RDA Basics: Foundations and Background September 13, 2011 Tami Morse McGill & Susan Wynne Logo used by permission of the Co-Publishers for RDA (American Library Association, Canadian Library Association, and CILIP: Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals)

What area of the library do you primarily work in?  Technical Services (Acquisitions, Cataloging, Collection Development)  Administration  Reference  Systems  Other

How much do you know about FRBR, FRAD, and RDA already?  Never heard of them  I’ve heard them mentioned, but I don’t know much about them yet  I’ve looked at some of the documentation, but don’t quite get it  I have a pretty good grasp of the models and looked at some RDA records  I’ve created catalog records using RDA

Outline  What is RDA?  Why was it developed?  History of RDA  Influences and foundations  The FRBR family of models  Objectives and principles  Organization and structure

RDA in a nutshell  RDA=Resource Description and Access  New international cataloging standard to replace AACR2  Content standard, not display or encoding standard  Designed to apply to resources in any format  Greater emphasis on “cataloger’s judgment” (i.e., more options and alternatives)  Greater emphasis on relationships

Why not just update AACR2? AACR2 has been described as…  Difficult to adapt to digital resources  Very complex and intricate  Little used outside of library profession  Some conventions still tied to the catalog card  Too Anglo-American centric

Potential benefits of RDA Based on slides from Barbara B. Tillett, Deutscher Bibliothekartag, Berlin, June 2011,  Based on a data model for a more logical structure  Adds/enhances relationships missing or not fully realized in AACR2  Separates content from carrier  Supports data that can play well in the Web environment and be more easily manipulated by machines  Increased focus on user needs

A brief history of RDA  Developed by the Joint Steering Committee for Development of RDA (JSC)Joint Steering Committee for Development of RDA (JSC)  Began as AACR3 in 2004  Shift in 2005 to RDA  New structure of the RDA draft in 2007 to align more closely with the FR… models  Full draft issued for community comment in late 2008  Published in RDA Toolkit (online) in June 2010  U.S. national libraries coordinated a test in late 2010  Announced results and implementation decision June 2011  Earliest implementation (with conditions) January 2013

Influences and foundations  The “FRamily” of models:“FRamily” of models  FRBR (Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records)  FRAD (Functional Requirements for Authority Data)  FRSAD (Functional Requirements for Subject Authority Data), eventually  AACR2 (Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules, 2 nd ed.)  Statement of International Cataloguing Principles Statement of International Cataloguing Principles  ISBD (International Standard Bibliographic Description) (But RDA does not follow ISBD order and ISBD punctuation is no longer required) ISBD (International Standard Bibliographic Description)

RDA’s Predecessors: What Are FRBR and FRAD?  Reports written by IFLA subcommittees – the “FRamily”  Answers to perceived user needs  An evolving conceptual entity-relationship model

FRBR and FRAD: The “FRamily ”  Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records Published in 1998 by the IFLA Study Group on the Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records  Functional Requirements for Authority Data Published in 2009 by the IFLA Working Group on Functional Requirements and Numbering of Authority Records  There is a third report, Functional Requirements for Subject Authority Data, published in 2010, but it does not affect RDA (yet?)

FRBR and FRAD: User Tasks  User tasks in FRBR: Find Identify Select Obtain  User tasks in FRAD: Find Identify Contextualize (Clarify) Justify (Understand)

FRBR and FRAD: Conceptual E-R Model  Conceptual model: high-level, general  Entity-relationship model: identifies things and how they interact with each other Entities Attributes Relationships Instances

E-R Diagrams

The E-R Diagram for RDA  In the toolkit, this diagram can be found under the “Tools” tab, Entity Relationship Diagram (ERD), Overview, Relationships

Introducing the Entities  Group 1: Bibliographic Entities  Work, Expression, Manifestation, Item  Group 2: Responsibility Entities  Person, Family, Corporate Body  Group 3: Subject Entities  Concept, Object, Place, Event  FRAD Entities  Name, Identifier, Controlled Access Point, Rules, Agency

Group 1 Entities  Work  “Distinct intellectual or artistic creation”  Expression  “Intellectual or artistic realization of a work…”  Manifestation  “Physical embodiment of an expression”  Item  “A single exemplar of a manifestation”

Group 2 and Group 3 Entities  Group 2: Responsibility Entities  Person: “an individual or an identity established by an individual”  Family  Corporate Body  Group 3: Subject Entities  Concept, Object, Place, Event  Section 4 of RDA covering these entities has not been developed yet (FRSAD?)

