). Each class is then subdivided, each subdivision is further subdivided, and so on. The more

detailed the subdivision, the longer the number that represents it.

6 Applied sciences. Medicine. Technology

62 Engineering. Technology in general

623 Military engineering

623 8 Naval construction. Naval bases. Warships and other vessels

623 82 Fighting ships and auxiliary vessels. Warships

623 821 Battleships

623 821 4 Pocket-battleships

The symbols chosen for UDC notation are non-language-dependent, and universally recognisable: Arabic

numerals supplemented by a few other signs, listed in the Auxiliary tables. The arrangement is based on the

decimal system: every number is thought of as a decimal fraction with the initial point omitted, and this

determines the filing order. However, for ease of reading, numbers are usually punctuated after every third

digit. An advantage of this system is that it is infinitely extensible, and when new subdivisions are introduced,

they need not disturb the existing allocation of numbers.

The ten main classes are accompanied by auxiliaries. These are signs and subdivisions which can be used

throughout the classes, allowing the construction of compound numbers. The most common signs in the Caird

Library, the plus, the stroke and the colon, are used to link two numbers, thereby expressing relations of

various kinds between two subjects.

addition, two dissimilar subjects are linked

623.82+629.123

The Royal Institution of Naval Architects : papers presented at the centenary meeting in the

Royal Festival Hall in London on 17th May 1960. – London : The Royal Institution of Naval

Architects, 1960.

extension, one subject is extended to a second

623.823.1(73)"1934/1945"

US destroyers 1934-45 : pre-war classes / Dave McComb. – Oxford ; Long Island City, NY :

Osprey, 2010.

relation, one subject is related to another

92NELSON:613.68

The admiral's wounds / Donald D. Trunkey. – In: American College of Surgeons Bulletin, Vol. 79,

No. 2, (February 1994), p. 19-27.

13

Auxiliary subdivisions consist of tables that represent notions such as place, time, language, general

characteristics and physical form of the document. These numbers are simply added at the end of the number

for the subject.

place is added

778.36(282.242.41)

London's changing riverscape : panoramas from London Bridge to Greenwich / Charles Craig ...

[et al.]. – London : Frances Lincoln, 2009.

time is added

797.144.092.1"1908"

1908 Olympic yacht races : the Solent matches : a centenary celebration / Henrietta Smyth. –

Ryde : Royal Victoria Yacht Club, 2010.

language is added

629.12(429)=153.1

Welsh ships and sailing men / J. Geraint Jenkins ; translated by Martin Davis. - Llanrwst, Wales :

Gwasg Carreg Gwalch, 2006.

characteristic, persons is added

941-44:663.918.4-055.2

Chocolate, women and empire : a social and cultural history / Emma Robertson. – Manchester :

Manchester University Press, 2009.

form is added

355.49(42)(038)

Dictionary of British naval battles / John D. Grainger. – Woodbridge : Boydell Press, 2012.

The main and auxiliary tables have their official filing order as given in every edition. With numerals, this is self-

explanatory, but in the case of auxiliary symbols, filing guidelines need to be provided. Yet these are not always

simple to follow or remember, especially when a local alteration to one single class (355.49 – Naval history

where date auxiliary numbers take precedence over place numbers) is being made in order to bring together

the same events under the same classmarks. This amendment reflected users’ needs and was particularly

useful when one browsed the collection on open shelves.

Items about naval engagements in 1588 between the English and Spanish fleets are grouped together.

355.49"1588"(42:46)

England and the Spanish Armada : the necessary quarrel / James McDermott. - New Haven :

Yale University Press, 2005.

355.49"1588"(42:46)

The confident hope of a miracle : the true history of the Spanish Armada / Neil Hanson. –

London : Doubleday, 2003.

14

As classmarks with several auxiliary subdivisions added to them become longer, the filing becomes more

difficult. Staff might find themselves concentrating on one part of the sequence to the extent that they may miss

other parts or auxiliaries. The difficulty arises because unlike most classification schemes well-known to library

users, UDC was not principally intended as an apparatus for ordering books from shelves. In practice this

meant that librarians at the Caird Library applied simple numbers in order to aid retrievals when recording only

one simple UDC number on item level, and then repeated additional ones in MARC 080. Users would thus be

able to browse on the shelf and to search in far greater depth via the online catalogue. It was a sensible

procedure, and neither staff nor readers had to shelf read complex classmarks.

623.82VICTORY

HMS Victory : her construction, career and restoration / Alan McGowan. – London : Chatham,

1999

Call number 623.82VICTORY – simple number

See also 355.49"1805"(42:44) – first additional number

See also 623.821(42)"17" – second additional number

However, in recent times classification practice has shifted towards more sophisticated UDC numbers in the

Caird Library because many classes had become overly used which caused delays, or confusions when one

looked for a particular item on open shelves.

Complex number is given as simple numbers (914.21 or 069) are heavily used

914.21(282.242):069(26:421.6)(083.83)

Royal River : power, pageantry and the Thames / National Maritime Museum ; ed. by Susan

Doran, Robert J. Blyth ; guest curator David Starkey. – London : Scala in association with the

National Maritime Museum, 2012.

