Quaratiello_CH5.docx

Finding Books I’LL ASSUME THAT YOU HAVE HEARD THE FAMILIAR OLD SAYING, “You can’t judge a book by its cover.” In other words, don’t make assump- tions about things based on their outward appearance. These days, you can’t possibly judge some books by their physical appearance because the nature of b...

Finding Books I’LL ASSUME THAT YOU HAVE HEARD THE FAMILIAR OLD SAYING, “You can’t judge a book by its cover.” In other words, don’t make assump- tions about things based on their outward appearance. These days, you can’t possibly judge some books by their physical appearance because the nature of books is evolving. A book can be contained on an audio CD, viewed as a file on an electronic reading device, or accessed as an e-book via the internet. Despite changing times, however, traditional books do still line the shelves of libraries. Although an increasing number of books have been transformed into electronic versions available online, an enormous amount of information is still stored the old-fashioned way. A 2021 survey conducted by Direct Text- book seems to indicate that people might not mind this situation; it found that 62 percent of students actually preferred print textbooks to electronic versions. Although the rise of e-books early in the twenty-first century led to predications concerning the imminent death of print books, the novelty of this format seems to have subsided, and it is unlikely that the print book will ever become obsolete. When it comes to books, as with all information, however, format shouldn’t be an issue when evaluating the quality and value of the source; what mat- ters is the content provided, whether that information is conveyed in print, audio, or electronic format. What all of these formats have in common is the depth of coverage that only a book-length treatment of a topic can provide. When the term book is used in this chapter all by itself, it refers not only to the traditional book that sits upon a shelf but to all formats of books. This is similar to how the term library has been used in this book, referring not only to a brick-and-mortar building but also to the collection of resources provided by library websites. To find the books that you need from among the tens of thousands, hun- dreds of thousands, or even millions of books available in your own library, you will need to use an online catalog. This database will also enable you to locate nonbook material such as periodicals, CDs, DVDs, and videotapes. Searching online catalogs is similar to searching any computerized database. The principles used when searching a periodical database for finding articles or an internet search engine for finding websites are basically the same for using online catalogs. SEARCHING THE ONLINE CATALOG Because the layout and format of the online catalogs of different libraries may vary, I won’t get too specific here. You should be able to use any library catalog as easily as you drive a borrowed car because, fundamentally, they all operate in the same way. There are four basic ways of finding books: by title, by author, by subject, and by keyword. Keyword searching is usually the default setting for most online catalogs. To do another type of search, you must choose an alternative option: subject, author, or title searching. Back in the olden days, these three alternatives to keyword searching were the only options; index cards alphabetized in rows and rows of little drawers composed the card catalog. These cards essentially provided the same information as database records. Every book required multiple cards because there had to be copies of the same record under the title, author, and every subject heading assigned to the book. The digitization of library catalogs created a new way to search—by key- word—allowing the user to search for any piece of information included in the records. All the principles of Boolean logic discussed in chapter 3 apply to searching the online catalog by keywords. Suppose, for example, you can’t remember the title of a particular book or the author’s last name, but you do know that the author’s first name is Ann and the word pants is in the title. By entering the keyword search ann and pants, you are easily able to locate The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants by Ann Brashares, a task that would be impossible years ago. Aside from searching by keyword, title, author, and subject, there is usually an option like Other Searches that allows you to perform advanced searches or searches by numbers such as call number or ISBN (International Standard Book Number). Online catalogs also often allow you to limit your search in the following ways: Location—the library where items are located if your library is a member of a consortium (a group of small libraries in a particular area that shares resources) or has multiple locations on campus, like a main library and buildings that hold special collections Format—books, audiobooks, e-books, CDs, DVDs, journals, and so on. Language—most useful for eliminating foreign language works Date of publication To use these limiters, you may need to click on a link that takes you to another search form web page. Searching by Title or Author It’s easy to find a book if you know the author’s name or the exact title. Use the following simple rules when searching the online catalog by author or title: When looking up an author, use the last name first. For example, a search for Harper Lee, the author of To Kill a Mockingbird, should be entered as lee harper. In some online catalogs, however, this doesn’t even matter anymore, but it’s still a good general rule to follow anyway. When looking up a title, the general rule is to drop any articles (although many catalogs will now just ignore a, an, and the). For example, search for The Adventures of Tom Sawyer as adventures of tom sawyer. The capitalization of authors and titles is not required because online catalogs are not case-sensitive. Searching by Subject or Keyword As mentioned in the previous chapter, subject searching has certain benefits over keyword searching. You could just look at the subject headings listed in a pertinent record you found through keyword searching, or you could actually try a subject search directly if you have a fairly straightforward topic. Because keyword searching is usually the default in online catalogs, make sure to select the subject search option. Here’s an example: for a research paper that will argue that colonizing Mars should be a bigger priority than it currently is, think of a good general term; how about Mars for starters? If you enter mars as a subject heading, you probably won’t immediately see a list of items held by