Question:
The University of Pittsburgh Law Library is planning
to reorganize and reclassify materials in its international collection.
Part of our collection had been classed in comparative law that now would
be better off in their country code. Part of our collection is also not
fully classified and now with the completion of the international
schedules, we want to go back and reclassify these items. The greater
problem, however, is that we have had several staff turnovers in the
cataloging section of our library, thus, various points-of-view as to
where in our collection items should be located, esp. in regard to items
that deal with socia l policy. Some catalogers would place anything that
was not general law or United States law in the international
collection. Some catalogers would determine whether it was legal in
nature versus some aspect of social policy and place it in our general
treatise collection if it proved to be the latter. Who's right, who's
wrong? I tend to agree with both. But it's time to set a precedent.
So in the absence of having a librarian that specializes in foreign and
comparative law here at Pitt, I am hoping to get some feedback from the
rest of you. What steps would you take to complete a reclassification
project? How would you organize an international collection? Would you
place titles that deal exclusively with social policy yet are foreign
in nature in another collection or keep everything in one collection?
Answer:
There are many different "right" ways to catalog material.
Neither view is "wrong". You are not just setting precedent, but
creating policy - that needs to be both consistent and flexible. Which
way best serves your library users (rather than the preferences of
particular cataloguers)? What is your client profile? Law
students/faculty/staff - or public and undergrad students? How your
patrons look up info. - how they expect to find the materials,should
play an important role in this decision. How extensive is the
collection of materials dealing with the social policy of various
foreign countries? As a law school library, we have tended to "fudge"
materials into the K schedules wherever reasonable. It has only been in
recent years that the LC schedules for law of various countries/regions
have been completed. My feeling is that social policy materials
received today in LAW libraries are more likely to be located in K
rather than general "social" classifications.
