Critcatenate: #critcat in October and November 2023

Critcatenate is an effort to keep folks up to date on critcat efforts with a monthly-ish roundup of news. Critcat is short for critical cataloging, focusing on the ethical implications of library metadata, cataloging, and classification practice, standards, and infrastructure.

#critcat in October 2023 and November 2023:

General shoutout to the Advancing IDEAs: Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, Accessibility series of blog posts from OCLC Research team, which always highlights interesting things in the profession.

I’m doing a brief review of the new LCSH lists for headings that might be of interest to readers of Critcatenate. LCSH list numbers consist of a two-digit number for the year and a two-digit number for the month the headings were approved (for example, headings on list 2307 were approved in July 2023).

New LC headings of note on list 2307:

  • Revised LCSH: from Afghanistan–Politics and government–2001-  to Afghanistan–Politics and government–2001-2021 
  • New LCSH: Gender-nonconforming people in library science
  • New LCSH: Inuttitut dialect
  • Revised LCSH: from /Xam language to Kham language
  • New LCSH: Muslim sexual minorities 
  • New LCSH: Transgender people in library science

New LC headings of note on list 2308:

Some pretty significant structural revisions to the Israel and Palestine headings; terrific work being done there!

  • New LCSH: Israeli-Palestinian conflict–1993- 
  • New LCSH: Jews, Israeli
  • New LCSH: Jews, Israeli–Relations with Palestinian Arabs 
  • Revised LCSH: from Keechi Indians to Keeche Indians
  • New class numbers associated with LCSH Opioid abuse: instead of just a medicine-related class number, a new sociology class number has been added HV5822.O45
  • New LCSH: Palestine question (1948-)
  • New LCSH: Palestine question (To 1948)
  • New LCSH: Palestinian Arabs–Relations with Jews, Israeli
  • Revised LCSH: Zulu (African people): the 450 (use for) for Kafirs (African people) has been deleted

Also note work being done on special lists: list 2308a, which includes many revisions relating to the change from Gays to Gay people, and list 2310a, which makes significant revisions to LCSH relating to Ukraine and Crimea. Important to acknowledge the large amount of work required to make these long-overdue changes!

Upcoming:

  • Monday Dec 4: Cool Things We Cataloged, sponsored by ALA’s Rare Books and Manuscripts Section (RBMS), with the following topics:
      • Fashion show invitations by Melissa Raymond
      • Jackie Robinson comic books by Daniela Rovida
      • Pennsylvania Dutch tin nursing can by Caitlin Lenox
      • Reunionese Creole translation of Greek fables by Natalie Kazmin
      • Star Trek-related fanzines by Indica Mattson, discussing using Homosaurus to address gaps in LCSH relating to sexuality and fan culture

     

Please let me know if there’s anything else coming up!

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