your library. Instead, as shown in figure 5.1, a list of subject headings will appear pertaining to Mars, which all start with Mars Planet to differentiate this topic, I suppose, from Mars, the Roman god of war, and Mars, the company that makes M&Ms. The number of items categorized under each heading will be displayed to the right of these headings and will obviously differ from library to library. Although the same headings are used in all libraries, some may not be used if there are no items pertaining to that heading in a particular library. The first listing you see in figure 5.1 is a cross-reference: “Mars Planet — See also the narrower term Space flight to Mars.” Cross-references start with See or See also. The latter are narrower topics that fall under the main subject area or are related to it. They are suggested headings to look at in addition to Mars Planet. Although See also cross-references are not always relevant to your needs, Space flight to Mars certainly looks like a good link to click. A See cross-reference appears further down in the list; this tells you that Mars Planet Globes isn’t an official heading, so you should click on Mars (Planet) Maps instead. Notice also in figure 5.1 that the main heading Mars Planet is subdivided by subheadings including not only Atmosphere, Geology, and other scientific terms but also Drama and Fiction; none of these sound as relevant, however, as the subheading Exploration. Clicking on any of these headings, subheadings, or cross-references will bring up either a list of items or a further subdivision of the topic. Once you get to a list of items, just click to see the full record. Subject searching doesn’t always work as effortlessly as the previous exam- ple might suggest. Although Mars is a subject heading, many other words will not be. As explained chapter 3, subject headings are determined by the Library of Congress, which puts together the official list of standard accept- able headings under which all library material is categorized. If you look up death penalty, you will likely see the following sort of message: “Death penalty is not used in this library’s catalog. Capital punishment is used instead,” and a link to capital punishment should be provided. Subject headings can be an effective way to find relevant material, but if you get frustrated with subject searching, just search the same terms as key- words instead of subjects. Suppose you are looking for a book that explains the techniques used by headhunters—the kind that recruit people for jobs rather than the members of tribes that collect human heads. If you enter the term headhunters, you will probably get a message saying that this subject is not found. A keyword search for headhunters, however, does find books, but they have irrelevant titles like My Friends, the New Guinea Headhunters and Off with Their Heads. You will also, however, probably see more relevant titles like Confessions of a Corporate Headhunter and Headhunters: Matchmaking in the Labor Market. Retrieving the full record for either of these latter two books will provide you with a link for the precise subject term Executives—Recruiting. As with searching any database, searching an online catalog is often a process of trial and error requiring a certain degree of noodling around. UNDERSTANDING THE CLASSIFICATION SYSTEMS As emphasized in the beginning of this chapter, libraries certainly provide access to much more than traditional books, but books still take up the most space. If there are books in your library on your topic, you should find them. An average academic library may contain hundreds of thousands of books; a large university library might contain millions! But even if your library does contain millions of books, you can easily find what you need amid this overwhelming amount of material if you understand the classification sys- tems used to organize everything. With this understanding, you will also be able to locate periodicals, videos, and other materials in those libraries that organize their nonbook collections in the same way as their book collections. Dewey Decimal Classification (DDC) is used in many public libraries and some smaller college libraries, and Library of Congress Classification is the standard in larger public institutions and most academic libraries. Libraries assign call numbers to books to classify them by subject and author. This method groups books on similar topics together on library bookshelves. Find a book’s call number by looking it up in the library’s online catalog. With both standard classification systems, the subject matter and the author’s name determine the number a book is given, which in turn determines its location on the shelf. The nice thing about shelving books by call numbers is that books on similar topics are shelved in the same area. Once you find a particular book by getting its call number from the online catalog, you may be able to find additional sources by just doing some old-fashioned browsing. Dewey Decimal Classification Libraries that use the Dewey Decimal Classification system (DDC) have a separate fiction section organized by author’s last name with all nonfiction being divided into ten broad categories, from the 000s through the 900s. A list of all these categories can be found in appendix C. Each main category is subdivided into ten more sections, which are each further subdivided into ten smaller sections and so on, until you get down to the level of individual books that will have call numbers involving decimals. Here is an example: 800–899 Literature 810–819 American literature 818 19th-century American writers 818.3 mid-19th-century American writers (1830-1861) 818.31 Henry David Thoreau So, if you looked up Thoreau’s Walden in the online catalog, it will lead you to Henry’s own special number, 818.31, where you could also find his other writings and books about him. Not to get too wonky, but keep in mind that the part of the DDC number following the period should be read as a decimal rather than a whole number, so a copy of Walden found at 818.31 will actually be shelved to the right of a book with a number like 818.298, because .31 is greater than .298. A problem with this system is that, as new subjects arise, they must inevita- bly be jammed in somewhere. The original nineteenth-century scheme focused mostly on topics of interest to English-speaking countries and Western cul- tures; this explains why 800–889 classifies the literature of these countries, while the rest of the world gets only 890–899. DCC also had no place for many modern topics, so, for example, all the books about the internet are commonly squeezed into the first category, encyclopedias and other general