Power and Change in the US Cataloging Community
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5860/lrts.58n2.111Abstract
The US cataloging community is an interorganizational network with the Library of Congress (LC) as the lead organization, which reserves to itself the power to shape cataloging rules. Peripheral members of the network who are interested in modifying changes to the rules or to the network can use various strategies for organizational change that incorporate building ties to the decision-makers located at the hub of the network. The story of William E. Studwell’s campaign for a subject heading code illustrates how some traditional scholarly methods of urging change—papers and presentations—are insufficient to achieve reform in an interorganizational network, absent strategies to build alliances with the decision makers.
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by William E. Studwell' International Classification 19 no. 3 (1992): 166nStudwell, Library of Congress Subject Headings, 6nYukl, “Interactions in Organizational Change,” 308nWilliam E. Studwell, '“More Developments in the Subject Headings Arena,”
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, no. 2 (1990): 100; William E. Studwell, “The Subject Code: Two Unanswered Questions,”' Library Resources & Technical Services 34 no. 2 (1990): 228-30nYukl, “Interactions in Organizational Change,” 303nWilliam E. Studwell, '“A Subject Code: Do We Have One? Do We Need One?”' Technicalities 10 no. 10 (1990): 15nHeiko A. Oberman, Luther: Man between God and the Devil (: (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press 2006): 161-nYukl, “Interactions in Organizational Change,” 302, 310–11nThe “seminal” article Studwell mentioned was, according to Google Scholar on July 23, 2013, cited only eight times—six of those by Studwell himself; however, Shubert, “Critical Views of LCSH Ten Years Later,” 48, does credit him with sparking a wider discussion of the subject heading code in the cataloging communityn'“Subject Heading Clearinghouse for Map Catalogers: A Follow-up,” 22'nWilliam E. Studwell, '“Something’s Going on at LC; Or, A Code by any Other Name would Still be a Code,”' Technicalities 11 no. 7 (1991): 10-11n'Library of Congress Subject Headings: Principles of Structure and Policies for Application' (: (Washington, DC: Library of Congress Cataloging Distribution Service ) 1990)nWilliam E. Studwell, '“Will the Real Year of the Subject Code Please Stand Up?”' Technicalities (1991): 4n'The Future of Subdivisions in the Library of Congress Subject Headings System: Report from the Subject Subdivisions Conference' (Washington, DC: Library of Congress, Cataloging Distribution Service, 1992)n'“Library of Congress Five-Year Progress Report on Subject Subdivisions Conference Recommendations,”' Cataloging Service Bulletin 75 (Winter 1997): 47–53nWilliam E. Studwell, '“Hallelujah and Hurrah! A Major Recommendation for Change in LC Subject Headings by the Subject Subdivisions Conference,”' Technicalities (1991): 13n'“The Subject Code: Two Unanswered Questions,” 228–30'n'Library of Congress Subject Headings: Principles and Application' (: (Westport, CT: Libraries Unlimited ) 2005), 11n'“Something’s Going on at LC,” 10–11; Studwell, “Will the Real Year of the Subject Code Please Stand Up?” 4'nWilliam E. Studwell, '“Sumer and Consumer: More about the Future of LC Subject Headings,”' Technicalities 11, no. 9 (1991): 8–9; William E. Studwell, “Going Up Or Going Down? The Elevator Dilemma for LC Subject Headings,”
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, no. 10(1991): 15–16; William E. Studwell, “Cutterism, Codism, and Consumerism: The Past, Present, and Future of LC Subject Access,”
Technical Services Quarterly
, no. 1 (1991): 19–25nWilliam E. Studwell, '“LC’s Full Plate: A Time for Decision-Making about LC Subject Headings,”
Technicalities
, no. 4 (1992): 6; William E. Studwell, “Who Will be the Osborn and Lubetzky of Subject Cataloging? A Question of Leadership in LC Subject Heading Policy Making,”' Technicalities 12 no. 5 (1992): 15-16nWilliam E. Studwell, '“Who’s Afraid of the Subject Code?”' Technicalities 12 no. 6 (1992): 9-10n“LC’s Full Plate,” 6nWilliam E. Studwell, '“The Three-Pronged Fork in the Road: A Detective Mystery of the Twenty-First Century,”' Information Bulletin (Western Association of Map Libraries) 23 no. 1 (1991): 42–43; William E. Studwell, “Looking Back at the 1990s: Two Scenarios from the Future Concerning LC’s Subject Access System,”
Technicalities
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Music Reference Services Quarterly
, no. 1(1992): 73–75nWilliam E. Studwell, '“LC’s Head in the Sand; Or, Why the Subject Cataloging Manual is Not Enough,”' Technical Services Quarterly 10 no. 3 (1993): 45-50n'“Who Killed the Subject Code?” 39'nMasse Bloomfield, '“A Look at Subject Headings: A Plea for Standardization,”' Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 16 no. 1 (1993): 119-23 Karen M. Drabenstott, “Period Subdivisions in the Library of Congress Subject Headings System: Some Thoughts and Recommendations for the Future,”
Cataloging & Classification Quarterly
, no. 4(1992): 19–45n'“Who Killed the Subject Code?” 38'nWilliam E. Studwell, '“Ten Years After the Question: Has there been an Answer?”' Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 20 no. 3 (1995): 95-98nWilliam E. Studwell, '“Ignore It and It Will Go Away:... but It’s Still there!”' Technicalities 17 no. 4 (1997): 1; William E. Studwell, ““Much Ado about Little; Or, Why can’t LC Produce a Set of Principles for LC Subject Headings?”
Technicalities
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A Conceptual Model
(Berlin: De Gruyter Saur, 2011)nGerard N. Magliocca, 'The Tragedy of William Jennings Bryan: Constitutional Law and the Politics of Backlash' (: (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2011) ): 149-n
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