XPost: rec.arts.sf.fandom, rec.arts.sf.written
From: jclarkeusenet@cox.net
In article ,
jaceybedford@nospam.btinternet.com says...
>
> On 23/04/2014 07:26, The Starmaker wrote:
> > The Starmaker wrote:
> >>
> >> Quadibloc wrote:
> >>>
> >>> On Tuesday, April 22, 2014 5:14:33 AM UTC-6, J. Clarke wrote:
> >>>
> >>>> I see. So OCLC must be mistaken in classifying "Stranger in a Strange
> >>>> Land", "On Basilisk Station", and "Dune" as 813.54, "Sense and
> >>>> Sensibility" as 823.7, "A Christmal Carol" as 823.8, and on and on and
> >>>> on.
> >>>
> >>>> But what do they know, they just own and publish the Dewey Decimal
> >>>> System.
> >>>
> >>> So I am mistaken. While most libraries *using* the Dewey Decimal System
file all their fiction books separately, without numbers on them, it is
possible to include them, just as libraries using the Library of Congress
classification system do.
> >>>
> >>> John Savard
> >>
> >> what are you talking about?
> >>
> >> The Dewey Decimal system has nothing to do with ...numbers.
> >>
> >> It has to do with where the books should be at....
> >>
> >> So when you walk into *any* library,
> >> you see 100
> >> you see 200
> >> you know
> >> if you keep
> >> going to 800
> >>
> >> you'll find the science fiction section.
> >>
> >> Now, if you got a SF book
> >> and you put it in the 300 section..
> >> it's in the wrong place!
> >>
> >> It doesn't make any difference if it has
> >> numbers or not...the system is there.
> >>
> >> The science fiction section is not in the science fiction section...
> >>
> >> But since I don't read...fiction, there isn't any need for me to go
> >> past...700.
> >>
> >> It's too boring past 700.
> >>
> >> Keep SF away from children...put science fiction in the 1 million
> >> section.
> >>
> >> The Starmaker
> >>
> >> I see 800, that's not for me....that's far away land.
> >
> >
> > In other words, if you're looking for True Crime books, it's not in the
True Crime section,
> > it's in the section where the True Crime books are.
> >
> >
> > So don't give us this "So I am mistaken." business, ...that wasn't a
mistake...you just don't know what 'written' means.
> >
> > You never been to a library, that's all.
> >
> > Admit it.
> >
>
> I don't know about libraries in the USA, but no _public_ library* [1] in
> the UK would classify fiction by the Dewey Decimal system. The 800s are
> literature, sure, and poetry and plays can be found there, plus literary
> commentary - but not actual works of fiction unless it was something
> esoteric. You'll find them in alphabetical order of author in a whole
> nother section, sometimes with genre fic separated out and other times
> with it mixed in. I've worked in libraries that did both.
Public libraries tend not to shelve fiction according to the Dewey
Decimal system because it breaks things up in ways that make shelf-
browsing inconvenient.
That does not mean that the system doesn't provide for cataloguing them,
just that the libraries prefer to use a differetn system for fiction.
> Not sure I like the idea of ghettoising genre fiction (in proinciple)
> because there will always be books that sit on the fence between general
> and genre, i.e. they _could_ fall into a genre classification (or more
> than one), but should they? Would you put LMB's Sharing Knife quartet
> into romance or fantasy? Is Jules Verne literature or science fiction?
> Margaret Atwood? It's easier to shelve all fiction in alphabertical
> author order.
>
> And if you never go higher than 800, you're missing out on Geography,
> biography and history in the 900s
>
> * [1] If it's an academic library all bets are off, but they possibly
> don't use Dewey anyway, but subscribe to something like UDC -
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Decimal_Classification
>
> Jacey
--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)
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