The controlling organization of publishing rights of the UDC is the Universal Decimal Classification Consortium

(UDCC). Its first action was to build a database of the authoritative version of the scheme which is known as

the Master Reference File (MRF) and is maintained at the UDCC’s headquarters. The MRF has over 68,000

entries (in 2010) and its size increases every year. It is updated annually and issued as Extensions and

corrections to the UDC.

In the late 1980s, an in-house alphabetical list of subject index was composed by staff in the Caird Library

based on the most relevant maritime, art, navigation and history related UDC numbers (approximately 8,000

numbers). Over time one of these printed lists was regularly annotated by cataloguers but unfortunately, it was

rarely amended with updates from issues of the Extensions and corrections to the UDC. Occasionally the

Standard English edition of UDC is used, which has the complete content of the MRF, but it is now seven years

old. Moreover, since 1993 approximately 40 per cent of the UDC scheme has been completely revised and any

changes to classes and auxiliary tables have had far-reaching effects in the Caird Library. Because UDC is

used as the basis for how books are arranged on our shelves, a great many items may have to be altered

simply as the result of one change in an auxiliary table. Radical revisions in recent times, such as in Class 2 –

Religion or in the Common auxiliaries of place, mean that we may need to update our in-house classification

lists in the near future.

In mid-2000, the Caird Library adopted and started to use Library of Congress Subject Headings and

Authorities (LCSHA). It was believed that keyword search was by far the most common type of search, but

15

catalogue users would only find records for items if their search term was contained in a MARC field. Prior to

this less than 10 per cent of our catalogue records contained subject keywords; today we are in a far better

position. This makes our records easier to retrieve, yet, despite their vast numbers and the massive challenges

they pose for us, we still do not know enough about our readers and their search techniques. A recent query

about the Battle of Jutland demonstrated that it is still far more accurate to search by UDC than keyword, as it

brought back 57 titles for UDC as opposed to 35 titles for keywords.

Since searching by UDC still achieves more results at the moment, a question is imposed upon us: How should

we classify in the future? What is the sailing direction of UDC in the Caird Library then? Should it be leeward,

and be used only to help with shelving books? This would shift our classification system towards a more

comprehensive LCSHA usage and provide quicker shelf reading with basic UDC numbers. Or should it be

windward, and bring out UDC’s full potential? This would mean choosing complex and detailed numbers with

fewer LCSHA fields. One thing is certain: sturdy judgement and maintenance are required in order to continue

classifying books in the Caird Library.

References

1. “I think, therefore I classify” : a seminar and workshop hosted jointly by ISKO UK and the BCS Information

Retrieval Specialist Group. London, 16 July 2012.

2. All examples are taken from the Caird Library’s online catalogue. For more information, please see

www.rmg.co.uk/librarycatalogue

3. The article is based on McIlwaine’s book on UDC published in 2000. I would also like to thank Elizabeth

Wiggans, a former member of the Caird Library, and Geraldine Charles, Museum Archivist, for their

dedicated ingenuity in informing me with great detail about the early history of the Library and regarding

procedures of computerization under UDC rules.

4. A full description of this endeavour and a history of the origins of the UDC is to be found in Rayward, W.B.:

The universe of information. – Moscow : VINTI, 1975.

Bibliography

“I think, therefore I classify” : a seminar and workshop hosted jointly by ISKO UK and the BCS Information

Retrieval Specialist Group. London, 16 July 2012.

McIlwaine, I.C.: The Universal Decimal Classification : a guide to its use. – The Hague : UDC Consortium, 2000

Rayward, W.B.: The universe of information. – Moscow : VINTI, 1975

Robinson, Geoffrey: UDC : a brief introduction. – The Hague : FID, 1979

Scammell, Alison: Handbook of special librarianship and information work. – 7th ed. – London : Aslib, 1997

UDC: Universal Decimal Classification. – Standard ed. – London : BSI, 2005

16

The Dewey Decimal Classification, established in 1876 by Melvil Dewey, is used in more than 200,000 libraries

in 135 countries. It is also the most widely used classification scheme in the United Kingdom. It is used in each

of the 212 public library authorities, in many of the 115 universities and in most, if not all, of the 165 higher

education institutions. It is generally used in school libraries, either in an abridged form, or with shortened

numbers. Traditionally it has been used to order the national bibliography in the BNB, and also collections

within the British Library.

The Dewey Decimal Classification is owned by OCLC, and there is a well-established international committee

structure to help develop the standard. In the UK, BDS has representation on the Dewey Committee. This

committee’s work is vital in relation to promoting the UK library community’s interests in Dewey, ensuring that

topics which are manifested in the books published in the UK can be classified accurately and with specificity.

As a supplier of library quality catalogue records to public, academic, school and special libraries in the UK, and

most significantly, to the British Library, BDS is involved in cataloguing and classifying a significant percentage

of the books bought by libraries each year. For each of these titles, a Dewey number is contained in the record.

Most of these records represent new titles, and accordingly, BDS is in a unique position to contribute to the

development of Dewey as a classification scheme. This article will focus on the work undertaken at BDS to

promote, maintain and support Dewey.

BDS has been a principal supplier of library-quality bibliographic data to libraries, library suppliers, library

systems suppliers and publishers since its inception in 1994. The process of creating the data has evolved from

the early days when information was largely supplied to BDS on paper from the publishers, and this information

would be re-keyed with authority work, subject headings and classification numbers added. Increasingly, raw

data is harvested from publishers who are ONIX compliant, and subject and authority work is undertaken to

ensure a consistent record compliant with library standards and requirements is produced. For small publishers,

the records continue to be created from first principles. Central to these processes is the addition of the Dewey

number.

