Page 129 - DLIS405_INFORMATION_STORAGE_AND_RETRIEVAL

Information Storage and Retrieval

Notes Works by one author, especially individual examples of an author’s works are not usually assigned
any headings at all.
Subject headings representing examples of literary forms or genres usually are reserved for collections
of many authors.
Treatment of biographies:
Biographies about one, two, or three individuals (called the “biographees”) are considered
“individual” biographies. For such works, each biographee is assigned a subject heading consisting
of that biographee’s name in authorized AACR2R form. A second subject heading can be assigned
if the item contains a great deal of information about the person’s work or field of interest.

Kennedy, John F. (John Fitzgerald), 1917-1963.

When a work is about four or more persons, it is deemed a “collective” biography. The heading
reflects the common focus of the biographees.

• Hispanic Americans—Biography.
• Computer industry—Biography.
Treatment of works with geographical focus:
Many of the subject headings for topics in the fields of history, geography, and politics put the
name of the location first and topical subdivisions following it.
Treatment of materials other than books:
Use the same principles to assign subject headings to videos, electronic resources, and other material
formats.
“Videorecording” is not an authorized subdivision and do not use form subdivisions to describe
physical format.

Sears List
Minnie Earl Sears prepared the first edition of this work in response to demands for a list of subject
headings.

The Scope of the Sears List
New topics appear every day, and books on those topics require new subject headings. Headings
for new topics can be developed from the Sears List in two ways, by establishing new terms as
needed and by subdividing the headings already in the List.

Form of Headings
The Sears List still reflects the usage of the Library of Congress unless there is some compelling
reason to vary, but those instances of variation have become numerous over the years.

Scope Notes
All the new and revised headings in this edition have been provided with scope notes where such
notes are required. Scope notes are intended to clarify the specialized use of a term or to distinguish
between terms that might be confused. If there is any question of what a term means, the cataloger
should simply consult a dictionary.

124 LOVELY PROFESSIONAL UNIVERSITY