CATALOGUING OF CORPORATE SERIALS

Cataloguing of serials, brollght out by corporatebodies, has been a difficult problem, Traces the develop-ment of the various practices through the main cataloguecodes. The MCR of 1967 has not been able to solve theproblem to the satisfaction of all concerned.

INTRODUCTION

Cataloguing of serial publ ic a t ione remains apuzzle to m'iny librarians. All the cataloguing codespublished so far provi'de different rule s. No twocodes are similar. However, when studied histori-cally, some code's seem to have influencedothers. Here, an attempt has been made to trace thehistor ical development of cataloguing of CurporateS"r ia l Publications- beginning with Pamizzi's fa-mv'..lS 91 Rules to Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules1967, nd to assess the merits of various systems.

To begin with, there is a great difference ofopinion as to the correct definition of the term"SE'rial". In Great Britain, for E'xample "Periodical"is thE' term usually used fer serial publications.ThE'rE' have been many attempts to provide exactdefinition of the terms "SerialD and "Periodical".Some authorities, notably Charles Ammi Cutter andS. R. Ranganathan, have attempted, to differentiatebetween the two terms. As it Seems fairly certainthat no one person will be able to convince every bod'lthat he has provided the best definition of either orboth the terms, it seems futile to argue about them.For the purpose of this paper the term ·S erial" isused, rightly or wrongly, as the blanket term toinclude Journal, Memoirs, Official organ, Periodi-cal. Proceedings, Reports, Transactions, Year-books, and all such publications which are issued ona continuing basis. What Constitutes a Corporateserial has not yet been clearly defined.

TWO TYPES OF SERIALS

Broadly speaking serial publications may bedivided into the following two major groups!

I. Serials without an author, and

2. Serials with an author, either Personal orcorporate.

42'-10

Mohan BhatiaCentre for Science Policy StudiesJawaharlal Nehru UniversityNew Delhi-1100S7

Considering thE' great number of codes in usethere are relatively few points of diSagreementamong them in: regard to basic principles. As re-gards serials without an author, there Seems to begeneral agreement among all the codes to enter themunder their titles, al tho ugh they may not a lwav sagree on which part of the title a serial may beentered and under which title it should be enteredi.e., Earliest Title, Latest Title, or SuccessiveTitle.

Serials having a personal author are almostin all the codes prescribed to be entered under th ••author. But the serials issued by corporate bodies,namely societies, institutes, and government agen-cie s etc. are a problem. There is no agreementamong various codes as to how they should be en-tered - whether under the name of the corporatebody, or under the place, or form heading or title.For such serials, a study has been made for thechoice of entry in the different codes.

Panizzi provides rules 80-83 for the treat-ment of various types of serial publications. According to t heae rules Ser ials are to be enterE'd un de r thesubject heading or the form heading. Thus, for thepublications of the ac ade rn ie s , institutes, univer-Sities, and learned SOCieties, etc, Rule 80 allowsentry under the subject heading "ACADAMIES".Almanacs and calenders, e tc, are to be enteredunder the subject heading "EPHEMERIDES-; videRule 82. In his Rule 83, Panizzi provides for'-crossrefer~nces from the name of publications under .which they are generally known to the main entriesof suc h works. In theSe rules one Hnds an attemptto arrive at a main entry which is at the same timea subject entry and still not depart from the authori-ty of the title page. It may be mentioned here, thatPanizzi made tbe s e rules for the uSe of the BritishMuseum Catalogue of Printed Books.

JEWE TT'S CODE [2]

In 1850, Charles C. Jewett prepared a codefor the catalogue of the Smithsonian Institution. Hemade no USe of subject headings for main entry.

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For serials published by corporate bodies he pre-scribed in Rule 7.2, that they may be entered underthe name of the body. He established "U.S." asheading for publications of the U.S. Government. Hethus improved upon the Panizzi'1!I Rules which latterproved to be significant and pertinent to the develop-ment of cataloguing codes.