Core Activities

The core activities within the Book Division at BDS are to provide pre-publication information for the new

publications released in the UK and the Republic of Ireland, and to follow this up with a book-in-hand record as

soon after publication as possible. This allows pre-publication information to be used as a selection or

acquisition tool, and the subsequent upgrade to become a catalogue record, removing the need for libraries to

undertake this work themselves. The data created by BDS’s team of professional cataloguers can be made

available to libraries via a variety of delivery methods, designed to fit in with work practices in individual

institutions. Some libraries elect to pull in records on demand using a Z39.50 protocol, while others prefer to

load data to a PRF file, or order electronically by FTP.

Customer Base

BDS has held the contract to supply data to the British Library for the Cataloguing in Publication (CIP)

Programme since 1995.These records are created typically three to six months prior to publication, which

C a t a l o g u e a n d I n d e x

BDS and Dewey: Promote, Maintain and Support

Lesley Whyte Managing Director, BDS

17

provides advance knowledge of what is going to be published throughout the year.

Number Building

The British Library requires that the subject of a book is expressed to the highest level of specificity, but of

course, this level of analysis may be too detailed for other categories of customers. The hierarchical

structure of Dewey means that the number may be broken at different points in the string, and this is

expressed by logical break points in the number. The diversity of the customer base for BDS records – from

school library to national library- means that there are differing requirements for specificity of subject

analysis. Logical break points are inserted in the records, which can be stripped out on export to a

customer, but which can also be retained so that the individual library can decide on the level of specificity

required on a record by record basis. Profiled numbers can also be supplied to an agreed template.

The Importance of Classification

The importance of classification as a retrieval method is often challenged in a world where searching is

possible using keyword or category, but Dewey is more popular than ever, having recently been translated

into multiple new languages including Italian and Swedish. In 2011 Dewey was introduced to Sweden in

favour of the national classification system, SAB, which had been conceived early in the 20th century.

To take such a bold step as to introduce a new classification system after more than 100 years of using a

customised scheme is indicative that the Swedish library community felt that they had much to benefit from

changing to a universal scheme. The involvement of librarians in countries such as Sweden and Italy in

developing Dewey to reflect their cultural interests and history has to be beneficial for a global audience.

How does BDS Maintain Dewey?

Unlike most libraries, other than the Copyright Deposit libraries, BDS sees everything that is being

published, and so has a broader vision and a more holistic view than almost any other institution. BDS staff

deal with pre-publication information, and can foresee trends in publishing. In 1995, New Age subjects

became increasingly popular. In 2011, social networking was a popular subject for publications. Detecting

these trends early allows BDS to feed this information to the Dewey Committee, which in turn can lead to

topics being proposed for increased specificity or phoenix schedules.

The close working relationship that BDS has with public libraries in particular provides insight into the

application of Dewey, and where the strengths and weaknesses in the schedules can be found.

BDS staff examine both pre-publication details and the published item itself, so they have been able to

advise on areas such as whether an author publishing English fiction flourished in the 20th century or

whether it is more appropriate to apply the number for flourishing in the 21st century.

Working so closely with newly published material can bring a pragmatic approach to discussion about the

development of the schedules, which complements the more theoretical view of other Dewey Committee

members.

18

How Does BDS Promote Dewey?

In accord with the terms of the CIP Contract, BDS has adopted each new edition of Dewey at the same time

as the British Library. Having up-to-date classification numbers available has been an impetus to public

libraries to change to the current edition of Dewey. This means that public libraries in particular have been

quick to benefit from enhancements to the scheme.

Through a process of retrospective conversion and catalogue enhancement, BDS has assisted many

libraries to move to the current edition, leapfrogging over the editions they may have missed.

When libraries have access to current classification numbers they are much less likely to deviate from the

schedules, and therefore there is a more consistent application throughout the UK library system.

Since the introduction of WebDewey, BDS staff have been able to allocate new numbers such as historical

time periods mid-edition, which is to the benefit of all users.

How Does BDS Support Dewey?

Membership of the Dewey Committee has encouraged a deeper understanding of Dewey and the theory of

classification amongst the BDS representatives, and this expertise cascades down to users of the BDS

services.

BDS’s exposure to literary warrant through the number of new publications catalogued means that the

company is well placed to advise the committee if a number is too general or if greater specificity is

required.

The more widely a classification is used, and the greater the consensus on the application of the numbers,

the more likely the scheme is to endure. The work that BDS undertakes in assigning standard numbers

which are so widely adopted helps to ensure that Dewey remains the predominant classification scheme

used in the UK.

The Enduring Legacy

In times when library budgets are stretched and the role of libraries is being questioned it is important that

knowledge is organised for the benefit of its user community. The stock of a library is its most valuable

resource, and one that should be organised effectively for posterity.

BDS’s central position conveys the requirements of the whole library community to the Dewey Committee,

and its closeness to the schedules, and to the nation’s published output, assists the development of Dewey

to inform future generations of library users.