Attributes in RDA (Group 1)  Three classes of attributes: Core, Enhanced, and Specialized  Work: Title, Date, Place of Origin, Form  Expression: Content Type, Date, Language  Manifestation: Publication Statement, Edition Statement, Extent, Carrier Type, Copyright Date, Series Statement, Numbering of Serials  Item: no core elements; enhanced elements include Restrictions on Access, URL, Preferred Citation

Attributes in RDA (Groups 2 and 3)  Person: Name, Fuller Form of Name, Profession or Occupation, Field of Activity, Title, Date  Family: Name, Place, Prominent Member, Type, Date  Corporate Body: Name, Place, Date, Associated Institution  Group 3 entities: Name, Source Consulted, Status of Identification, Cataloguer’s Note

Relationships in RDA  Relationships between the entities  Primary relationships: relationships between Group 1 entities  “Relationships to…”: relationships between Group 1 and Group 2 entities  “Relationships between…”: relationships between instances of entities

Back to User Tasks  So you want a copy of Leaves of Grass?  Yes, I want a copy of Leaves of Grass The user knows the title, maybe the author, which are attributes of a Work  Yes, but I want the Chinese translation Language is an attribute of an Expression  Yes, but I want the “deathbed” edition The user is looking for a particular edition, which is an attribute of a Manifestation  Yes, I want the copy I found the other day with the green cover This could be considered an “item-specific carrier characteristic”, an Item attribute  Well, I guess, but I’m really looking for something about an electric body???

Example: Wyoming Blue Book  WYLDCAT record for the Wyoming Blue BookWyoming Blue Book  Possible “FRBRized” display:  Wyoming Blue Book (Work)  Print edition, CD edition (Manifestations)  Holdings in each library (Item)

Another example: Variations/FRBR  Variations/FRBR is a testbed for FRBR, developed by Jenn Riley and her team at the University of Indiana, Bloomington, focusing on music (primarily classical music):  Prototype catalog, ScherzoScherzo

Objectives (from RDA 0.4.2)  Responsiveness to user needs (find, identify, select, obtain, understand)  Cost efficiency  Flexibility (independent of systems, format, storage or communication media of data)  Continuity (interoperable with legacy data and other standards)

Principles (from RDA 0.4.3)  Differentiation  Sufficiency  Relationships  Representation  Accuracy  Attribution  Common Usage or Practice  Uniformity

Organization and structure  RDA Toolkit RDA Toolkit

Selected Resources: Books Maxwell, Robert L. FRBR: A Guide for the Perplexed. Chicago: American Library Association, Oliver, Chris. Introducing RDA: A Guide to the Basics. Chicago: American Library Association, Taylor, Arlene G. Understanding FRBR: What It Is and How It Will Affect Our Retrieval Tools. Westport, Conn: Libraries Unlimited, 2007.

Selected Resources: Links IFLA, Functional RequirementsFunctional Requirements Joint Steering Committee for Development of RDA, RDA BrochureRDA Brochure Joint Steering Committee for Development of RDA, RDA FAQRDA FAQ Joint Steering Committee for Development of RDA, Presentations on RDAPresentations on RDA Tillett, Barbara, “What Is FRBR?”“What Is FRBR?” WLA Technical Services Interest Group Cataloging Resources

Selected Resources: Free Webcasts Ellett, Robert. “Introduction to RDA.”“Introduction to RDA.” Oliver, Chris. “RDA Benefits for Users and Cataloguers.”“RDA Benefits for Users and Cataloguers.” Tillett, Barbara. “FRBR: Things You Should Know, But Were Afraid to Ask.”“FRBR: Things You Should Know, But Were Afraid to Ask.”

Thank you! Tami Morse McGill Susan Wynne WLA Technical Services Interest Group Wiki