CUTTER'S RULES FOR DICTIONARY CATALOG [4]

Charles Ammi Cutter in his aRules for Dic-tionary Ca ta lo g" supported the principles of Jewetton which he has been at variance with Panizzi. Cut-ter made no use of subject headings (except in caSeof anonymous biographies) for main entry. He hastreated the corporate serials as follows. "TheMemoirs, Proceedings, Transactions of a SOCietyare periodicals in point of {I) occasional publication,(2) indefinite continuance, and so far as they containanything beyond the record of the SOCiety's meetingsof (3) variety of subje-ct; but the lack of the (4) charac-teristic, variety of authorship, in as much as thememoirs or other papers given in addition to'proceedings' proper may be considered as the workof the society acting through its members; the socie-ty, therefore, is the author, and the transactions etc.etc., need not have title entry. There are, however,some DJournals- published by or ·under the auspicesOfDsocieties which are really periodicals, andshould be so treated in entry, the society being notthe author but the editorft. [5]. Cutter himself wasso confused about them that in his note under Rule60, DSocieties are author of their journal ••• • hestates -Where to enter societies is the most difficultproblem in cataloguing. So difficult that theGermans evade it, not entering them at all, andBritish Museum solves it by putting them in aseparate cata lo g" [6]. It may, however, be mention-ed that Cutter was the first librarian who attemptedto set forth the catalog rules in a systematic way.His rules are often referred to as the first principlesof cataloguing. In the prefa~e to his fourth editionCutter states -The convenience of the public isalways to be set b~fore the' ease of the cataloger, asthe underlying principle for cataloguing ft [7].

PRUSSlAN INSTRUCTION [8]

The Prussian Instructions are widely followedin Germany and these differ to a great extent fromthe practices in other countries as no entry isallowed under the corporate body. The Prussian In-structions differ from other codes on the plea that theauthorship can be only a personal thin~, and hencethey did not in gener-al treat the names of organiza-tions a e potential main entry. Since 1931 there hasbeen a move to rev,lse these Instructions. However,not much progresl ha s been made in connection withthe corporate entry. One suggestion which is putforward in the German Democratic Republic is thatthe athe names of government bodies, SOCieties,and institutions whic h occur On the title page of anannonymous work will be given an added entry when

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the publication relates contentl-wile to the inatitu-tion concerned"[9). This is more in line with thepractice in other parts of the world.

CATALOGUE RULES, 1908 [10]

These rules are the product of the jointventure of the American Library Association and theLibrary Association (UK). Here serials have beentreated in Rules 121-125 and 128. The Library ofCongress practice ia alao given in these rules, th eBritish practice wherever it differs Is also indicat-ed. FOT Corporate Serials these rules provide that"A regular periodical issued by a society or aninstitution is ordinarily to be entered under its title,especially if this is dist inc tlv •• in c haz-act s r "; 'Whatis a distinctive title is not made clear. The rulesbecome more confusing by adding ·When however,the Successive parts appear at long intervals-annual·ly, bienially, e tc, or when the publication, contains,only the regular proceedings, transactions, andannual r e ports of the SOCiety, it is to be enteredunder the name of the latter, with added entry orreferenc-e under the title if it is distinctive... Indoubtful cases entry under the society is to be pre-ferred" [11].

Cutter in his rules had left it to the choiceof the cataloguer to enter such doubtful serialseither undet the title or under the name of thesociety with a warning to rna k r- all the ne c es ea r vreferences. It appears that the compilers of 1908Rules were influe'lced by Jewett, who had stated inhis code that "The rules for cataloguing must bestringent. and should meet, as far as possible. alldifficulties of detail. Nothing a~ far as can be avoid-ed, should be left to the individual taste or judgemenlof the cataloguer" [12]. As 1908 Rules attemptedto provide separate rules to Cover specifiC situationthe problem became much wider than when catalo-guers were posed with problems for which no rulesexisted.

ALA CATALOGUING RULES, 1949 [13]

In the years that followed, the libraries oftenhad to formulate their 0"." rules to meet s pe c ificdemands created by the volume, variety and vagariesof the publications. For corporate serials theymainly relied for guidance on the nGuide to thecataloguing of the serial publications of societies andinstitutionsti, issued by the Library of Congress andby following the practice adopted by that library intheir printed cards. This guide Was quite detailedand gave solutions to all problems of serials as theyexisted and the treatment they received at the Li-brary of Congress. Provision for the cataloguing ofCorporate Serials in the ALA 1949 code were entire-ly based on the above mentioned guide. Rules pro-vide that seials published by corporate bodies andhaving a distinctive title Should be entered under thetitle, otherwise under the name of the corporatebody. What is distinctive title is not explained. As

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a matter of fact there is nothing r., A' in the 1949Rules.

Rule 5 in the ALA 1949 Code provides for en-tries of collections and serials. It follows thepattern of 1908 Rules but is mor e detailed. and isfull of HIIl.trations after the rules. Thus making itmore difficult for the cataloguer to catalogue a workwhich is different from tho s e illulltrated, or notprovided in the rules.