Lesley Whyte is Managing Director and Co-Founder of BDS. This paper draws on material presented to the

European Dewey Users Group Symposium in Stockholm in April 2011.

19

Introduction

My dissertation research aimed to explore the differences between the tagging behaviours of users and the

classification schemes of experts in order to surmise whether or not traditional systems were best representing

the facets users primarily focus on and how folksonomies might provide an alternative. This was achieved

through a mixed methodology: a literature review to establish a context of folksonomies in response to

traditional music classification, the construction of a thesaurus using tags from the Internet service Last.fm, and

the comparison of this with a selection of classification schemes using content analysis. The findings suggest a

value in applying control and structure to folksonomy to develop new tools while illustrating the importance of

the subjectivity and chaos that comes with the crowd.

Establishing the context

The literature review pointed to music as a domain frequently plagued by the difficulties of expansion and

change and very rarely fully mapped despite the consistently high efforts of cataloguers. Smiraglia (2006, p. 8)

notes a problem of divergence that has plagued music classification in the past, with different factions of

librarians requiring different kinds of music organisation for different ends. He points towards the introduction of

AACR2 and ISBD as going some way to remedy this, though also criticises music classifications for being

devised and analysed in a philosophical vacuum that fails to consider the context or history to which they

contribute. There is an island thinking that recurs in the history of music classification: other cultures, uses, or

the future of the domain are not typically entertained. Existing classification schemes are often criticised for a

history of ethnocentrism and bias towards an established canon, or for failing to present terms in a natural

language that multiple user groups can understand.

Recent attempts have been made to widen the provisions of music classification, though these have not been

without setbacks. While the Music Libraries Association formed a working group for the construction of a music

thesaurus which was to fill the gaps found in LCSH, this project was dissolved a few years ago and the

suggestion was put forward that the Library of Congress take the lead on issues relating to the classification of

music by form and genre. Indeed, thesauri for genre and form and for performance medium are under way,

though the extent to which they will remedy bias and fill gaps is unknown.

Steele (2010) explains LCSH as being the recommendations of the expert - "here are other resources I as a

librarian recommend on the topic." This has its uses, but what about the resources that other users recommend

on a topic? What about lay experts who are not employed in any position of authority to otherwise assign

recommendations? Librarian expertise has to originate from somewhere, and harvesting the ideas of the crowd

allows a development of this expertise at a greater rate while moving away from the central authority inferred by

expert taxonomies and towards a more open and receptive approach.

One potential source for expanding a music thesaurus was identified as the Internet music service Last.fm,

where users are invited to tag tracks, albums and artists in order to organise their own music libraries while

adding to the wisdom of the crowd on the website's main interface. This leads to recommendations based on

tags and a system of linked keywords. Preferred terms and popular keywords begin to emerge through critical

mass, inviting the creation of an impromptu thesaurus through consensus and democratic classification.

C a t a l o g u e a n d I n d e x

Folksonomies and Music Classification: Sourcing Controlled Vocabularies from

the Crowd Andrew Milne MA LIS student, UCL

20

There are caveats, of course. Sedgwick (1991, p. 26) writes about how 'nonce taxonomies' can be seen as a

way of removing oppression by freeing people from the language and organisation of the dominant group,

though this works only when such a folksonomy is limited in its contributions to members of the minority group.

Relying on the general crowd, meanwhile, is relying on the bias and prejudice of its majorities; the structure and

consensus in folksonomies emerging from majority agreement naturally excludes through omission.

Furthermore, commentators like Lemieux (2009) point towards folksonomies as simply "good enough", lacking

the accuracy or precision of taxonomy and often riddled with errors. The thesaurus built from Last.fm, however,

should illustrate that this is a false dichotomy that fails to consider the superior knowledge of the crowd in

developing areas and the ease with which control can be applied (and is sometimes suggested by users

themselves).

Building a thesaurus from Last.fm tags

The thesaurus was built using a set of terms taken from the Million Song Dataset, a repository of open data

from Last.fm. The top 500 most commonly used tags were taken and screened for applicability, with a number

removed due to their highly personalised or contemporaneous use. For example, some common tags refer to

"favourites" or "seen live", both of which refer to the individual user as much as the item, while tags such as

"new" have an obvious but varied shelf life depending on the user.

Once the list was pared down to only applicable terms, synonymous terms were combined and the thesaurus

was organised into categories and placed into a hierarchy. For the most part this was a simple exercise in

establishing existing thing-part or thing-kind relationships - a violin is a kind of string instrument, for example.

Some difficulty lay in giving hierarchy to contemporary genres, though this was decided upon by consulting

wikis written by the Last.fm community. Further ambiguities were dealt with through the introduction of

polyhierarchies (where a term might be subordinate to multiple others), allowing for a more webbed approach

that works well with the flexible structures of folksonomies. Stoner rock, for example, can be seen as emerging

from both psychedelic rock and heavy metal, combining elements of the two to create a new sub-genre of both.

By representing this with a polyhierarchy, users browsing the thesaurus are provided with multiple routes of

access to each term, replicating the web of relationships that emerges between Last.fm's tags.

