[DCRM-L] Relationship designators

[Deborah J. Leslie]

I’m beginning to see the advantages of keeping and maintaining our own list of designators. The biggest sticking point, aside from scenario that Francis foresees, is that some of the RDA and the RBMS forms for the same relationships diverge, which will cause unnecessary problems in our opacs down the line. What about a general policy of making sure our terms are the same as RDA terms for the same relationship, much as we have been doing with the MARC code list?

Deborah J. Leslie, M.A., M.L.S. | Head of Cataloging, Folger Shakespeare Library
djleslie at folger.edu<mailto:djleslie at folger.edu> | 202.675-0369 | www.folger.edu

From: dcrm-l-bounces at lib.byu.edu [mailto:dcrm-l-bounces at lib.byu.edu] On Behalf Of Lapka, Francis
Sent: Friday, 03 August, 2012 12:25
To: dcrm-l at lib.byu.edu
Subject: Re: [DCRM-L] Relationship designators

I agree with those who say that there’s no particular need to subsume the RBMS list of relationship designators into that of RDA.

I suppose you could argue that the inclusion of all (or some of) the RBMS designators into RDA’s list would help propagate the wider use of these terms, perhaps among catalogers not even aware of the existence of the RBMS designators. On the other hand, mention of the RBMS designators in a resource such as PCC guidelines (for the use of relationship designators) could help in this regard too.

Should we be concerned that our separate list of designators might not be as well integrated into future cataloging tools as might be the RDA list?  Suppose a well-designed cataloging utility comes along—an absurd thought, I know—that allows a cataloger to select the relationship designator from something like a drop-down list of valid terms. Is it possible that such a controlled list might work well with the RDA designators, but not those of other communities?

Francis



_________________________________
Francis Lapka, Catalog Librarian
Yale Center for British Art, Department of Rare Books and Manuscripts
1080 Chapel Street, PO Box 208280, New Haven, CT  06520
203.432.9672    francis.lapka at yale.edu<mailto:francis.lapka at yale.edu>

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