Topic 4. Transcription

[Patrick Russell]

Hi all:

Seems to me that there is more agreement here than might appear abuot aims,
though not necessarily about solutions.

1) Most important, the 245 should be a transcription of what is on t.p., a
principle shared by AACR2 and DCRB

2) Certain characters should be handled in a predictable manner.  I
interprete this to mean that we should be able to know with some certainty
whether the t.p. at a certain point has, e.g., "u" or "v", and whether or
not a ligature/digraph has been used. 

3) While some of us like the LCRI quoted by Bob, and it would come closer
to meeting my "filing" concern, it does not meet the "transcription"
criteria of clearly indicating what is on the t.p.  T.p. could have
"uictoria" but per LCRI this would be "victoria;" as I read present DCRB,
it could be transcribed either way, depending on what the cataloger judges
to be the printer's style sheet/custom for the position of the word/letter
on the t.p., or other places in the text.  A "Table for transcription" may
be a last resort, but it does give I think greater predictability about
what is on t.p.  

As to ligatures/digraphs, I would prefer to represent t.p.  This matter can
be handled, as at Berkeley, by filing rules without tampering with the
character(s).  

I think this discussion ought to include some discussion with LC Descr.
Cat. Office.  Its unfortunate to have DCRB & LCRI giving different
solutions, however commendable each might be, since it simply exacerbates
the filing problem in multi-language catalogs.

4) A "non-prining" 240?  I'm not certain what is meant here, but I believe
that title variations due to typographic characters are better handled in
246, 240 being reserved for AACR2 uniform titles. Whether or not one wants
to "display" a 240 in an online catalog depends on a variety of things:
authority control, handling of voluminoous authors in local practice, etc.
I am only familiar in detaI with Berkeley's situation with respect to 240,
and therefore can't picture a situation where I would not want 240 to
display.  I'll label this as a MARC question.

5) Whether or not DCRB (and appendix) reflects Fredson Bower's views, I
think it needs to be kept in mind that although I think we do want to
faithfully represent the t.p., a catalog record in MARC or on a card is not
a segment of a descriptive bibliography. There is a limit imposed by
context.  It is clear to me that part of this discussion of transcription
has to do with some variation of opinion as to the degree with which a
[MARC] catalog record should do what a descriptive bibliography does.  

Patrick


3) At 12:34 AM 1/22/99 -0800, Stephen Tabor wrote:
>At 06:07 PM 1/20/99 -0700, Bob Maxwell wrote:
>>Especially for titles that are used frequently (either containing common
>>terms or for works that have been issued in many editions), both dcrb
>>transcribed titles and exact transcriptions give an entirely arbitrary sort
>>order in title searches. 
>
>If sorting is the concern, is there not an option to add a non-printing 240?
>
>Every rule we make that permits tampering with the form of the title in the
>source (and with this I would include the splitting of digraphs mandated in
>LCRI) compromises the catalogue as an identification tool. If you can't
>compare a copy in hand with someone else's catalogue record and be pretty
>confident of whether you have the same edition (i.e. typesetting) or not,
>the cataloguing has failed in a fundamental way. Everyone who has spent
>time in various institutions' catalogues is familiar with the critical
>function that kicks in when one realizes that the cataloguer has massaged
>the data somehow. One is less able to trust the record, and more inclined
>to call the physical item up just to verify something that should have been
>plain from the record. I believe it is possible to accommodate the finding
>function of the catalogue (as distinct from the identification function)
>within a policy of relatively literal transcription, by the reasonable use
>of 240s and 246s.
>
>
>Stephen Tabor
>Catalogue/Reference Librarian
>
>Clark Library, UCLA              2520 Cimarron, Los Angeles, CA 90018
>(323) 731-8529            (323) 731-8617 (fax)              stabor at ucla.edu
>    http://www2.humnet.ucla.edu/humnet/clarklib/
>
>