Posted on by Violet

Critcatenate: #critcat in March 2025

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 March 2025:

  • new book: Ways of Knowing: Oral Histories on the Worlds Words Create edited by Amanda Belantara and Emily Drabinski, featuring oral histories with the creators and editors of some of the most widely used alternative vocabularies in libraries: Chicano Thesaurus, A Women’s Thesaurus, and Homosaurus

cover of the book Ways of Knowing: Oral Histories on the Worlds Words Create edited by Amanda Belantara and Emily Drabinski.

Scan of a letter from Sandy Berman to The Policy, Training, and Cooperative Programs Division of the Library of Congress. It reads: 3-22-25 Policy, Training, and Cooperative Programs Division Library of Congress Washington, DC 20540-4305 Dear Colleagues, BRAVO! Your recent conversion of DENALI, MOUNT (ALASKA) and MEXICO, GULF OF to MCKINLEY, MOUNT (ALASKA) and AMERICA, GULF OF, respectively, as both primary and subheadings was breathtakingly thorough and detailed. You are masters of your craft. Alas, you are also willful handmaidens of chauvinism, ethnocentrism and fascism. Also: Trumpism. Many weeks ago I expressed the hope that LC would resist the temptation to implement this palpably capricious, arbitrary, and baseless name-charging. That admonition appears to have gone unheeded. Our President has no authority to wantonly replace the name for international waters that abut more countries than our own. Beyond that, the Gulf of Mexico has been so known since about the 16th Century. Its renaming, totally rejected by neighboring Mexico, smacks of arrogant linguistic imperialism. It seems the whole state of Alaska prefers the Athabascan place- name, Denali, to McKinley, a U.S. President associated with American expansion who never set foot in Alaska. The widely-unwanted name change is an affront to Alaska's indigenous population, as well as its state legislature and two Republican senators. Although LC has now fully demonstrated its lock-step deference to bigoted, unjustified authority, I hope American librarians will muster the moral and intellectual strength. to ignore its dismal example. Sorrowfully, [large, sprawling, angry signature] Sanford Berman Margaret Mann Citation Recipient Robert B. Downs Intellectual Freedom Award Recipient ALA Equality Award Recipient Herb Biblo Outstanding Leadership Award for Social Justice & Equality Recipient

  • new webinar recordings available: ALA Core Interest Group Week. Critcat-related sessions include:
    • Cataloging and Classification Research Interest Group, featuring “The Ethics Evolution: Catalogers’ Perspectives Over Time” by Karen Snow and Elizabeth Shoemaker, and “Exploring Systemic Gender Bias in Library of Congress Subject Headings: A Comprehensive Study” by Sungmin Park and Yuji Tosaka
    • Faceted Subject Access Interest Group, featuring “Faceted Subject Vocabularies Increase Representation of Marginalized Communities in Biomedical Research” by Mego Franks
    • Cataloging Norms Interest Group, featuring “Cataloging for Accessibility: An Inclusive Approach to Yiddish-language Collection Description” by Michelle Sigiel
  • new call for board members: the Homosaurus board is restructuring and looking for new volunteers for the Homosaurus Collective. They encourage individuals passionate about LGBTQ+ representation, linked data, and/or ethical metadata practices to apply for membership. Application closes on Wednesday April 30th.
  • new call for committee members: SAC, ALA’s Subject Analysis Committee, is looking for members for three new working groups. Members do not need to be ALA members to participate. The new working groups are:
    • SAC Working Group on Scope Notes will identify LCSH headings that could benefit from scope notes. This will include gaining insights from the cataloging community on headings that they find particularly confusing or see often misapplied. The group will then draft scope notes for some of these headings in accordance with LC procedures, and submit them, with an eye to finding a clear workflow for headings that could benefit from scope notes. To join or ask questions, contact the chair: Margaret Joyce (mjoyce4@hawaii.edu)
    • SAC Working Group Opposing the Removal of $v (Form Subdivisions) from Subject Headings in “Modern MARC” will promote awareness of the Library of Congress policy to not include $v (form subdivisions) in subject headings as part of “modern MARC“; and will advocate for a reversal of that policy and retention of $v. Particular attention will be paid to investigating the effects of this change for non-academic libraries, articulating the usefulness of $v for users, and highlighting the negative impacts of the loss of this subfield. To join or ask questions, contact the chair: Deborah Tomaras (Deborah.Tomaras@marist.edu)
    • SAC Working Group on Local Authorities will work to ensure that the broader library community (with particular attention to non-academic libraries) is aware of changes to LCSH, and providing information on how to change display names and/or create local records. This group was formed in response to the recent LCSH revisions to Gulf of Mexico and Mount Denali. To join or ask questions, contact the chairs: Allison Bailund (abailund@sdsu.edu) and Rebecca Saunders (rlsaunders@email.wcu.edu)
  • new journal issue: issue 210 of Catalogue & Index is focused on the themes of equality, diversity, and inclusion within metadata work. The contents include:
    • Cataloguing the Empire : Classification as Colonial Project / Gabriella P. Reyes
    • Cataloguing Buddhist Literature in English: Ethical Issues in an Assay / Lambert Tuffrey
    • Problematic Subject Headings: Making Our Catalogue More Equitable, Diverse and Inclusive at the University of Bristol / Liz Cooper and Damien McManus
    • Forming an Anti-Racist and Inclusive Library Catalogue at Cardiff University / Mouse Miller, Karen F. Pierce and Vicky Stallard
    • The Technical Side to Forming an Anti-Racist and Inclusive Library Catalogue at Cardiff University / Vicky Stallard, Karen F. Pierce and Mouse Miller [describing specific ways to display preferred terms in Alma]
    • Changing the Subject: The Homosaurus in Emory University’s Library Catalogue / Tara Kunesh and Jude Romines
    • Updating Subject Headings for Children’s Literature at the University of Strathclyde: the Children’s Theme Index / Andrew McAinsh
    • Narrowing the Diversity Gap: LGBTQ+ Zines, Metadata and Discovery at the University for the Creative Arts / Emma Hallett
    • The Cataloguing Code of Ethics Since 2021: What Next for Your Code? / Jane Daniels
  • new recording: Critical Cataloging for Libraries, presented by Rhiannon Williams for The Library Corporation, including information about how to add local headings in TLC products such as Library•Solution
  • new recording: Library of Congress Subject Heading Authority Work presented by Elissah Becknell, the first part of the free webinar series titled Engaging with Critical Cataloging Past and Present hosted by Minitex

LC shenanigans follow-up from last month: The changes to the LCSH Mexico, Gulf of and Denali, Mount (Alaska) were implemented in mid-March, despite the many responses received opposing the revision.  If your library or consortium would like to implement local alternatives, possible alternatives would be to continue using the old LCSH locally, or using the Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names (Denali; Mexico, Gulf of).

Upcoming:

Please let me know if there’s anything else coming up or I’ve missed anything!

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