Report on the meeting of the Joint Steering Committee, 3/17/09

The JSC had another productive day, ending up well ahead of schedule.  Unfortunately, my notes became increasingly cryptic as the day progressed, so I haven't tried to report on all the decisions.

Chapter 6: Identifying works and expressions

• A definition of "reference source" will be added to the Glossary: "Any source form which authoritative information may be obtained, including authority files, reference works."  [line 560]
  

• It was confirmed that the designation "Selections" will never be the preferred title, but will always be added to some conventional preferred title, such as "Works."  [6.2.2.11.3; line 571]
  

• The instructions on preferred titles for the Bible does not include provision to add "Selections" because "Selections" is not part of the preferred title (6.23.2.9.7) but rather is an addition to the preferred title (6.30.3.2).  Instructions and references will be added to 6.30.3.2 and to 6.25 that will specify the addition of "Selections" when appropriate. [line 632]
  

• The instructions on access points for works will include a reference to the scope of the Creator element, in particular to the instructions on corporate body as creator in 19.2.1.1.  [line 642]
  

• It was confirmed that compilers are only considered to be creators in the case of compilation of factual information (e.g., bibliographies, dictionaries), but not in the case of compilations of aggregate works.  In other words, there was no intention to change the AACR2 rules relating to collections, which will be entered under the preferred title.  6.27.1.4 will be revised to clarify this, as will the definitions of Compiler and Editor of Compilation in Appendix I.  [line 644]
  

• An exception will be added at 6.27.2 to allow access points for episodes of moving image works to be formulated with the preferred title of the work, followed by the preferred title of the part.  [line 651]

Chapter 8: General guidelines

• The scope of Person will be expanded to include fictitious persons.  As a result of this, works that purport to be created by fictitious persons such as Miss Piggy will be treated as creators of those works.  [9.0; line 730]
  

• The definition of Family was expanded to "two or more persons related by birth, marriage, adoption, civil union, or similar legal status, or who otherwise present themselves as a family".  [8.1.2; line 731]
  

• The scope of Undifferentiated name (8.11) will be limited to names of persons.  [line 741]

Chapter 9: Identifying persons

• The instruction at 9.2.2.9 will be rendered gender-neutral: "married persons identified only by a partner's name".  [line 764]
  

• The apparent contradiction among various examples that include "saint"; "saint" is not part of the preferred name (9.2.2.9.6) but is part of the access point (9.19.1.1).  [line 767]
  

• Instructions for recording elements such as date of birth (9.3.2.3) need to specify a particular way of recording dates because the instructions for access points simply refer back to these instructions.  This was in part because it was desired to be able to construct access points algorithmically by picking up the content of the related elements and adding them to the preferred title.  [line 785]
  

• Limitations on recording elements only when needed as part of a preferred access point will be removed; it is also legitimate to record elements when needed as part of a variant access point.  [9.6.1.4; line 789]
  

• It was agreed that the distinction between Field of activity and Profession or occupation was difficult to make.  However, in part because these are distinct elements in FRAD, it was decided to defer making any change.  [9.15, 9.16; line 792]

Chapter 10: Identifying families

• It was confirmed that families must meet the definition, i.e., two or more related persons; it is not sufficient that the name include the term "family".  Therefore, the Partridge Family, which a fictitious family but a legitimate corporate body, will be treated as the latter.  [line 800]

Chapter 11: Identifying corporate bodies

• An ALA proposal to deal with ruling executive bodies was deferred until a formal proposal can be presented for consideration.  [11.2.2.19; line 827]
  

• The instruction at 11.2.3.3 that refers to multiple identities was an error in the full draft. The concept of multiple identities is limited to persons.  [line 852]
  

• Date of usage is also limited to persons.  [line 852]
  

• Text will be added to the exception at 11.3.2.3 to explain the conditions under which the name of an institution is given instead of a local place name as location of a conference.  [line 858]
  

• Number of a conference, etc., will be made a separate element in Chapter 11, and will be identified as a core element.  [line 877]
  

• It was agreed that access points for conference need not always include the location. All additions to names of conferences will be made "when applicable and readily ascertainable."  The World Series example will be moved the the section of the instructions dealing with a series of conferences, etc.

Chapter 17: General guidelines on recording primary relationships

• It was agreed to move the term "related" from this chapter, to help distinguish Section 5 from Section 8.  [line 914]
  

• "Item of manifestation" will be changed to "Exemplar of manifestation".  [17.11; line 918]

Chapter 18: General guidelines

• An instruction was added allowing use of relationship designations that are not listed in Appendix I, J, or K.

Chapter 25: Related works

• There was a long discussion of how contents notes ended up in Chapters 25 and 27, as relationships, rather than in Chapter 7, as an attribute describing content.  Contents notes will remain as structured descriptions of parts of the resource being described, but a reference at 7.10 (Summarization of content) will point to Chapters 25 and 27 for contents notes.  [line 951]
  

There will be no JSC meeting on Wednesday; the JSC will be meeting with the CoP in the morning and will have at least part of the afternoon to recover.  I won't be posting a report.

Thursday morning the JSC will consider issues relating to names of musical works (5JSC/LC/12 etc.).  On Thursday afternoon, we will resume consideration of Chapter 25 and subsequent sections, including the appendices and glossary.