VATICAN RULES [14]

These rules were compiled at the time whenthe ALA 1908 Rules were being c r it ic is a d in theUnited States and their revision was underway.These rules were the product of the joint efforts ofthe librarians from the United States and Vatican.As suc h Vatican Rule s have all the influence ofAmerican practice. Vatican Rules were first publi-shed in 1930. Its Rules 229-241 provide for entryof serial publications. For corporate serials theSerules provide entry under t h•• latest name of thecorporate body. Thes •• rules are, however, moredetailed than the ALA Rule s of 1908 or even 1949.

CLASSIFIED CATALOGUE CODE (CCC) [15]

This code is the personal contribution of S.R.Ran gana t han and is widely followed in Indian lib-raries. Us first edition was brought out in 1934 andhas since be,.,n revised five times. Its fifth editionappeared in 1964. CCC is full of detailed definition""At 'C 32 corporate body is, defined as an authorwhen "the responsibility for the thought and expres-sion constituting the work resting solely On it or anyorgan of it, and not on the private capacity of anyperson or persons forming part of or holding officein or in any other way connected with that bo dv"; Inchapter GC the distinction between the Personal andthe corporate authors is discussed, and in chapterGD different kinds of corporate authors are defined.The detailed definitions make the CCC more difficultto USe than simplify the situation. It has even dis-t ing u ished Periodical from a Serial vide FF III andFF 112

In CCC Main Entry il! under the Class Number.So like Panizzi, CCC avoids the direct entry underthe title. However, hea din g of the Main Entry Con-stists of 'title proper' which can be compared withthe Prussian Instructions. For Corporate Serialsit is stated at FB 94, that "Title pr ope r of Periodi-cal Publication - includes the name of the sponsor ifit occurs at the beginning and excludes it if it occursat tile eodD. Thull CCC 1I0IYe. the i.su~ of corporatelIerial!!'b~ leaving it to the authority of the printedtitle. For those who approach Corporate Serials bythe Corporate body, CCC provides at PB 34 addedentries -by interchanging the name of the sponsorand the Titie of the Periodical Publication, and •••Every variation got by substituting eVery AlternativeName of the Sponsor in the Heading ••• " It also

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provides an added entry under the Generlc CIa ••which CCC; calls "Generic 'Class Ind-sx Entry", withthe Heading DPeriodical"or -Serial-, a. the cas ema y be. An optional added entry i. a lao providedunder the geographic place name vide PB 38.

Apparently, CCC has been influenced by all th~earlier codes and tries to cover all aspects by pro-viding added entries to cover different anglell fromwhich a serial publication may be approache I,e.subject, title. corporate body. place of origb .•.•etC.

CODE REVISION

Beginning from Panizzi's 91 Rules to ALA 19..,Rules, cataloguing codes not only increased innumber but also made the problem more complex.No code for example took into consideration econo-mics of cataloguing or practical needs of the reader.Osborn, in his paper, -The crisis in cataloguing-.said that -More and more rules and definitions arebeing worked out constantly until at the present timeit begins to appear that the classicism is taking fullcontrolD [16]. He pleaded for simple rules andsuggested that the revision of the cataloguing rulellshould be based on pragmatic theory.

In 1949, the Library of Congress also publish-ed their rules for descriptive cataloguing. Theserules were simple and became succ aseful I, Allthe s e led to the demand for simplification of rulellfor author and title entry. As a result, the Boardon Cataloguing Po lic y and Research of the AmericanLibrary Association's Division of Cataloguing andClassification asked the Library of Congrellll tomake a detailed study of the ALA Rules for Authorand Title Entry. In 1951 the task was a aa lgned toMr. Seymour Lubetzky, Library of Congress Con-sultant on Bibliographic and Cataloguing Policy.Lubetzky worked on this task for two years and inMay 1952, he issued the first draft of his report.This report was revised after it was studied byleading contemporary librarians and ca.ta lo guar a,Second draft was issued in March 1953. Again,after criticism and suggestions from leading autho-ritieS a third draft was issued in 1953 under thetitle -Cataloguing Rules and Principlell-. Here,Lubetzky questioned the very structure of the ALA1949 code and suggested few principles on whieh newcode may be formulated. These principlell laterbecame the basis for the new Anglo-American Cata-loguing Rules, 1967.

Before the final Rules were publ iehe d in 1967,two draft codell were prepared by Lubetzky one in1958 and another in 1960. These Were disculllled inStanford Institute and th~ McGill Institute respective-ly.

