[rak-list] Michael Gorman on RDA

[Bernhard Eversberg]

Der große alte Mann der AACR, Michael Gorman, hat sich in einem noch
unveröffentlichten Artikel über das RDA-Konzept und die Entwürfe
geäußert:

http://www.slc.bc.ca/rda1007.pdf

Manche werden ihn womöglich nunmehr nur noch als alten, nicht mehr als
großen Katalogisierungsfachmann ansehen, der einen Verrat an seinem
Lebenswerk wahrnimmt und anprangert. Es kann aber nicht schaden,
hier ein paar Kernsätze zur Kenntnis zu bringen, denn ganz daneben
sind seine Ansichten wohl nicht, und wir sollten über das Regelwerk,
das über uns hereingebrochen wird, nicht nur die Lobpreisungen zur
Kenntnis nehmen.

"... theoretical approach promises to be the biggest disaster to hit
descriptive cataloguing since the draft rules of 1941 (the latter
consigned justly to the mists of history, but an instructive example of
how badly wrong groups of wellintentioned people can be)"
...
The simplistic idea [of metadata] is that vast numbers of electronic
documents can be catalogued effectively by having their creators apply
uncontrolled terms in a few simple categories. ... It is hard to believe
the world's libraries have taken metadata seriously.
....
Then there is the even more simplistic approach of those who think that
the free-text searching used by search engines can substitute for
cataloguing.
...
Lastly, there is the attachment on the part of the theoreticians to the
document Functional requirements for bibliographic records
(acronymized to FRBR). FRBR may have some merit as a way of looking at
the theory of cataloguing -- it has little as a foundational document
for creating a cataloguing code.


I have studied the drafts of RDA that have been made available and I
am horrified by them, for the following reasons:
...
Part I of AACR2 was organized in the following manner. A general
chapter, following the order of the universally accepted ISBD preceded
chapters giving details, amplifications, and exceptions for particular
kinds of material ... and publication patterns ... in the same order.
There is no good practical reason ... why this structure has been
abandoned in favor of an incoherent hodge-podge of general and special
rules
...
Second, the ISBD is used as the basis for description in almost all
modern cataloguing codes and its order and punctuation (mirroring as
they do the MARC format) are accepted throughout the world ... Part I of
the RDA is divided into six chapters, each of which mixes up general and
specific instructions. It is therefore astounding to read that "RDA is
not structured around the areas and elements specified in ISBD (G)" in
the draft RDA.
...
Third, RDA gives its examples without ISBD punctuation and with only
the element that is subject to the rule - that is completely out of
context ... examples are supposed to illuminate rules, not confuse the
reader.
...
Fourth, the draft RDA is an editorial disaster. Many of its "guidelines"
(rules are passé to these people) are incomprehensible, internally
inconsistent, and belied by their examples
...
Last, the foregoing applies to the first part of RDA -- the most
developed thus far. The following parts -- on assignment of name/title
access points -- are only partial as I write but already display a
massive confusion.


The RDA seeks to find a third way between standard cataloguing
(abandoning a slew of international agreements and understandings) on
the one hand and the metadata crowd and boogie-woogie Google boys on the
other. The sad thing is that betraying the former has not managed to
appease the latter.