More than any other facet presented by the Last.fm tag set, however, mood has always been a challenge to

classify, with no consensus as to which models are preferable between dimensional and categorical. It was

decided to arrange mood tags into eight categories closely resembling Hevner's model (1936). This was both a

practical and a philosophical decision: there is a greater ease of distinguishing between Hevner's categories

than many others, and others have considered it to have an implicit dimensionality that might offer the best

aspects of both categorical and dimensional models (Gabrielsson and Lindstrom 2001). Indeed, the eight

categories of Hevner's model can be organised onto a 'wheel' of sorts that expresses the proximity between

neighbouring categories and the opposition between categories facing each other across the wheel. Category

4, for example, houses moods such as "ambient" and "calm", while the opposing category 8 is "intense" and

"powerful."

Hevner's model, then, expresses a fluid map of moods and their relationships that is easy to navigate while

allowing terms to be grouped for the sake of representation within the thesaurus. Terms were treated as related

when placed in the same category, allowing each mood's thesaurus entry to direct users to similar moods. It

was then the compiler's job to identify common links between certain moods and certain genres, for instance,

though Last.fm wikis and associated tag displays aided these decisions and saw more crowd-sourced

relationships.

21

Comparing the thesaurus with existing schemes

Content analysis was undertaken by counting the number of slots in the main schedules of a number of

classification systems (DDC, UDC, BCM, and ANSCR) and tabulating the number of provisions for each facet -

musical form, genre, instrument, musical element, performer, and so on. This was then compared against the

numbers for the newly created thesaurus and the initial set of tags.

A comparison of the Last.fm thesaurus against traditional classification schemes suggested that it offers

provisions for facets typically ignored or underrepresented. Mood was completely unrepresented by all other

classification schemes but made up a large part of the thesaurus and the Last.fm tags, suggesting that when it

comes to music, listeners will often approach it and classify it depending on the feelings it communicates and

represents. It is understandable that classification schemes typically avoid this facet, owing to both its

subjectivity and presumably low priority for researchers or students. In fact, considering music stores too, mood

has never been a frequent organisational tool, perhaps pointing towards the emergence of new indexing

behaviours thanks to the ubiquity of tagging or the developments of the digital world.

In contrast, the facets for which provisions were highest in established classification schemes - form,

instrument, space, and time (the latter two often through auxiliary tables which were not included in the content

analysis but which are unavoidably large) - were not nearly as well represented in the top Last.fm tags or the

thesaurus built from them. Tags denoting years or decades, cities or countries did have a place in the top 500,

though once synonym control had been exercised their scope was expectedly narrow. Time dealt largely with

the last 60 years, with a higher level of specificity for the period after Last.fm's introduction. Space was heavily

weighted towards western countries and their larger cities, exposing the bias folksonomies fall victim too as

taxonomies did before them. Largely, users simply did not seem interested in a high level of specificity when it

came to these facets, presumably because data such as language or date can be accessed or sorted through

existing metadata.

Finally, there was a great deal of agreement between the new Last.fm thesaurus and the set of tags from which

it originated. This helped to illustrate that although various tags had been removed due to redundancy or

inapplicability, the thesaurus otherwise represented the tagging behaviours of the community from which it

derived, offering a relevant controlled vocabulary to users in natural language.

What have we learned from mining Last.fm's folksonomy?

The value of building the thesaurus is multifaceted. There is a democracy to the process of harvesting users'

tags ranked by frequency of use, empowering users and bestowing authority on the crowd rather than a core

committee of appointed experts, for whom the burden of understanding a rapidly expanding domain is

unreasonable.

Furthermore, the thesaurus focuses largely on terms preferred by users, so while it may show noticeable

weaknesses with regards to form and instruments, it boasts a higher number of terms relating to genre and

mood. Moreover, the genres dealt with by the thesaurus are typically recent developments from the last century

onwards rather than the classical movements best provided for by traditional classification schemes. Last.fm

offers a much deeper level of cataloguing by genre, with those such as rock given clear sub- and micro-genres

which would otherwise simply be treated as part of the same homogenous mass by older systems. Santini

(2009) suggests that this avoidance of deep classification for popular music is due to its transitory nature,

something which this exercise might suggest folksonomies are better equipped to deal with.

22

It is clear that Last.fm tags are of value only to certain users, and that for expert or academic communities there

is a greater need for the use of established classification schemes. However, what this research reiterates is

that music is an ever-growing domain that has not always been appropriately treated as such. Genres continue

to emerge, and the distribution and use of music in different ways sees audiences organising it using previously

ignored facets. With neither traditional nor folksonomy approaches providing a complete map of the domain, it

is recommended that a hybrid model is adopted in order to help classification tools widen with the domain.

As we welcome folksonomy, we welcome increased subjectivity and unlimited possibilities. Part of the reason

why facets such as mood and contemporary genres are not often dealt with by classification schemes is

presumably their subjective and contentious nature. One listener's maudlin is another listener's camp, and what

you consider dream pop could be someone else's synthpop. The use of scope notes based on wikis goes some

way to helping the thesaurus best represent the shared understanding of the community, but we hear what we

hear regardless. What this exercise exposes is the messy dynamism and subjectivity of art, the organisation of

which requires a certain chaos. Should we even attempt to control such a domain? This is questionable. We

should, however, cultivate an anthropological approach to folksonomies to understand their growth and origins.

In today's world, genres are born overnight, sometimes as self-aware meta-classification jokes (Detrick 2012).