PARIS PRINCIPLES:

Two international conferences were held in1959 and 1961 on principles of cataloguing. At the

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end of the 1961 Conference IIStatement of Principlesllwas adopted which are nOWpopularly known as theParis Principles. For Corporate Serials. ParisPrinciples provides as under:

9 Entry under Corporate Bodies.

9.1 The main entry for a work should be madeunder the name of a corporate body [I, e.any institution. organized body tlr assemb-ly for persons known by a corporate orcollective name. )

9.11 When the work is by its nature ue cas sa r i-ly'the expression of the collective thoughtor activity of the corporate body; even ifsigned by a person in the capacity of anofficer or Servant of the corporate body.or

9.12 When the wording of the title or title-page.taken in conjunction with the nature of thework. clearly implies that the corporatebody is COllectively responsible for thecontent of the work.

1. e.g. official reports, rules andregulations, manifestoes, programmesand records of the results of collectivework.

2. e.g. serials whose title consist of ageneric term (Bulletins. Transactions,etc.) preceded or followed by the name ofa corporate body, and which include someaccount of the activities of the body [18]and,

11.23 Works whose main entry to make uuue.r thename of corporate body but which havedistrictive titles not inc ludln g the name ofthe corporate body [19]. The 1967 Anglo-American code is mainly based On theseprinciples, with slight variations especial-1y with regard to corporate s inids.

ANGLO-AMERICAN RULE, 1967 [20]

Its Rule 6 deals with serial publications anddivides them mainly into the following three groups.

A - Serials without any author, personal orcorporate should be entered under title.To distinguish between two similar titlesrules provide that place of publication maybe added in parentheses after the title. Ifboth tre titles appear from same placethen dates of commencement and ceasationmay be added after the place name

B - Serials issued by the corporate bodieshave been divided in two parts:

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1. Those whic h rn a y be enter cd under titlee. g. -a Periodical, monographic seriae,or a serially pub l is hr-d bibliography. index,directory, biographical dictionary. al-manac or year-book issued by or under theauthority of a corporate body,- exceptwhen it includes lithe name or the abbre-viation of the name of the corporate bodyor consists solely of a generic term •••• II

2. Any other serial not provided above butissued under t ho authority of corporatebody may be entered under the body.

C. Serials issued by a personal a utho r maybe entered under his name.

The compilers of this code have departed homthe Paris Principle No.9. 12 as regards corporateserials are concerned on the plea II that. the inclusionin the title of a serial of the name or pa r t of thename of the issuing corporate body is too powerful acriter ion to be nullified when, in unusual ca ae s , noaccount of the activities of the body is ir.c Iud ed inthe publication. Further, mKnown primarily or con-ventionally by title II is too vague a criterion.

The British edition of the A.A. Rules [22] forcataloging corporate serials differ substantiallyfrom the North-American text. Several se r ial s is s u«ed by corporate bodies are entered under the co r »

porate body but some or not. The BrItish versiondecides the issue by studying the relationShip bet-ween the title of the serial and the name of the issu-ing body.

Present code like ALA Rules is inconsistent inallowing entry of some serials issued by a corporatebody under the title and some under the name of thecorporate body. So the problem is still with us.

CONCL UDING REMARKS

An age-old problem relating to corporatepublications is the entry for the writings of officersof corporate bodie s, All code s except Prussian In-structions' provide some entry under a corporatebody. In Germany where Prussian Instructions arefollowed, librarians have now agreed in principle tothe entry of a corporate authorship. Cutter enteredthem under the name of the body because he Con-sidered them as authors and as a convenience to thereaders it will bring all publications of a corporatebody together in the catalog. The 1908 Rules.created more confusion by differentiating betweendistinctive and non e d iat t nc t i.va titles. In 1949, rul ••••became increasingly elaborate and intricate. lubet-sky approaChed this problem horn a diff(l ent anglei.e. authority. He allowed entry of a Benal publ i- ..cation under title lIa serial is entered under the titlenot because it is a Ser, b'( because it i" Subject tochange of author. In Let, ,f th"re is no change ofauthor, a serial if! enter,·j under the a.utho r" - e.g.corporate body [23].

