Dear members, I am enclosing a copy of the letter which was sent to the Library of Congress concerning the SARS at LC.
Thank you to Daniel Lovins and Laurel Wolfson for their help. Ronda Rose June 20, 2006 Deanna Marcum Associate Librarian for Library Services Library of Congress 101 Independence Avenue SE, Room 642 Washington DC 20540 Dear Dr. Marcum, We are writing to express our deep concern about the Library of Congress (LC) decision to discontinue creation of series authority records (SARs) effective June 1, 2006. While it is certainly LC's prerogative to change its own policies as it sees fit, it is also true that LC occupies a preeminent position among American libraries, sets the national cataloging agenda in many ways, and has a long history of consulting with peer institutions before making major policy changes. We are also concerned that the new policy will fail to achieve its stated goal of increased efficiency. Indiscriminate discontinuation of SARs is counter-productive because, in the long run, such records save all of us time by disambiguating similar titles, keeping track of cataloger research (so as to avoid duplicated efforts), and recording complicated series treatment decisions. Excessive editing and redundant record creation is a major cause of high cataloging costs, and by cutting back on authority control, those costs will rise even more. The greatest gains in efficiency will come from strengthening - not weakening - compliance with standards. By adhering to professional norms and best practices, cataloging output is optimized for interoperability. This, in turn, means that multiple agencies can trade and repurpose records without special editing, re-keying, or other costly human intervention. Considering recent developments in the Middle East, and the major role played by the United States in that part of the world, it is more important than ever that American libraries provide efficient access to Hebrew and Arabic script materials. Controlled series headings are especially important when providing access to documents written in non-Roman languages and scripts (such as Hebrew and Arabic). Non-roman script titles are a particular challenge because, within a single monograph series, they may appear in original script, in Romanized form, and/or as translations. And each of these possibilities contains a further level of complexity: original script titles may have been printed in more than one orthography; publisher-supplied transliterations may have been derived from more than one Romanization scheme; publisher-supplied translations may, at different points in the series, vary as to specific word choices. In addition, the cataloger must also provide a transliteration, and the standardized ALA/LC scheme her or she uses may differ from the ones supplied (if at all) by the publisher. The potential confusion caused by so many possible representations of a series title is staggering. We believe that the series authority record is the single most efficient way to pull together all the variants so that, regardless of the search term entered, readers will be directed to a comprehensive list of all series items held by the library. We know from daily experience that our users greatly appreciate being able to search by series title, and to have such titles normalized and collocated within our catalogs. The sad truth about eliminating series authority records is that it shifts the burden of collocation from the library (which can do it more efficiently) onto the researcher. This is a clear violation of Ranganathan's 4th law of library science, namely, "Save the time of the reader". If present trends continue, the pool of shared cataloging which has done so much to reduce costs and nourish American libraries over the past 30 years will either dry up from neglect or become brackish with inferior content. With staffing cutbacks at LC and elsewhere, the recycling of substandard records is likely to increase throughout the shared cataloging system and cause a degradation of service to all our patrons. The Association of Jewish Libraries sympathizes with recent statements from the ALA Executive Board, the Library of Congress Professional Guild, the Africana Librarians Council, the Music Library Association, the ALCTS Board of Directors, and other concerned groups, and finds that the indiscriminate discontinuation of series authority records, combined with the lack of consultation with other stakeholders, compromises LC's professed commitment to uniform bibliographic standards and cooperative cataloging. We believe that greater consultation with other libraries -- including postponing implementation until after the ALA 2006 annual meeting -- would have helped avoid the current atmosphere of mistrust. We support ALCTS' request for LC to share the rationale behind its new policy, "including as many aspects of the decision-making process as possible, in hopes that other libraries outside LC could carefully examine their own series practices in a thoughtful manner." In particular, we would be interested in any empirical data that suggest series authority control is no longer cost-effective or desired by our patrons. Dr. Marcum, in your 2004 address to the EBSCO Leadership Seminar you suggested that catalogers should spend more time on "authority control, subject analysis, resource identification, and evaluation, and collaboration with information technology units on automated applications and digitization projects." We are confused, therefore, as to why series authority control has suddenly been singled out for elimination. We are concerned that this latest decision is the beginning of a long-term retrenchment in LC's commitment to bibliographic control and access. LC still has considerable influence among libraries and other cultural memory institutions around the world. For instance, LC Subject Headings, LC Classification, and MARC21 are used in many countries and have been translated into multiple languages. With digital collections and metadata initiatives such as MODS and METS, LC has extended its influence into the digital realm as well. The decision to end SARs, however, and the process that led up to it, risks undercutting the tremendous good will and influence that LC has built up over the past many years. Is that a risk LC really wants to take? In summary, we deeply appreciate the leadership role LC has played -- and for the most part continues to play -- in all aspects of the library profession. We hope you will reconsider your decision on series authority control, and we look forward to many future years of fruitful collaborative efforts. Thank you for your consideration. Ronda Rose President of the Association of Jewish Libraries cc: Beacher Wiggins, Director for Acquisitions and Bibliographic Access James Billington, Librarian of Congress Messages and opinions expressed on Hasafran are those of the individual author and are not necessarily endorsed by the AJL =========================================================== Submissions for Ha-Safran, send to: Hasafran @ lists.acs.ohio-state.edu SUBscribing, SIGNOFF commands send to: Listproc @ lists.acs.ohio-state.edu Questions, problems, complaints, compliments;-) send to: galron.1 @ osu.edu Ha-Safran Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/hasafran%40lists.acs.ohio-state.edu/maillist.html AJL HomePage http://www.JewishLibraries.org
