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Inclusive Cataloging: Histories, Context, and Reparative Approaches
304 pages, Paperback
Published July 18, 2024
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
November 24, 2024
This collection of essays deals with the impact of DEI initiatives on areas of library service where it might be less intuitive to find evidence of past injustice, specifically, in how things are described and organized in library cataloging systems. Long based in assumptions of “neutrality,” these authors argue, harmful traditions have been perpetuated in the form of call numbers, subject headings, and naming conventions, in part because “neutrality” in an unjust system privileges those who hold power and dispossesses their victims. The librarians who contributed theoretical analyses or case studies to this volume depict efforts to reverse these trends under a DEI lens.
A lot of the book deals with how people describe themselves, versus how the Library of Congress, or other centralized library standard-bearers such as Dewey Decimal Classification, describes them. Probably the most frequently discussed controversy surrounds the use of “illegal aliens” as a descriptor until 2021, when it was replaced with the terms “noncitizens” and “illegal immigration” – the second of which remains controversial, most of the authors here preferring “undocumented immigration” or even just putting all “immigration” together in one category without presuming to judge its legal status. The continued use of “North American Indians” and all the narrower terms (“Cherokee Indians,” “Sioux Indians,” etc.) that follow from it is another issue confronted, especially in the case studies, where various local organizations have reached out to local tribal/band leadership for guidance on better terminology. LGBTQ+ terms are also addressed, with strong preference for the community-led Homosaurus controlled vocabulary over LC.
If you’ve been able to follow most of what I’ve said in the previous paragraphs, this book may just be for you – at least in terms of thought-provoking and discussion at a library you work at or are a stakeholder in. I know already that a lot of people I know will complain that it is too academic-focused – I work in a school library and I only saw one article (out of 28) that even discussed Destiny, the ILS I use and that most school libraries are dependent upon. There are some studies from public libraries, but the bulk of the articles come from universities and colleges. I think this is still stimulating, though, because they often have the resources to form Metadata working groups locally or consortially, and so have more opportunity to try things the rest of us can learn from later.
In fact, I do wonder whether, in five years, a lot of this book will look a bit dated. Some of the practices suggested, like reaching out to everyone who is going to be represented in your library for naming guidance, is likely to play out as impractical and perhaps even annoying to those groups. The question of how to represent transgender authors seems to have undergone a major reversal in recent years, such that the authors here favor eliminating any record of an author’s gender in favor of privacy – which sounds to me like throwing out the baby with the bathwater. In five years, that may be the new consensus, or I may sound ridiculous for saying it; it can be hard to say, and that, in the end, is why librarians of all kinds need to keep current with this type of discussion.
A lot of the book deals with how people describe themselves, versus how the Library of Congress, or other centralized library standard-bearers such as Dewey Decimal Classification, describes them. Probably the most frequently discussed controversy surrounds the use of “illegal aliens” as a descriptor until 2021, when it was replaced with the terms “noncitizens” and “illegal immigration” – the second of which remains controversial, most of the authors here preferring “undocumented immigration” or even just putting all “immigration” together in one category without presuming to judge its legal status. The continued use of “North American Indians” and all the narrower terms (“Cherokee Indians,” “Sioux Indians,” etc.) that follow from it is another issue confronted, especially in the case studies, where various local organizations have reached out to local tribal/band leadership for guidance on better terminology. LGBTQ+ terms are also addressed, with strong preference for the community-led Homosaurus controlled vocabulary over LC.
If you’ve been able to follow most of what I’ve said in the previous paragraphs, this book may just be for you – at least in terms of thought-provoking and discussion at a library you work at or are a stakeholder in. I know already that a lot of people I know will complain that it is too academic-focused – I work in a school library and I only saw one article (out of 28) that even discussed Destiny, the ILS I use and that most school libraries are dependent upon. There are some studies from public libraries, but the bulk of the articles come from universities and colleges. I think this is still stimulating, though, because they often have the resources to form Metadata working groups locally or consortially, and so have more opportunity to try things the rest of us can learn from later.
In fact, I do wonder whether, in five years, a lot of this book will look a bit dated. Some of the practices suggested, like reaching out to everyone who is going to be represented in your library for naming guidance, is likely to play out as impractical and perhaps even annoying to those groups. The question of how to represent transgender authors seems to have undergone a major reversal in recent years, such that the authors here favor eliminating any record of an author’s gender in favor of privacy – which sounds to me like throwing out the baby with the bathwater. In five years, that may be the new consensus, or I may sound ridiculous for saying it; it can be hard to say, and that, in the end, is why librarians of all kinds need to keep current with this type of discussion.
January 15, 2025
A must for any cataloger; I don't catalog FT, but some of my time, and found it useful and insightful.
September 25, 2024
My full review of Inclusive Cataloging: Histories, Context, and Reparative Approaches will appear in Cataloging & Classification Quarterly, v 62, no. 6.
Online edition available here: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/...
Sorry about the paywall. I get a decent number of free online "copies" so just let me know if you want to read it and I'd be happy to share.
Online edition available here: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/...
Sorry about the paywall. I get a decent number of free online "copies" so just let me know if you want to read it and I'd be happy to share.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews