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August 12, 2006
Labels on library books
If you look at a book the publisher has tried, on the cover, to convey to potential readers what the book contains and what kind of book it is. Tremendous (if not always perfect) effort goes into the choice of title and subtitle and any other design and content on the outside. That isn't new - this endeavour has been going on since books were first printed.
If it's a chemistry book or a historical romance there is a conversation between reader and publisher which takes place through this presentation. In addition to that which is visible, the bar code in the bottom corner gives access to a vast amount of bibliographic and other information about the book, of the kind one sees on Amazon
If you go in a bookshop you see book jackets and signs which are intended to help you find what is of interest to you. The signs change all the time to keep up to date with the way people talk. I saw a sign last week above a section that used to be called "cookery" or "food and wine" a decade ago. Now it is called "Celebrity Chefs". In this way the shopkeeper is also saying something about being aware of the world.
In libraries however the librarians put labels on the books, which are intended to further classify the books. They say all kinds of things about where the book has come from but mostly they replicate the information already provided and printed on the book by the publisher. Some of them could be understood by a reader if they looked hard but most of them are in a code that is for librarians to underastand. Most books have about 6 labels of different kinds in different places; I have seen a book with 17 labels on it. Each of those labels costs a huge amount of money in terms of time and handling. Almost every single council and every single library in the country has a different system- so each time a supplier or the council library service handles the book, they have to conform to the requirements of an individual library. In fact more money has been spent putting labels on most books in libraries than was spent writing and printing the book. I'm not kidding.
The consequence of that observation is that if libraries simply accepted the same classification information that bookshops and websites do we could afford to buy twice as many books for libraries as we do.
So what should we do? Explore different ways of providing the labelling that libraries ask for-- or tell them to stop wasting the money on labels. That is one of the main questions that Price Waterhouse were asked to answer. What do you think the right answer is? Or, in an ordinary small community library, am I missing the point. Is there some vital information in the labelling of a library book that makes it worth having instead of an other extra book on the library shelf?
Posted by Perkins at August 12, 2006 1:28 PM
Comments
I think they should stop wasting money on labels. What are they for? Are they a way of making sure the books go on the right shelves? I think the classification that some librarians use is a little misleading anyway. Presumably, if there is not a standard system, a book may be classified at whim - with a book that is literary fiction (but set slightly in the future) being classified as Sci Fi by some libraries and general fiction by others.
Posted by: Clare at August 12, 2006 5:19 PM
Tim,
May I ask for a little clarification here? I apologise if I am being dense but what type of labels do you mean?
I am willing to argue quite strongly for that case of spine labels on non-fiction books but I find it difficult to imagine why as many as six would be necessary on a single book (hence my plea for clarification).
Genre labels on fiction books are something of a double-edged sword. They do enable people to easily locate books that they know will appeal to them (although my personal view is that they can also discourage readers from experimenting with fiction outside of their chosen genre). Once again I am puzzled that it would be necessary to have more than one or two labels at the very most.
Thanks,
Miriam
Posted by: Miriam Palfrey at August 12, 2006 5:47 PM
As you know Tim, these things are for the convenience of the library staff and of no use or interest to the borrower. Fine. But I would have thought that the title, author, Blurb as provided by the publisher would do for the latter, and the old Dewi Decimal system for the former. Or is that too easy ?
Posted by: SUSAN HILL at August 12, 2006 7:03 PM
I wish to catalogue my home library using a table format. Columns can be sorted alphabetically by author or subject/title. I also wish to indicate size. As this is a lot of work I wish to use a system meaningful to librarians or booksellers. The Dewi System sounds good. Can anyone please give me a beginner's key to the system?
Posted by: Irene at May 31, 2008 9:08 AM