The Beginning Cataloguing course was organised as a response to feedback from CILIPSW members, asking what training events they would like. This was a one-day in person workshop held at Frenchay Campus, UWE in Bristol on 14 June.
In preparation I had planned the route using google maps and allowed extra time for any of those ‘just in case’ scenarios! Unfortunately, I didn’t account for missing a turning at a roundabout and ending up back on the M4. Only 5 miles from my destination, the route suddenly jumped to 15! However, I arrived at UWE with ten minutes to spare. Once again, my lack of navigation skills let me down as it took a further 15 minutes to find the right building and room. I had forgotten how vast UWE is, apart from building contractors I didn’t see a single person until eventually arriving in the classroom.
The course was led by Anne Welsh, who has worked as a librarian in different roles and libraries for the last 25 years. Her professional passion is for cataloguing; she aspires to improve the quality of metadata, analyse the key attributes of an item, and then ensure that this can be communicated to the people who want or need it. Anne, a published author, provides consultancy, training and is secretary to the steering committee of the RDA, Resource Description and Access. RDA is a package of data elements, guidelines, and instructions for creating library and cultural heritage resource metadata that are well-formed according to international models for user-focused linked data applications. [1]
Anne provided the 16 participants with a 44-page workbook. She introduced the session with a summary of the toolkits and resources available, and the relationships between Work, Expression, Manifestation, and Item, also known as the WEMI model. The course focused on the current formatting standard, using RDA in MARC (Machine Readable Cataloguing). When writing a catalogue record, we were encouraged to think about who the audience is and where and how they are searching. What information needs capturing and what fields does it go in.
We looked at the common MARC fields, the indicators, and the delimiters. In my current role I have been trained how to add catalogue records to the LMS, however, I have not had any formal catalogue training before, other than an introduction to MARC. I was fine with tags and delimiters but hadn’t previously understood indicators, so it all suddenly made sense!
Our first workbook exercise required us to create a record in the 300 field for the physical description of a book. Anne had picked Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, a small book, but with two sequences of page numbers. The book is a mock up of a school notebook, with marginal notes by Harry Potter, these count as illustrations, so get included in our description. We also looked at the author, title, and publisher fields, with plenty of books to practice with.
The course was a great introduction to cataloguing, I was relieved that I already had a basic understanding. I think I would have found it overwhelming if I was unfamiliar with a catalogue record and the MARC fields. Anne kept us all engaged throughout the day and was interesting and entertaining to listen to. There was a lot of interest in the room for a further instalment in cataloguing, especially for librarians like myself who deal with items that don’t appear on any other catalogues e.g. local studies material. It was interesting to learn from other participants that being able to create catalogue records in their institution is limited sometimes to one person, reluctant to share their knowledge or access to allow other staff to learn these skills, inevitably leading to a backlog of items waiting to be catalogued, and therefore not accessible to anyone who could be using them for research or reading for pleasure.
On leaving the course I had the pleasure of trying to find my car, at least no time pressure! I bumped into another librarian on the course twice around UWE whilst we wandered around in different directions trying to get to car and bus stop! Google maps told me the journey home would be an additional hour due to an accident on the M5, so I decided rather than sit in the traffic I would turn off at Cribbs Causeway and call into the mall! All in all, an enjoyable day, a great opportunity to network with colleagues across all library sectors and skill development that will make a difference not only to myself, but improved catalogue entries for people interested in our local studies library.
CILIP South West Member Network 