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Mr. Chaplin, while commenting on the problemat Paris Conference said that there are two app r oa c h-eS to entry under corporate bodies: (I) theoretical;and (2) useful, and in case of official reports of acorporate body there is no difference [24]. He fur-ther pointed out that it was necessary to make dis-tinction between serial publications - such as theperiodical reports of the activities of a corporatebody for wbich the body was completely responsible,and periodical publications made up of separate con-tributions by individual personal authors, there wasalso intermediate type of publications which contain-ed individual contributions but which was still anofficial record of the proceedings of the corporatebody [25]. Prof. Lubetzky has clarified the positionby stating that the corporate body may be considerednot only as the editor of a periodical but also as thecompiler ••• A corporate body could act as the com-piler either of one work or of a publication in serialform; its relationship to both types of publicationwc ul d be the same •• 1£ a serial was not subject tochanges of authorship. it should be entered under itsauthor" [26]

Anglo-American Catalog Rules, 1967 providethat for serials pu bl is hed by corporate body entrymay be made under the corporate body only ••• if thetitl·e (exclusive of the subtitle) includes the name orthe abbreviation of the name of the corporate body,or consists solely of a generic term that requiresthe narne of the body for adequate identification ofthe serial, "[27]. Otherwise it should be entered underthe title, with an added entry under the corporatebody. In 1967 the age-old problem is still un so lve d,

It is difficult to convince everybody that a givenme tbod in the- best. Since the 1967 Code has fallenshort of the expec tations the n('led for a code which issimple and economical to use still remains. Nowonder the 1967 code is already under revision andthe new code is expected to be published in 1977,which hopefully may solve the riddle.

REFERENCES:

1. Rules for the compilation of the catalogue. InThe Catalogue of Printed Books in theBritish Museum. London, 1841, V.I, p,ix.

2. Jewett, C.C. on the construction of ca ta lo guoof libraries. Wa s hington , D.C. Smith-sonian Institution, 1853.

3. Strout, Ruth French. The Development of t~Ecatalog and cataloging codes. LibraryQuarterly, 1958, 26(4) 271.

4. Cutter, Charles Arnrn i, Rules for a dictionarycatalog, 4th ed. Wa s hington , D.C., Go vt,Printing Office, 1904. 173 p,

5. ibid. p; 59.

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6. ibid. p, 44.

7. ibid. p, 6.

8. Prussian instructions; rules [or the alphabeti-cal catalogs o[ the Prussian Libraries.Translated from the 2nd ed. with an in-troduction and notes by Andrew D. Osborn.Ann Arbor, University of Michigan Press,i 938. xiu, 192 p,

9. Osborn, Andrew D. Cataloging and catalogingcodes in other countries today. LibraryQuarteriy, i956, 26(4) 280.

io, Catalog rules: author and title entrie8. Com-piled by Committees of the AmericanLibrary Association and the (BritiSh) Ll-brary Association. American edition.Boston, ALA Publis hing Board, 1908. xvi,89 p,

11. ibid. p, 36.

12. Jewett, o pp, c it, p. 6.

13. American Library Association. Division ofCataloging and Classification. ALA Cata-loging rules for author ar¥i title entries.2nd ed., ed. by Clare Beetle. Chicago,American Library Association, 1949. xxi,265 p.

14. Vatican Biblioteca Va t ic ana , Rules fo.r thecatalog of printed books, tr , from the 2ndHalian ed. Chicago, American LibraryAssociation, 1948.

15. Ran ganat han , S.R. Classified catalogue code,with additional rules for dictionary cata-logt'e code by S. R. Ra ngauat han a s elate dby A, Neelamegban. 5th ed. Bombay,etC., Asia Publ is hin g House, 1965. 644 p,

16. Osborn, Andrew D. Crisis in cataloging, apaper read before the American LibraryIn st itute at the Harvard Facuity Club,June 31, 1941. P. 2.

17. Lubetzky, Seymour. Cataloging rules andprinciples. Wa sb in gton , D.C., Libraryof €ongres s, 1953. 65 p.

1S. International Conference on Cata logutn gPrinciples. Paris, 9th-16ih October,1961. Report. 1. on don , internationalFederation. of Library As sociations, 1963.p. 44.

19. ibid. p, 72.

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20. Anglo-American Cataloging Rules. preparedby tbe American Library Association. theL lbrary of CongresS. the Library AS80cia'tion and the Canadian Library Association.Nortb American Text. Chicago. ALA,1967. xxi. 400 p.

21. ibid. p. 3.

22. Anglo-Amer~can Cataloguing Rules. Preparedby the American Library AS80ciation.(and others). British text. London.Library Association, 1 967.

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23. Lubetzky, Seymour. Code of cataloging rule.:author and title entry ••• with an explana-tory commentary by Paul Dunkin. (n. p. )American Library Association, 1960. p.80.

24. International Conference on Cataloguing Prin-ciples, Paris. Opp, e it; p, 46.

25. ibid. p. 47.

26. ibid. p. 98.

Anglo-American Cataloging Rules. NorthAmerican text. opp. cit. p. 20-~1.

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