works (000–099), and assigned with the very specific number 004.678. Library of Congress Classification The Library of Congress Classification system is more complex than DDC. It is used by some larger public libraries, many academic libraries, and, of course, by the Library of Congress, which designed it in the nineteenth cen- tury to organize its vast collection. The Library of Congress system breaks all of knowledge down into twenty broad categories indicated by letters of the alphabet. A list of all these categories can also be found in appendix C. You’ll find encyclopedias in the A section, atlases in the G section, and lit- erature in the P section. Although it may seem odd that Military and Naval Science are considered top-level categories, the original purpose of the scheme was to serve the needs of the government, which would be concerned with national defense. The basic categories are then subdivided by alphabet. For example, while books of literature are given the letter P, English literature is designated PR and American literature is PS. The Library of Congress system is alphanumeric. Following the initial one-, two-, or occasionally three-letter code are numbers that further divide a particular topic. Here’s a basic example of how to get your hands on a book once you have the Library of Congress Classification number: Finding J. D. Vance’s Hillbilly Elegy at HD8073.V37 2016 Because this book has been categorized in the social sciences (H), first, find out what section of the library you go to by referring to diagrams usually featured on library websites or look for old-fashioned library signage (or simply ask a library staff member) to determine where the social science books are shelved. Once you find the general H section, finding the HD area is simply a matter of alphabetical order—it will be between HC and HE. When you find the HD area, follow the call numbers numerically until you get to 8073. This is not a DDC number so don’t look for 807.3. Once you have found HD8073, switch back to the alphabet to find V (which stands for the author’s last name). After finding the V section, look for .37 (again this is a decimal that will be found between .3 and .4). The year of publication is often included at the end of the call number to indicate the specific edition. Library of Congress Classification numbers, however, are not always this simple. As mentioned before, when classification systems were developed in the nineteenth century, many of today’s subjects did not yet exist. So, when books about such topics as airplanes, television, and space tourism were written, they were added to existing categories. As a result, a lot of books have been crammed into very small call number ranges and therefore must have very long call numbers with lots of digits, letters, and decimals. Many items are difficult to classify because they might involve more than one subject. A book about the psychology of women, for example, may be classified in the HQ section rather than BF, which is the primary psychology section, because HQ contains books on women’s studies. Such a book could fit in either section. If this book on the psychology of women was of a more medical nature, it could even be placed in the RCs. If there’s only one copy of the book, however, it can have only one distinct call number, so the librarian who catalogs the book must make a choice. The same problem can occur when a book is classified with the Dewey Decimal Classification system. This is why it is important to use the online catalog rather than just wandering through the stacks; you may find that books on basically the same subject are cataloged in different call number areas. E-BOOKS Library E-book Databases Just as libraries subscribe to databases for finding periodical articles, they can subscribe to databases that provide access to electronic versions of books. Some of the more popular e-book databases are listed in appendix B. If your library does subscribe to these resources, you can certainly search them individually to find e-books, but you may also find that the e-books available through them are actually included in your library’s online catalog. This simplifies the research process because instead of searching the online catalog for books in your library and then searching another database for e-books, a single search will find both the books that are physically available in your library and the e-books accessed virtually. This convenient one-stop shopping disregards the format of a resource, which, as I have mentioned, should not be considered as an important evaluation criterion, and focuses on the actual content of the item. Public Domain Texts on the Web The full texts of many classic books are available online for free because the copyright is no longer owned by the author, most likely because that author is deceased. These texts are considered public property and are often referred to as being “in the public domain.” If you use any material from these works, however, you still need to give credit to the author in your paper as will be explained in further detail in the final chapter of this book. One of the oldest sources of public domain texts on the internet is Project Gutenberg (gutenberg.org), a website that was named appropriately enough for the fifteenth-century inventor of the printing press that brought move- able type to Europe and revolutionized book production. Records in this database look like typical online catalog records, but below this bibliographic information is a list of the formats in which the book is available, usually including HTML and PDF files. HTML versions are particularly useful when you want to copy and paste quotes from the source into your paper (with proper credit given to the author, of course). Google Books (books.google.com) is another good source of public domain material and also provides free previews of copyrighted books with the entire text available to purchase. If users need only a bit of information, the free content may provide the needed answers. Google’s lofty goal is to someday provide access to every book ever written. Although the traditional format of books may be evolving, the essence of what a book is will never become obsolete. While books will line the shelves of libraries for years to come and be checked out by students thirsting for knowledge, they will also be downloaded to cell phones, read on e-readers, and viewed on the internet by these same students. The format in which someone reads a book, after all, doesn’t really matter; what does count is the content of the book. This reflects the fundamental philosophy of this book, which adheres to the idea that substance is superior to style.