Making the Move to RDA: A Self-Study Primer for Catalogers

by Chamya Pompey Kincy, Sara Shatford Layne (Editor)

Overview

Making the Move to RDA: A Self-Study Primer for Catalogers is aimed at catalogers working in the MARC environment who currently create records using AACR2 and need to transition to using the new standard, Resource Description and Access (RDA). Since both RDA’s structure and content differ from AACR2 in many respects, this primer details the development and rationale for RDA as well as its intended goals, principles, and objectives. It then explains RDA’s theoretical underpinnings—collectively known as the FRBR Family of Models.

Framing the text along these lines provides readers the context for understanding the similarities and differences between AACR2 and RDA, both in terms of content and structure. With this foundation in place, the book takes the reader on a survey of RDA elements used to describe bibliographic and authority records and demonstrates how the MARC code has been expanded to accommodate new elements. Finally, it leads the reader field-by-field through MARC bibliographic records for book and non-book resources as well as through authority records for works, expressions, persons, families, and corporate bodies, describing the similarities and differences between AACR2 and RDA for each field.

Examples are provided throughout the text to help the reader visualize the concepts presented.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780810887695
Publisher:	Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Publication date:	01/13/2014
Pages:	346
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

Chamya Pompey Kincy was a librarian at UCLA until her untimely passing in 2013. She worked in the UCLA Library for 16 years, first as a student assistant, then as a library assistant, and finally as a librarian, serving most recently as the Life and Social Sciences Cataloger in the Cataloging & Metadata Center. She was active in several professional organizations, including the Medical Library Association (MLA), the American Library Association (ALA), and the Program for Cooperative Cataloging (PCC). In the Medical Library Association, she chaired the Technical Services Section and was MLA’s liaison to ALA’s cataloging rule-making body Cataloging Committee: Description and Access. In the Program for Cooperative Cataloging, she served as co-chair of the Standing Committee on Training. She was active in local, regional, and national efforts to prepare catalogers for implementation of the cataloging rules Resource Description and Access (RDA), teaching workshops all over the country.

Sara Shatford Layne was a librarian at UCLA until her retirement in 2013. She worked as a librarian at UCLA for almost 30 years, serving most recently as Principal Cataloger in the Cataloging & Metadata Center. She has been active in the American Library Association, at one point chairing the Cataloging & Classification Section of ALCTS. She has published in several areas, but primarily in the area of access to images, and co-authored Improving Online Public Access Catalogs with Martha Yee (1998). She currently serves on the editorial board of Cataloging & Classification Quarterly.

Table of Contents

Preface
Part I. RDA Background Explained
Chapter 1. Development, Objectives, and Principles
Chapter 2. Underlying Models and Organization
Chapter 3. Major Differences between RDA and AACR2
Part II. RDA Instructions Summarized
Chapter 4. Attributes of Manifestations and Items
Chapter 5. Attributes of Works and Expressions
Chapter 6. Attributes of Persons, Families, Corporate Bodies, and Places
Chapter 7. Recording Relationships
Part III. RDA Applied in the MARC Environment
Chapter 8. Creating and Interpreting Bibliographic Records for Books
Chapter 9. Creating and Interpreting Bibliographic Records for Non-Book Resources
Chapter 10. Creating and Interpreting Authority Records
Acronyms
Bibliography

Editorial Reviews

Making the Move to RDA will be useful to new and experienced catalogers alike who lack an understanding of RDA, especially those working in a MARC environment. The book is a strong reference guide that will help catalogers navigate the current mixture of RDA and AACR2 records that coexist in today’s catalogs.

Library Resources & Technical Services (LRTS)

Making the Move to RDA: A Self-Study Primer provides a very comprehensive overview of RDA. The authors provide numerous examples to illustrate RDA rules. Unlike other texts on RDA or cataloging in general, this text also addresses RDA authority records and a discussion of LC’s Name Authority File (LCNAF). The authors have organized the text so that readers are introduced to RDA, the rationale for its development and addresses why guidelines were changed, progresses to a summary of RDA, and concludes with RDA and the creation of bibliographic and authority records.

Mary Beth Weber

The goal of this book is to provide a practical and immediately usable guide for catalogers to creating bibliographic and authority records using RDA, even if they have little or no previous training in RDA. Kincy and Layne do an admirable job of meeting this goal.. . .Making the Move to RDA is an excellent primer for catalogers who are looking to change over to the new code. The book provides practical guidance for getting started, and has a thorough 13-page index with many entries for specific MARC fields and specific RDA instructions that make navigating the chapters for quick reference easy. I recommend the book to any cataloger interested in RDA, especially experienced catalogers who are well-versed in AACR2, but are not familiar with RDA.

Technicalities

Making the Move to RDA has "primer" in its subtitle, but experienced catalogers will also benefit from this detailed explanation that compares and contrasts RDA to AACR2. Examples of cataloging records resulting from the application of the different rules—complete with MARC coding—are welcome, especially for situations such as collaborative works, compilations, and manifestations embodying multiple language expressions.

Elaine A. Franco

Finally, an RDA primer that is useful for practicing catalogers and cataloging students alike! Kincy and Lane’s book is like having a conversation with two expert catalogers as they walk you step-by-step through the intricacies of the conceptual models of FRBR, FRAD, and FRASAD that serve as a foundation for RDA and then guide your hand through comparisons between AACR2 records to those created applying RDA. The text includes a multitude of useful examples for cataloging book and nonbook resources, along with explanations of the differences between AACR2 and RDA when creating the records for each format. The chapters on authority record elements provide the reader with detailed explanations of the changes as well as new RDA elements present in authority records and their connections to the conceptual models. This logically organized and accessible self-study primer is a necessity for all cataloging departments as they ‘make the move’ to RDA and for beginning and advanced cataloging students who are just learning about the potentials of RDA.

June Abbas

[T]his book is clearly written and is a fantastic resource for catalog librarians and students looking to acquire knowledge about how to catalog using RDA. The careful organization of this book, as well as its detailed index, make this volume a highly useful tool.

Technical Services Quarterly

RDA is still a moving target, with ongoing revisions taking place in addition to the evolution of how MARC and environments like WorldCat accommodate RDA. Throw into the mix developing data carriers outside of MARC, and it becomes clear why a book on RDA must be able to speak to many perspectives all at once. Making the Move to RDA: A Self-Study Primer for Catalogers takes on this challenge effectively, providing context on RDA's structure and scope, explaining RDA's instructions for cataloging materials of all formats, and comparing its application in MARC to that of AACR2 in clearly defined sections that allow catalogers and administrators of all levels of expertise to easily find the chapters that address their specific needs.. . .Beyond the thorough and clearly explained treatment of RDA in this book, it is perhaps the flexibility it offers that is one of its greatest strengths. Catalogers from all types of institutions and of all types of learning styles will find the information in this book neatly organized, allowing them to read through the book in the order they prefer and later revisit the book's specifics without getting lost. Combined with other training resources and the ongoing monitoring of changes in RDA, catalogers will be prepared with this book to navigate the changing cataloging environment we face today; it is a thorough and versatile resource that will remain of continued use to catalogers for years to come.

Olac Newsletter

Making the Move to RDA will be useful to new and experienced catalogers alike who lack an understanding of RDA, especially those working in a MARC environment. The book is a strong reference guide that will help catalogers navigate the current mixture of RDA and AACR2 records that coexist in today’s catalogs.

Library Resources & Technical Services