I don't really want to fan the flames any more than is necessary, but I think a few responses are in order.
Bibliographic record sharing: Multiple language versions of bibliographic records of the same resource already exist in our bibliographic utilities. How in the world does RDA impede bibliographic record sharing when this situation already exists? Do the bibliographic records that SLC produces contain only internationally acceptable abbreviations or words? What do you do when the need arises to make a note? Doesn't that have to be in the language of the catalog for which the resource is intended? UBC: If UBC is accomplished by using natural language strings, then yes, your point is well taken that a string that uses English, German, French, etc. terms to describe the type of date, cannot be readily shared. But using natural language to achieve UBC is stupid anyways. Names change and dates change. If you want to achieve UBC then unique identifiers, such as URIs, must be used to uniquely identify persons, works, and the data elements that describe each of these. How these elements display (whether as hyphens or with specific language terms) should be left to the programming of user displays. Arguing over whether or not ca. or circa should be used, or 1978- vs. born 1978 is pointless when it comes to creating the metadata of the future. The only sense that this argument is meaningful is if we continue to use natural language strings to control bibliographic entities such as persons. If we continue to control headings in this manner, then this will be a problem in a multi-lingual catalog. But if identification and control is done using URIs, then this problem becomes mute. Using URIs will allow the Francophone users of a French/English catalog to have the record display in French while the Anglophone users will have the same record displayed using an English display. I get the sense that you believe the cataloger will have to supply every language permutation for a date display, but this is simply not the case. This is something that can be done through computer programming on the user-interface side. Damian Iseminger New England Conservatory -----Original Message----- From: Resource Description and Access / Resource Description and Access [mailto:RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA] On Behalf Of J. McRee Elrod Sent: Friday, January 27, 2012 12:41 PM To: RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA Subject: Re: [RDA-L] Showing birth and death dates Barbara said: >For a non-English catalog, the English term "born" or "died" (if >needed) would be replaced by appropriate terms in the language of the >cataloging agency. Wouldn't this impede bibliographic record sharing, and UBC? Why are we abandoning ISBD, the most successful international library standard ever devised? As a cataloguing agency, we are multilingual. What terms would we use for a item in a third language going to a bilingual catalogue, e.g., a Spanish item going to a French/English or French/German catalogue? (We have clients of each of these types.) Would we have to have multiple copies of records for each language of the catalogue? Wouldn't a hyphen after birth dates, and before death dates, be a simpler solution? Not to mention "fl." and "ca." RDA is much more Anglo centric and AACR2, even though "Anglo" is no longer in the title. RDA seems unaware of Quebec or bilingual European countries, where there may be no one language of the catalogue. __ __ J. McRee (Mac) Elrod (m...@slc.bc.ca) {__ | / Special Libraries Cataloguing HTTP://www.slc.bc.ca/ ___} |__ \__________________________________________________________
