Cooperative Cataloging, Vendor Records, and European Language Monographs

Abstract

The appearance in OCLC and RLIN of minimal level catalog records from European book vendors for European language monographs and their effect on cataloging department workflows and cooperative cataloging efforts have been matters of concern expressed recently at ALA meetings and in the library literature. A study of 8,778 catalog records was undertaken to discover how many current European language monographs were being cataloged by the Library of Congress, by member libraries, and by vendors. It was found that vendor records accounted for 16.7% of Spanish books, 18% of French books, 33.6% of German books, and 52.5% of those in Italian. The number of libraries enhancing vendor records in OCLC was found to be only approximately one-third the number of libraries contributing original records for European language books. Ongoing increases in European book publishing and the increasing globalization of cataloging databases mean that the results of this study have implications not only for local cataloging practice but for cooperative cataloging as a whole.