You might never have heard of genres like witch house or metalstep and you may never need to, but just now

they represent legitimate classifications to a sizeable user group whose understanding of this chaotic domain is

vastly different to what we have previously accepted.

References

Bertin-Mahieux, T., Ellis, D. P. W., Whitman, B. and Lamere, P. (2011) 'The Million Song Dataset'. Proceedings

of the 12th International Society for Music Information Retrieval Conference, Miami.

Detrick, B. (2012). 'Little Mermaid goes punk: seapunk, a web joke with music, has its moment' [Web Page].

.

Accessed September 2012.

Gabrielsson, A. and Lindstrom, E. (2001). 'The influence of musical structure on emotional expression', in P. N.

Juslin and J. A. Sloboda (eds.), Music and emotion: theory and research. New York: Oxford University Press.

Hevner, K. (1936). 'Experimental studies of the elements of expression in music'. American Journal of

Psychology, 48, pp. 246-268.

Milne, A. (2012). 'User-provided tags as a means of creating formal classifications and thesauri: the trials and

tribulations of lay cataloguing in a music environment'. MA LIS dissertation, University College London.

Santini, R. M. (2009). 'Collaborative classification of popular music on the internet and its social implications'.

OCLC Systems & Services, 27 (3), pp. 210-247.

Sedgwick, E. K. (1991). Epistemology of the closet. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Smiraglia, R. P. (2006). Bibliographic control of music, 1897-2000. Lanham: Scarecrow.

Steele, G. (2010). 'The wisdom of the cataloguers: using collective intelligence to assign Library of Congress

Subject Headings'. Catalogue & Index, 161, pp. 6-9.

23

The title of ISKO-UK’s¹ July seminar and workshop was deliberately provocative, and hopefully evocative.

Some people reacted by saying ‘No - it should be “I think, therefore I categorize”, because categorizing is what

we do first, and classifying is a next step’. Others may have wondered what all the fuss was about. “Why bother

about classification?” But for those of us who have built careers and served our clienteles by developing and/or

applying the tools of classification, there are certainly some interesting questions to address. Plainly there is

interest for some computer scientists too, because the BCS Information Retrieval Specialist Group joined ISKO

in running the day.

Readers beware: I am writing this brief report as one of the event organizers, so it will not be the unbiased

account of a neutral observer. Classification lies at the heart of ISKO’s mission. We wanted this event to give

our core members the opportunity to exchange ideas on where our profession has come from and where it may

be heading next. Some members had expressed concerns about the way “Cat and Class” has shrunk in the LIS

curriculum; there are even cases where whole LIS departments and their courses have been swallowed up in

the battle for budgets and students. Should we be worried, or is this an opportunity to revise our thinking and

provide a more appropriate grounding for the emerging professionals of the twenty-first century?

Vanda Broughton (of University College London, one of the last bastions of thoroughbred Cat and Class

teaching and learning) set the tone for the day by outlining the development of modern classification theory.

Chris Urquhart from Aberystwyth followed up by reporting on the disparities found in her survey of how

classification is taught today in UK universities and courses. And Donald Lickley (from Sue Hill Recruitment)

described the changing scene of employment opportunities.

Classification is not the sole property of librarians. And so we had five presentations from speakers with very

different perspectives on what it is all about:

Sandra Knapp, a “real taxonomist” from the Natural History Museum and a specialist in the Solanaceae,

presented a scientist’s view. Classification enables the science to advance, raising questions as well as

answers. She reminded us that people have always classified things in ways useful to them, and not

necessarily in any fundamentally unique or correct way. No surprises, then, when the experts change the

scientific name of our favourite garden plant.

Fabrizio Sebastiani’s research deals with text mining and automatic classification. He drew a parallel

between the way a child learns to tell the difference between a tiger and a lion, and the way a computer can

be trained to do the same. He made an entertaining and persuasive case for further advances in automatic

classification techniques. (Not persuaded? Take a look at his slides and listen to the recording at http://

www.iskouk.org/events/classification_july2012.htm.)

Judi Vernau’s talk dealt with “Classification functionality in search and browse” but most unfortunately she

was struck down the night before with a nasty lurgie and could not make it. The resourceful Cerys Hearsey

stepped into the breach and delivered Judi’s presentation with aplomb. The talk asked how important are

the traditional structures of knowledge organization schemes in a twenty-first century organization. As with

most of the speakers, the interest lay not so much in the solutions presented as in the ideas stimulated in

one’s own head by the questions raised.

C a t a l o g u e a n d I n d e x

“I think, therefore I classify” - is it true? Stella G Dextre Clarke Chair, ISKO UK

http://www.iskouk.org/events/classification_july2012.htmhttp://www.iskouk.org/events/classification_july2012.htm

24

Addressing the records management community, Steve Bailey of JISC infoNet seemed the most sceptical

of our speakers, asking why do records managers classify and whether classification is part of the solution

or part of the problem. “Functional classification” is much lauded as the way to organize a business

classification scheme, but Steve pointed out that “there is now an awful lot riding on the completeness,

currency and accuracy of the records manager’s understanding of the functions and activities within their

organization and their ability to capture it. The question is whether we as a profession fully appreciate this

and whether the tools and techniques we employ are really adequate to serve these purposes.” His

conclusion was not at all optimistic about the state of current tools and practices. It sounds to me as though

there is plenty of scope for classification enthusiasts to investigate and revolutionize the records

management space, wherever there is a demand for retrieval by subject content.

