This summer I completed a 6-week virtual course on the fundamentals of cataloging, offered by the American Library Association (ALA). I’m not a cataloger, but I reference catalog records every day in Special Collections & Archives. I stepped up to this challenge so I could improve my understanding of these records.
It’s been more than 8 years since I was a student, so let’s just say my study skills were a bit…rusty. Shoutout to everyone who let me vent about the struggle! Eventually I remembered the routine of class readings and quizzes.
ZSR is my first library job, so I was glad this course began with the history of cataloging. I wasn’t familiar with the different cataloging standards or the origin of terms like “Cutter number.” When I realized “Cutter” was a last name and definitely not about cutting a call number into pieces, I had to take a laugh break! Every course module contained helpful information, but the module on MARC 21 Format for Bibliographic Data is most applicable to my job.
When I’m looking for a book in SCA, I search our catalog records for clues hidden in the bibliographic data. First I use the MARC 300 field to find the book’s size in centimeters. SCA books are stored in different areas depending on their size, so this helps me know where to start. Then I check various 500 fields for extra notes about the book. Even when we have multiple copies of the same title, every book in SCA has something unique about it. I have to make sure I pull the right one!
The cataloging course taught me additional MARC fields I can use. When I’m transporting items other than books, I can consult fields 336 (content type), 337 (media type), and 338 (carrier type) to plan accordingly. A lot of SCA mysteries involve older records that haven’t been updated since the 2020 migration from Voyager to Alma. This means I don’t have many clues to work with, so when I learned I can use the 008 field to find a record’s original creation date, I cheered! Translating the codes in each MARC field is a lot like learning a foreign language, which has always been fun for me.
Now that I have a strong foundation in cataloging fundamentals, I can pursue on-the-job training here at ZSR. We have a lot of data cleanup to do in Special Collections & Archives, especially for our books at Offsite Storage. If I can work on those, it will make things much easier for our cataloging team. Wish me luck!
8 Comments on ‘Summer 2024 ALA Course: Fundamentals of Cataloging’
Thanks for pursuing this professional development opportunity, Alayna! I’m glad it helped to unlock some of the mysteries of cataloging for you. Congratulations!
Congrats on finishing your course Alayna. We appreciate you and your work.
Thanks, Alayna, for sharing about your continuing education efforts–they are much appreciated!
Archives mysteries beware, Detective Alayna is on the case! Congrats on finishing your course!!
Congratulations on finishing the course Alana and sharing the details on MARC records sleuthing!
What a great opportunity! Glad you were able to pursue it!
This is wonderful, Alayna. I’m sure that the skills you gained by completing this course will benefit the library as well as your career.
Congratulations!!!!!!
Alayna, thank you for illustrating how understanding the organization of the data is important. I think a basic understanding of cataloging gives a good foundation for any library work since everyone interacts with the catalog records! And I love that you find the Content, Media, and Carrier type fields useful since we did a special project with a vendor to add them to the catalog many years ago. (Carolyn, Kevin, Steve, and I wrote an article after the project: “Can RDA Content, Media, and Carrier Coding Improve Discovery Facet Mapping?”)