[DCRM-L] Advice requested for Rare Book Cataloging preparation

[Marilyn McClaskey]

Deborah,

To come from a place of No Experience and attempt such practice in
isolation seems daunting. Taking a cataloging class would provide feedback
at least. I realize there is a cost to this unless the person is employed
at an institution with a library school and a tuition benefit. Online
courses or webinars?  Volunteering at someplace that would provide the
basic training in return for a certain productivity?  (The suggestion for
getting a working cataloger to do a customized course is good.)

Feedback from and discussion with colleagues has been the greatest enricher
of my cataloging perspectives and expertise, even when I have been on the
trainer end of the equation.  Of course, there is nothing better than
teaching something as a way to learning it.

Marilyn McClaskey
Rare Books Cataloger
University of Minnesota Libraries

On May 8, 2017, at 9:13 PM, Deborah J. Leslie <DJLeslie at FOLGER.edu> wrote:

Dear colleagues,



I’d like to brainstorm ideas for preparing potential students to take my Rare
Book School class <http://rarebookschool.org/courses/library/l30/> who
don’t have original cataloging experience. I’ve always considered it
essential that students walk into the class with enough active mastery of
general cataloging rules that they can competently populate a blank MARC
workform, and that experience doing original cataloging is what provides
necessary active competence.



What can I tell people whose jobs involve cataloging rare books, whose
institutions are willing to invest in their training, but are not in a
position to give them background experience with original cataloging? What
about people whose ambition is to be a rare book cataloger, but again, are
not in a position to develop experience in original cataloging of general
materials? It seems neither fair nor ultimately beneficial to shut these
people out.



When pressed in the past, I’ve recommended that individuals sit down with
the rules and practice original cataloging of older books (published before
1970 or so) at hand, advising against looking them up in OCLC or the LC
catalog; older books don’t have CIP and are unlikely to have AACR2 or RDA
cataloging.



Are there more effective ways to get adequate practice in original
cataloging? Better ways to gain the necessary competence so they can hit
the ground running on Day 1 of class?



All thoughts and suggestions welcome, even half-baked ones.



Deborah J. Leslie, MA, MLS | Senior Cataloger, Folger Shakespeare Library |
djleslie at folger.edu | 201 East Capitol Street, S.E. | Washington, DC 20003
| 202.675-0369 <(202)%20675-0369> | orcid.org 0000-0001-5848-5467
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