Our fifth perspective came from Ian Horrocks, a Professor in the Oxford University Department of Computer

Science. He is much involved in Semantic Web developments, and especially with the ontologies that will

underpin them. For him the importance of classification lies in its power to organize the hierarchies within

ontologies. He pointed out that ontologies are hard, and ontology engineering is error-prone. Therefore, we

need better tools to detect the errors and reduce the effort of ontology construction. Classification is by no

means a thing of the past.

Stevan Harnad is probably best known to most of us as a pioneer of open access publishing. But his main

research field is cognitive science, enabling him to claim that “most of human and animal cognition and

adaptive behaviour is categorization”. The capability to categorize is essential to our cognitive development

from infancy, and logically we should have asked Stevan to start us off in the morning. But he is now based in

Montreal rather than Southampton, so instead we placed his “Back to basics” session after lunch, and he spoke

to us by videolink. Inter alia, he pointed out that animals as well as humans rely on categorization to make their

way through the world, but humans have the advantage of language to pass on their learning and speed up the

process of acquiring new categories. Does a cow classify? Stevan did not raise that question, but it’s a thought

to take away and play with. (He did convey other carefully developed thoughts; you can follow them via the

recordings on the website.)

“Back to basics” concluded with John Dupré’s talk on the philosophy of classification, tracing a path from Plato

and Aristotle through John Locke to Charles Darwin. “What makes two things members of the same kind?” and

“Are kinds discovered (‘natural’) or invented?” he asked (along with all the other philosophers who have argued

about these questions over the centuries, and are still arguing). John came out clearly on the side of those (like

myself) who feel that classification can and should be made to do what we need it to do. “Classifications are

discovered, and chosen; nature offers many ways to classify, we choose which to use,” he concluded. “Choices

of classificatory scheme are relative to our purposes”.

After the tea break we split into breakout groups, allowing further discussion of the ideas presented. Only 16

chose to join the group with topic “Learning about classification in the workplace, and curriculum needs”. This

group concluded that students should be taught the principles of knowledge organization rather than the details

of particular schemes, and that the workplace should support the application of the principles. It was

noticeable, however, that the vast majority of the 80 participants chose the groups considering the future of

classification in networked electronic environments and in formal vs informal classification. Does it mean we

can stop worrying about the shrinkage of classification in the curriculum? Judging from the buzz in the

refreshments breaks and the liveliness of the final plenary discussion, the subject of classification is not

suffering a downturn, but maybe it is looking for a home in curricula other than LIS?

25

To gain more perspectives on the event and the underlying concerns, look out for a write-up by Debbie Lee,

expected in a future issue of Cataloging and Classification Quarterly. Could there also be scope for a follow-up

event sponsored by CIG?

Reference

1. UK Chapter of the International Society for Knowledge Organization

E-forum on RDA

Thursday/Friday, 24th/25th October 2012

CIG is delighted to be offering a unique practical e-forum for the creation and

discussion of RDA catalogue records. Based on an idea from Anne Welsh

during the first CIG RDA e-forum discussion last year, the CIG committee

believe this practical e-forum offers an exciting new opportunity for

participants to try “hands on” cataloguing with RDA, then air questions,

examine problem areas and discuss the various options and choices

available in RDA with other cataloguers from all over the UK and beyond.

Full details of how the practical RDA e-forum will work will be made available

through the CIG blog (http://communities.cilip.org.uk/blogs/

catalogueandindex/default.aspx) next week and also on the e-forum mailing

list. Joining instructions are available here

http://www.cilip.org.uk/get-involved/special-interest-groups/cataloguing-

indexing/eforums/pages/default.aspx.

If you are interested in participating in the e-forum then save the date, keep

an eye on the blog and mailing list and prepare to tackle some RDA

cataloguing!

http://lyrisweb.cilip.org.uk/t/168084/87677/1939/0/http://lyrisweb.cilip.org.uk/t/168084/87677/1939/0/http://lyrisweb.cilip.org.uk/t/168084/87677/12314/0/http://lyrisweb.cilip.org.uk/t/168084/87677/12314/0/

26

The Wheatley Medal for an outstanding index is normally presented at the Society of Indexers’ annual

conference. Although the judging panel felt unable to identify one index as sufficiently outstanding to be

awarded the medal this year, three of the thirteen indexes submitted really stood out above the rest. According

to Linda Gilbert of CILIP, who chaired the judging panel, ‘It was impossible to choose between them. They all

showed high regard for the needs of users. They were well laid out and clearly demonstrated meticulous

attention to accuracy and detail.’ The obvious solution was to award ‘highly commended’ certificates to all three

indexers. These were presented (in strict alphabetical order) by the Society’s President, Professor John

Sutherland, at the gala dinner during the Society’s annual conference in Brighton in July.

