[Publib] Dewey Decimal Classification

[Judith Turner]

I enjoy bookstore browsing when I have time on my hands but it's rare that I can find a specific title without assistance from somebody working there.  The bigger the bookstore, the more assistance I need.  More often than not, the bookstore worker checks multiple special category niches and then the computer while I chase after him/her (not easy in a crowded store during the holidays.)  

If it took me as LONG to find an item in a LIBRARY as it does in my local B&N or Borders, I'd most likely GIVE UP the effort.  Perhaps this is one reason why online booksellers are flourishing at the expense of free-standing bookstores. 

Maybe I'm seeing conspiracies where none exist but why are libraries accepting the claims of a sector of the economy that's in even bigger hurts than libraries?  Consider the  amount of money invested in the development of BISAC, and the closure of bookstores that have been happening around the U.S. for a couple of decades now, it seems possible that the book-selling industry is claiming its system has advantages over older library systems that do not exist.  If they convince enough libraries (and legislators who control library purse strings) to switch), then they can charge libraries for using their system and amortize their costs a bit better.  

Anyway, if literacy challenged patrons are a concern, I'm at a loss to see how the change can help them.  There is nothing intrinsically simple about the organization of BISAC, nor does it lend itself to standardized sequence the way a numeric or alphanumeric system does.  In effect, each bookstore a person enters is laid out quite differently from other bookstores and now we want to have literacy-challenged people experience that wonderful degree of confusion upon finding their way around libraries.  

Classification systems are only simple to people who have never tried to apply them conscientiously.  Any system requires staff time to apply, especially when the librarian wants to emphasize local nuances, and then use (label the book, shelve and reshelve it,  direct patrons to the correct spot.)  Size is a major factor in the complexity of the classification system a library needs.  Neither the original question, nor in the article about the Maricopa County branch library discloses how many items there are in the collection nor how many square feet the library building encompasses.  

Even the best signs are useless when there are too many or they are too far away to read.

What percentage of the library's new acquisitions fall into the fiction
category (leaving aside the special subcategory of faked memoirs)? 
Public libraries classifying fiction are pretty rare in my experience;
usually fiction is broken into various genres or bookstore-like
categories anyway.  It doesn't take BISAC to accomplish that -- just
knowledge of what the libraries' most frequent customers want.

In non-fiction there might be some savings. Assuming a library is using OCLC or a vendor deriving its cataloging from OCLC, one could argue that
using LC Classification is a better way to go from a cost standpoint
since the 080 or 082 numbers include Cutter numbers, making the number
a unique identifier from the beginning.  There are a lot of costs,
though, including a lot of staff and patron training if you want to switch.

Using the 090 or 092 field for a Dewey Classification requires the addition of a Cutter number (a few seconds) and a quick check of the shelf list to make certain it's not a duplicate.  Seems to me this still will not cost as much as retraining everybody to BISAC or to a locally created subject system, not to mention creating signs, maps and floor guides. Both the retraining (new patrons, new staff) and the graphics costs will be ongoing.

Judy Turner
Whitefish Bay, WI