Error during command authentication.

Dear Colleagues:

The papers for the U.S. MARC Advisory Committee meetings at ALA Midwinter in Boston (Jan. 15 and 16) are now available at:

http://www.loc.gov/marc/marbi/list-p.html

http://www.loc.gov/marc/marbi/list-dp.html

The paper of most interest to art librarians is DP 2005-01, Subject Access to Images (http://www.loc.gov/marc/marbi/2005/2005-dp01.html), which was submitted by Sherman Clarke and myself. The paper discusses the possibility of changing MARC coding in order to distinguish between indexing terms for intellectual content and indexing terms for visual depictions. Many libraries and visual resource collections create records in their OPACs for visual materials (slides, photographs, prints, you name it);  their book collections may also contain substantial amounts of illustration. Currently, MARC coding offers no way to distinguish between material ABOUT something and visual depictions OF something, so a subject search for “horses” will retrieve records for works about horses and for images of horses.  This is an impediment to retrieval even within our own databases; it will only grow worse as we start offering users federated searching of many different databases, some of which may be image only, or a mixture of image and text. The paper describes current search strategies for identifying images in a MARC-based catalog, and explores some ways MARC coding could be changed to distinguish between intellectual and visual content.

Proposal 2005-04, Hierarchical Geographic Names in the MARC 21 Bibliographic Format (http://www.loc.gov/marc/marbi/2005/2005-04.html), proposes subfields to be used in a new Field 662 (Subject Added Entry - Hierarchical Place Name). The new field would allow a hierarchical approach to geographic coverage that is subject-oriented, as opposed to production-oriented (currently provided by Field 752, which is used for place of publication, production, or creation). This would facilitate subject research by area or subregion.

The comments which Sherman and I received in response to an earlier posting on subject access to images were very helpful in drafting the paper. We would be most grateful for any fresh light you can shed on this issue, or any of the issues discussed in the MARBI papers.

Elizabeth O’Keefe

ARLIS/NA liaison to U.S. MARC Advisory Group

Elizabeth O'Keefe
Director of Collection Information Systems
The Pierpont Morgan Library
29 East 36th Street
New York, NY  10016-3403

TEL: 212 590-0380
FAX: 212 685-4740
NET: [log in to unmask]

Visit CORSAIR, the Library’s comprehensive collections catalog, now on
the web at
http://corsair.morganlibrary.org