More than 135 leaders in cataloging and library systems called on the Library of Congress to set the pace in making the library catalogs of the 21st century viable tools for discovering information in all formats—traditional books and maps, born-digital content, visual images, digitized reproductions of conventional materials and other formats yet to be imagined.
At the Library of Congress Bicentennial conference on "Bibliographic Control for the New Millennium," held Nov. 15–17, these invited guests reviewed the current state of bibliographic control, heard about cutting-edge research in catalog design and came up with approximately 100 specific recommendations for shaping catalogs in the digital age.
Director for Cataloging Beacher Wiggins was the conference host. - Ana Cristan
Director for Cataloging Beacher Wiggins welcomed the conferees on Nov. 15 by noting that, in many respects, the conference planners had anticipated the recommendations of the National Academy of Sciences report LC21: A Digital Strategy for the Library of Congress (see Information Bulletin, August-September 2000). More than a year ago, they had envisioned a conference that would be both scholarly and action-oriented to advise the Library on achieving bibliographic control of digital resources in the near and long term.
The conference they designed included about 30 invited papers, grouped into five major topics: the Library Catalog and the Web; Assessing Current Library Standards for Bibliographic Control and Web Access; Future Directions; Experimentation; and Exploring Partnerships. The papers were posted on a conference Web site ahead of the conference and viewers were invited to comment.
Mr. Wiggins urged the conference participants to be vocal in sharing their ideas: "The Cataloging Directorate has a critical role to play and we've made a start, but we have a lot more to do. We need your synergy and expertise."
Mr. Wiggins hosted the conference, which received major financial support from netLibrary, EBSCO Information Services and the Gale Group, with additional support from other library vendors and publishers: 3M Library Systems, Blackwell's, Blue Angel Technologies, Bowker, Brodart, Epixtech, Ex Libris, H.W. Wilson, Ingram Library Services, MARCIVE, OCLC Inc., VTLS Inc., Wiley, the Library Corp. and the Library of Congress Cataloging Distribution Service.
Keynote Address
Michael Gorman, dean of library services at California State University at Fresno, gave the keynote address, "From Card Catalogs to WebPACs: Celebrating Cataloging in the 20th Century," a sweeping and witty overview of the development of library catalogs in the last century from his perspective as one of the editors of AACR2, the Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules, second edition. Mr. Gorman said that in this "century of erratic progress in cataloging," the story of cataloging is the story of standards and of the means by which catalog records are communicated. He reminded all participants that "effective cataloging involves controlled vocabularies and adherence to the standards that have evolved during the past 100 years."
Honoring the Past
Since the conference on Bibliographic Control was convened to honor the Library's Bicentennial, it was fitting that several speakers reviewed the proud achievements of cataloging over the past century. Conferees were reassured that, although the challenges facing them are unprecedented, they are not so different in nature from those of a century ago.
Cornell University Librarian Sarah Thomas quoted William Warner Bishop, superintendent of the Reading Room in the Library of Congress, who wrote in 1915: "Catalogs and catalogers are not in the forefront of library thought. … Shallow folk are inclined to belittle the whole cataloging business." Mr. Bishop predicted that libraries would have to collaborate to maintain control of the burgeoning universe of information and that the form of the catalog would evolve or even experience "total change of form."
Celebrations and Reunions
Conference speakers included (from left) Karen Calhoun, Cornell University; Paul Weiss, Innovative Interfaces; Library ILS Director Barbara Tillett; and Brian Schottlaender, University of Calfornia, San Diego. - Ana Cristan
Conference participants enjoyed the video "How the Web Was Won," a lighthearted tale of conquest in the modern bibliographic universe, produced by Joan Biella and video- graphed by Henry Lefkowitz, both senior catalogers on the Hebraica Team in the Regional and Cooperative Cataloging Division. The heroine, "The Web site," was played by cataloger Robin Dougherty of RCCD's Middle East and North Africa Team. Other stars included Lynn El-Hoshy, Kay Guiles and Tom Yee of the Cataloging Policy and Support Office, Coop Team members Sami Kotb and John Mitchell, and many Special Materials Cataloging Division staff. Original video lyrics by Hebraica Team cataloger Peter Kearney were set to melodies from the Gilbert and Sullivan operetta H.M.S. Pinafore.
During the conference's gala dinner in the Great Hall of the Thomas Jefferson Building on Nov. 16, Clifford Lynch, executive director of the Coalition for Networked Information, gave an after-dinner talk that defined bibliographic control as support for "finding things." He suggested that the public was willing to underwrite libraries and related services because people want to "find things." He saw the application of the human mind to organize and describe material as a well-established, honorable tradition.
Looking to the new millennium, Mr. Lynch said, there is no doubt that the vast majority of works to be created will exist in digital form. We will need to be able to apply new tool kits to these works. Mr. Lynch concluded that the context of bibliographic description is different now, and we ignore the context at our peril.
Calls for Action
Each conference participant chose a topical discussion group that met in breakout sessions to address a major challenge facing catalogers and their allies in the vendor and publisher communities. The groups presented their recommendations at the final plenary session on Nov. 17.
Major recommendations included: Create a national-international database of standard records for Web resources; define core competencies for catalogers in the digital age; involve the library community in the development of the publisher metadata scheme ONIX to ensure that it meets the needs of both communities; create a long-term research-and-development program, including partnerships with publishers and registration (standard numbering, etc.) agencies; develop a strategic plan for the continuing development of the Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules; promote semantic and systems interoperability; develop a metadata creation tool that authors can use to help with bibliographic control of their works; create a definable access framework for integration of traditional catalogs, abstracting and indexing services, and other databases; improve and promote standard metadata schemes; and hold open meetings at American Library Association conferences with catalogers, reference librarians, vendors, systems people, publishers and administrators to ensure that reference librarians' needs for resource description are heard.
The recommendations have been edited and circulated for comments from all conference participants via e-mail. The recommendations can be viewed on the conference Web site at www.loc.gov/catdir/bibcontrol. The site also includes a Webcast of the actual conference and final versions of all the invited conference papers. The full conference proceedings will be edited for publication in late spring.
Meanwhile, Library staff, under Judith Mansfield's leadership, will rank the dozens of specific recommendations to develop an implementation plan.
In wrapping up the conference, Mr. Wiggins asserted, "Whatever is in our power to do, we will do."
