Stu writes:
> I would like to see a solution that acknowledges the readily apparent
> logical relationship among agents. Among the many who oppose the Agent
> proposal, there are few indeed who would argue that these three elements are
> not related. ...
> Acknowledging this relationship does NOT make later acceptance of the agent
> proposal a fait accompli.
> It certainly WILL make it easier to reconcile the DC-15 with other
> initiative including INDECS, but perhaps more importantly, with Z-39.50,
> which has basically adopted DC as the cross discipline searching set, but
> has decided to conflate the three agent elements into an abstract element
> they call NAMES.
>
Assuming that "It" here means the acceptance of the agent proposal, I'd
like to add one remark and suggestion:
Cataloging rules have long since differentiated between descriptive elements
and access point elements.
If you want unified access to names on the one hand (regardless of
functions) but still differentiate between different categories of names,
this can of course be done.
MARC does it by providing just one descriptive field into which you enter
the "Statement of responsibility" in the form given on the piece being
cataloged. For the access points, there are different fields for persons
and corporate bodies, their functions can be coded in subfields and/or
indicators. If unified indexing is the goal, one might downgrade MARC
to have just one repeatable names field, not indicating any functions in
it. The functions are only in the descriptive field - which does not and
need not get indexed.
This would suggest a different approach for DC: instead of the three fields
there are now, one would have
DC.Responsibility Text, not intended for indexing, saying who's done what,
containing names as given
DC.Name repeatable for all persons and bodies involved,
containing the forms of names suitable for indexing
B.E.
Bernhard Eversberg
Universitaetsbibliothek, Postf. 3329,
D-38023 Braunschweig, Germany
Tel. +49 531 391-5026 , -5011 , FAX -5836
e-mail [log in to unmask]
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