Book Review: Cataloging and Classification: An Introduction, Fifth Edition

Abstract

The fifth and latest edition of Cataloging and Classification: An Introduction successfully brings a classic cataloging textbook fully into the present day. Originally published in 1980 by Lois Mai Chan, it was last updated with the fourth edition in 2016. The new edition, with Athena Salaba now as the lead author, largely preserves the outline of previous editions: six main parts encompassing Introduction, Record Production and Structure, Resource Description and Access, Subject Access and Controlled Vocabularies, Organization of Library Resources, and Encoding and Records of Bibliographic and Authority Data. It also adds some small but welcome updates to the sections on metadata schemas and encoding to adjust for standards that have come further into use or become fully outdated, and introduces a completely new part 7, “Cataloging Ethics.” Its biggest accomplishment is a major revision and expansion of part 3, “Resource Description and Access (RDA),” to include full coverage of Official RDA, introduced since the publication of the previous edition. Where that edition had four chapters on Original RDA, the new edition condenses these slightly into two chapters, rearranging rather than excising content, and adds two fully new chapters on Official RDA that walk readers through its elements, structure, and potential usage in metadata descriptions.