RDA: a Really Decisive Action or a Relatively Disappointing Area?

So. Resource description and access has landed. Sort of. Every time I glance at planet cataloging, open my Update magazine, or happen to browse the CILIP website, there it is. Draft proposals. More draft proposals. And yet more - well, you get the idea.
Ann Chapman provides a really concisive overview of the new code in Update magazine this month. Yet, the more I read about it, the more I feel that I'm missing something.

I understand that AACR was developed in a pre-computerised world. In this world, the catalogue card was King. The main access entry point was Queen and the added entries were really just some half-royal illegitimate infants running blindly through the castle keep. Most information was printed in books. The nearest we came to the concept of multi-media was listening to cassette tapes on our oh-so-trendy walkmans. It is amazing that since then the world has changed so rapidly. Many people conduct so much of their lives in an online environment, not least their education. Although I am wary of falling into trap of believing in the simplistic "information society" worldview, no one can doubt that the impact of digital resources on many people's lives has been enormous.

In practical terms, for the library user this meant the development of the OPAC and enhanced searching facilities. In this environment, the card catalogue Kings were deposed by the people's republic of the online public access catalogue, thus rendering the concept of main and added entries obsolete for the user. As new forms of media developed, it became problematic to catalogue electronic, digital and mutli-media items within the world of AACR2.

Thus changes needed to be made, but I can't help wondering whether they have been the right ones. RDA seems to be concerned predominantly with updating the language and the layout of the cataloguing rules, which is fair enough and makes good sense. It also lets us catalogue non-print items in a more meaningful way; again, big points there. Yet attempting to have one code to cover all media, when said media all behave in such wildy different ways, is perhaps (and I say this only tentatively) not the easiest concept with which to identify. There is also issue of the millions of MARC records currently doing their job perfectly thank you very much; what will happen to those?

As RDA works on a FRBR model, there is a need for functionality, which is great. However, the concept of 'preferred' and 'variant' access points is a little worrying, especially when so much work is currently going into the NACO project.

The simplification of terms, for example ‘s.l.’ being replaced by statements such as ‘place not recorded’ or ‘place not known’, might be easier for new cataloguers but it concerns me that it may lead to a gradual decline of skill and a steady decline in the quality of bibliographic records.

It is a concern that, the further we simplify the skill of cataloguing, the further we thus move to a library management who believes that cataloguing could be automated. After all, save the salaries of cataloguers and speed up a mechanical process. Except that it isn't mechanical. It involves skill, a clear vision of local practice and user needs, and an ability to apply rules with skill and panache. However, I'm not saying that RDA will lead ultimately to this future, but we do have to be careful as cataloguers to raise our advocacy within the wider library community.
Practically, there seems like there will be little change. I suppose only time will tell.

Hammer Horror: a genre to die for.

I have been intrigued by the Hammer Film Productions output for a long time and so, now that I am a proud member of a postal video rental club, I decided to find out more. The name actually derived from the stage name of the studio's original founder. I duly put the first title that came to mind onto the rental list and sat back to wait for the magic.

I wasn't disappointed. The Brides of Dracula arrived several days later, just in time for a Friday night in front of the laptop. It is probably the best film I have seen all year, if not of all time, and no hyperbole intended.

The film, short by today's standards at approximately 85 minutes, begins by introducing us to Marianne, a young woman who is travelling to a finishing school to take up an appointment as a tutor. After her coach stops at an inn, the driver suddenly takes fright and leaves the poor young girl inside the inn by herself. The story then proceeds quickly, as Marianne winds up at the castle and stupidly frees a blood sucking Baron. Fair play to her though as he did look rather dashing at the time; it's all in the eyes, you know.

So he escapes, she escapes, she falls in the woods, he starts creating a harem of Brides in the old windmill. Then, drum roll please, enters the star of the proceedings, the wonderful Mr Peter Cushing. What brilliance, what intelligence, what skill. Nothing will get in the way of this Van Helsing protecting the beautiful innocent Marianne. Put your guns away and show some respect for the holy water, crosses and just plain fisticuff methods of the 1960s-pretending-to-be-late-19th-century vampiric war.

Let's face it, if Dracula couldn't kill him, then what chance does this young disciple in an obviously plasic cape have? He could at least have got hold of a velvet one, he is supposed to be a Baron after all. But then that is the beauty of this film: the sets that look like they're one breath away from keeling over, the plot lines that don't fully run together, the fact that there is a church quite conveniently in the back room of the village inn. And yet, they still manage to chill, to excite and most of all to make you laugh and shriek in the same breath. I shall definitely be renting more. I can't believe it's taken me this long to find out about them.

One last thing: Marianne, if Dr Van Helsing gives you a rosary, it's not a necklace love, don't take it off before bedtime! Silly girl.