> -----Original Message----- > From: Resource Description and Access / Resource Description and Access > [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Mike Tribby > Sent: November 30, 2010 9:11 AM > To: [email protected] > Subject: Re: [RDA-L] Dates in call numbers for RDA > > This exchange illustrates another factor that gives me pause about the whole > RDA thang-- even those who helped create RDA don't appear to know precisely > what it does or what it will affect. If you invite deviant practices, deviant > practices will occur. Is it really a good idea for RDA to suggest using > inferences (the date the item arrived at the individual cataloging agency) to > determine publication date for an item that has only a copyright date but not > an explicit publication date? What percentage of titles that the rest of you > catalog even have an explicit publication date whether or not a copyright date > is present? For us, those items are absolutely in the minority. At least using > a date that actually appears on an item lessens the chance of duplicate > records for a single item that was received at one cataloger's desk in, for > example, December of 2010 and at another cataloger's desk in January of 2011. > > > Mike Tribby > Senior Cataloger > Quality Books Inc. > The Best of America's Independent Presses >
The suggestion for using 'year of receipt' instead of Copyright date if the years are different comes from the Library of Congress Policy Statement for RDA 2.8.6.6. Above that LCPS is the one for using the Copyright date as the probable Date of publication, which is essentially the information that has always been intended to be conveyed by the recording of date practice in AACR2 and in MARC 008/07-10. Perhaps there is an argument to be made to get rid of the 'year of receipt' policy statement. There has been no shortage of conventions for providing probable dates of publication, as in AACR2 1.4F7. Even in the wording for 008/06 for "s" in MARC Bibliographic probable dates are considered expected conventions: "Date consists of one known single date of distribution, publication, release, production, execution, writing, or a probable date that can be represented by four digits. The single date associated with the item may be actual, approximate, or conjectural (e.g., if the single date is uncertain)." The possbility has always been there for different agencies to come up with different approximations or conjectures. What is different in RDA is that there are two separate elements-- two separate fields to fill out, not just one spot after 260 $c: Date of publication Copyright date So with RDA there is a change in MARC conventions for 260 to follow this direction for two separate elements-- which allows for greater specifity in indicating what information is transcribed and what is supplied, as probable dates of publication are in square brackets. By arranging familiar cataloging data into separate elements, RDA moves cataloging in a direction where that data can be used by a wider number of encoding schemes (including recognized ISO standards), which can supply additional constraints and display opportunities on that data that go beyond what is possible with MARC. The required reading on this is here: http://www.rda-jsc.org/docs/5editor3.pdf. Thomas Brenndorfer Guelph Public Library
