[DCRM-L] [RBMS] Controlled Vocabularies updates from ALA annual

[Deborah J. Leslie]

Amy and Ryan, & al.,

Please forgive this drive-by commenting on "Literature of prejudice," but my time is tight, the comment involves a hierarchy instead of a single term, and the issue is important.

A number of years ago, the thesaurus team acknowledged problems with the term "literature of prejudice," but threw up our hands on a solution and postponed consideration of the whole issue. (Possibly because there wasn't a formal thesaurus editorial team, only an Editor, without even a scheduled meeting. We usually met for lunch after the BSC meeting on Saturday at a café or restaurant, and reported at the BSC Sunday meeting. History lesson complimentary; more details upon request. (-;)

Calling this type of literature-however hateful it is to most or all of us-"prejudicial" is a form of labelling, and therefore violates cataloger ethics. That is, we are imposing our own value judgments on the material. Who are we to say that all literature opposed to certain religious, racial, sexual, etc. groups cannot be the result of thoughtful consideration-by definition the opposite of prejudice?

I'd like to propose replacing "Literature of prejudice" with the AAT term "Polemics," which is scoped as "Aggressive, forcefully presented arguments, often disputing a policy or opinion." The term and scope avoids labelling with value judgments while still acknowledging the controversial, passionate, vitriolic nature of the material.


From: rbms-request at lists.ala.org [mailto:rbms-request at lists.ala.org] On Behalf Of Amy Brown
Sent: Wednesday, 29 June 29 2016 9:24
To: rbms at lists.ala.org; dcrm-l at lib.byu.edu
Subject: [RBMS] Controlled Vocabularies updates from ALA annual

Dear Colleagues,

The Controlled Vocabularies Community Discussion Blog (http://rbms.info/cv-comments/) has been updated with scope notes for 62 terms. These scope notes were reviewed at our committee meeting on June 25, 2015 at ALA Annual.


Due to the volume of terms for comment, the comment period for these terms has been extended. The comment period runs from June 29 to July 27, 2016.

The CV team welcomes and encourages your feedback!  Let us hear from you on our blog at http://rbms.info/cv-comments/, and many thanks to those who have contributed in the past.

With thanks,

Amy F. Brown and Ryan Hildebrand, co-chairs
RBMS Controlled Vocabularies Editorial Group





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