The first of these was to Moira Greenhalgh for her index to Blackstone’s Civil Practice: The Commentary

2012, edited by Stuart Sime and Derek French and published by Oxford University Press in 2011. This 93-page

index covers a complex field in great detail, with bold headings helping users to navigate their way to the

required topic and clearly set out subheadings and subsubheadings enabling them to pinpoint the precise

information they need. ‘With over 1500 pages of closely spaced text, an in-depth and user-friendly index of this

kind is essential’, said Linda. Moira is a Fellow of the Society of Indexers and has been a freelance indexer for

nearly 30 years, specializing in legal materials. She prepared the index and tables to Blackstone Civil Practice

from its first edition in 2000 and also indexed Blackstone’s Criminal Practice, for which she was commended by

the Wheatley panel in 2005. She was thrilled to be commended again. ‘It means a lot to me’, she said. ‘For an

indexer working largely in isolation, with little or no feedback from authors, editors or users, it gives me the

confidence that I’ve been doing something right.’ Moira feels very strongly that legal indexers get little credit for

the preparation of tables of cases and statutory materials, a vital task unknown to indexers in other subject

specializations. For many users these tables rather than the index are the primary means of access to the text.

The second highly commended certificate was presented to Auriol Griffith-Jones for her index to The

Cambridge History of Nineteenth-century Political Thought, edited by Gareth Stedman Jones and Gregory

C a t a l o g u e a n d I n d e x

Indexing achievements recognized: Wheatley Medal 2012 Ann Kingdom Chair, Society of Indexers

The three shortlisted candidates, Auriol Griffith -Jones, Gerard Hill and Moira Greenhalgh (left to right)

27

Claeys and published by Cambridge University Press in 2011. This major work of academic reference (over

1000 pages in length) covers every major theme in political thought in Europe, North America and Asia, from

the French Revolution to Marxism, ranging from industrialization and imperial expansion to feminism and

socialism. This gave the indexer the huge task of dealing with complex terminology and names and concepts

from a wide range of movements, organizations, people and countries. ‘We felt that this challenge was expertly

managed’, said Linda. ‘And by providing detailed and helpful subheadings and useful cross-references, the

indexer avoided those “strings” of page numbers that mar so many indexes.’ Another Fellow of the Society of

Indexers, Auriol read history at Oxford University and then spent nearly four years in publishing. She trained as

an indexer in 1985, specializing in history, politics and current affairs. This book is one of several Cambridge

series that she has indexed. ‘Apart from the sheer length, it certainly offered the typical challenges of a multi-

authored book,’ she said. ‘Not only was there some variation in depth, scope and style between the chapters,

but also differences in terminology and sometimes even contradictory arguments.’

The third certificate was presented to Gerard Hill for his index to Livy: the War with Hannibal, translated by J.

C. Yardley and published by the Folio Society in 2011. Neil Titman also received a certificate on behalf of the

Folio Society and Gerard paid tribute to him as a discriminating and appreciative client. At over 600 pages, this

translation of Livy’s work is a detailed history of the Second Punic War (218–201 BC) – a decisive chapter in

Rome’s emergence as a great power. It provided the indexer with a huge challenge in ensuring that all the

people and places were covered, and the many identical or similar personal and place names differentiated,

which was neatly achieved by the use of descriptors. ‘We were impressed by the presentation and layout of the

index,’ said Linda. ‘There are helpful introductory notes, and the novel device of a running footer spelling out

the Roman given names that had been abbreviated in the index to save space.’ The book confronted Gerard

with the usual problems of identification. As he explained, ‘Livy’s Capua, for example, is not the modern Capua,

which he knew as Casilinum, and there are three people called Spurius Carvilius Maximus. Worse still, most

Carthaginians had only one name, so there are three Hannibals, seven Hasdrubals and eight Hannos (though

at first there seemed to be ten).’ Sometimes he had to work out, from the ship, season, wind, weather, distance

and strategy, whether two well-separated mentions were likely to be the same person. In addition to including

John Sutherland, Gerard Hill and Neil Titman (editor at the Folio Society) (left to right)

28

abbreviated names in the running footer, Gerard also demonstrated his creativity by providing chronological

subheads, where appropriate, without sacrificing alphabetical order. Gerard qualified as an indexer in 1991,

after previous careers as teacher and lorry driver. His first job was writing index entries in Latin for Iter Italicum.

Since then he has indexed a wide variety of books (ranging from Anglo-Saxon–Irish Relations before the

Vikings to Houdini and Conan Doyle), co-written The Boy with the Violet Eyes and In Isadora’s Steps, produced

a new edition of West’s Guide to the Lakes, proofread five million words in the Dictionary of National Biography,

and rewritten or copy-edited many other publications. He lives in Cumbria near the Roman Wall with a Polish

wife, two adult children, two sheep and a piano. He is also mentoring and tests director of the Society for

Editors and Proofreaders.

The Society of Indexers is grateful to those publishers and indexers who submitted their work this year, with

indexes spanning the arts and social sciences, including history and archaeology. Generally these were

competently executed but for the second year running the judges were very disappointed that there were no

scientific or medical texts.

Background information about the Wheatley Medal and the Society of Indexers

The Wheatley Medal was established in 1961 by the then Library Association and the Society of Indexers to recognize and encourage excellence in indexing. The panel of judges includes representatives from the Society, from the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals (CILIP) and from the academic community. Further information and a list of past winners is available on the Society of Indexers website

(www.indexers.org.uk).

The Society of Indexers was established in 1957 and is the only professional association of indexers in the

UK. It aims to promote indexing, the quality of indexes and the profession of indexing. In addition to its well-

respected