College and Research Libraries


prove, it has its bright side. Those stu­
dents who are to be the catalogers of the 
future should, because of these uncertain­
ties and disagreements, prove more adapt­

able in making changes and adjustments 
when they undertake the building of actual 
catalogs in libraries and the solution of 
future cataloging problems. 

By FRANCIS G. WILSON 

The Library Catalog and the Scholar 

Mr. Wilson is professor of political 
science, University of Illinois. 

T HE USERS of the college and research library hardly know that there is a 
"crisis" in the art and science of catalog­
ing. In degree each professor and student 
is aware of the virtues and the vices of the 
catalog but few have any coherent opinions 
on what might be called policies of the 
cataloging department of a library. Yet 
any scholar should welcome the wide dis­
cussion among librarians of the question, 
for it is only the inert and static profes­
sional group which has no questions as to 
its own folkways. The users of libraries 
will see a hope for continued improve­
ments in the management of the book 
resources of the nation in the re-examina­
tion of cataloging, even though they may 
not know just what the improvements are 
to be. 

The nonprofessional approach to the 
catalog would, perhaps, distinguish first of 
all between the kinds of users of the 
library. Undergraduates have a certain 
type of demand, the graduate students an­
other, and the faculty still others. But 
distinctions must be made between differ­
ent kinds of faculty men, since some teach­
ers seldom use the library while others 
regard it as their garden of research which 

JUNE, 1942 

must be carefully cultivated. If the least 
sympathy need be expended on the teacher 
who does no research, we must also recog­
nize that the needs of the students 
generally follow the pattern of demand 
originating in the teaching process. The 
values of the teacher are reflected in the 
demands the students make upon the li­
brary. A library catalog is a single instru­
ment which must serve the needs of the 
whole academic community. 

Wider Meaning of Service 

Professional librarians may become im­
mersed in the details of policy and ad­
ministration and they may therefore forget 
the wider meaning of the service they are 
rendering the university. The library is, 
for the liberal and humane aspect of edu­
cation, the organic and functioning center 
of the campus. If the laboratory courses 
may neglect the treasures of the mind 
locked up in books, the humanities cannot. 
Our universities have grown up in measure 
around the permanence of the library. 
We assume that the library will continue 
always to be where it is and that it will 
be always available to the seeker for know­
edge. Americans who have used libraries 
in Europe will in many cases have realized 
the achievements of the American li­
brarian, and this realization comes from 

201 



knowing the relative inaccessibility of ma­
terials not governed by the modern catalog. 
Distinguished exceptions may be remem­
bered in the libraries of the League of 

· Nations and the International Labor Of­
fice in Geneva where the handiwork of 
American library science was visible in the 
arrangement and cataloging of the books. 
As with the liturgy of a universal church, 
the scholar is at home anywhere and any 
time with a good library catalog. 

A catalog is the key to effective teaching 
and research. It is for people to use, 
always and openly. But "people" are not 
experts in cataloging, and here as else­
where the latent conflict between the ex­
pert and the layman can be seen. While 
we may regard the undergraduate as a 
layman in the extreme meaning of the 
word, the practiced scholar is a little less 
of the layman, though not an expert in the 
librarian's sense of the word. In the field 
of government, the civil servant or bureau­
crat often feels that his knowledge is un­
appreciated by the citizen-subjects of the 
modern state. There is continued conflict 
between the expert or administrator and 
the ordinary individual upon whom the im­
pact of government falls. So with the 
library. The librarian must be conscious 
of rendering a real service to the public 
and that there is a debt of appreciation 
which should be shown in refraining at 
least from capricious criticism. Possessors 
of the administrative arcanum do not wel­
come the clumsy curiosity of the un­
initiated. Whatever one may say of 
professional achievements, those in edu­
cational endeavor, including librarians, 
must stand a constant public inspection and 
a lay evaluation of their work. Law, 
medicine, and, once upon a time, theology, 
were accepted and respected by the ordi­
nary mortal, but not education for which 

the whole society pays good tax dollars. 
The modern bureaucrat would like to 
hush his critics with a frown of disapproval 
but in a democracy let us hope that this 
will never be. Those who direct the cata­
loging of a modern library must remember 
that the bureaucratic virus will weaken 
their position; it is a disease resolutely to 
be resisted. 

Institutions of Consultation 

One basic solution, long suggested in the 
discussion of social policy, is to develop 
institutions of consultation with the recipi­
ents of public service. Good opinion, the 
best opinion indeed, should be consulted. 
For the cataloger the best opinion available 
is that of the active scholar. If there are 
policies to be determined in cataloging, 
such people should be regularly and for­
mally consulted. It might be suggested 
that in each university library there should 
be a general committee of such people, 
appointed by the librarian, who will be 
consulted about the problems of catalog­
ing. Scholars will .not be unwilling to 
accept the wisdom of the professional li­
brarian, but the professional librarian may 
find there is wisdom to be gathered from 
the scholar. It is not suggested here that 
the minute problems of what call number 
should be assigned to a book should be dis­
cussed by such a committee but that the 
larger issues facing the cataloger and 
administrator of the library should be dis­
cussed. The conventional library com­
mittee in a university hardly gets beyond 
the divisions of the budget, the purchase 
of ·particular academic rarities, and the dis­
cussion of certain equipment needs. If 
the contemporary librarian faces a crisis 
which will not be short, he should seek all 
of the advice on policy that it is possible 
for him to get. 

COLLEGE AND RESEARCH LIBRARIES 202 



Value of the Scholar~s Advice 

Librarians are seldom if ever in ivory 
towers, though students and scholars 
may be at times. The specific needs of 
an individual are what the librarian 
faces, but those needs must be correlated 
with the general financial and adminis­
trative circumstances of a library. Such 
a correlation cannot be achieved by 
intra-professional discussion alone. The 
generalized interests of library users 
should be consciously studied by the ablest 
representatives of the consumer of the 
library service. 

Let us assume that the library must ac­
cept its share of the critical time through 
which all public institutions, not military 
in character, must pass. The brilliant 
tradition of American library science is 
stalwart support for troubled days, and a 
capacity of libraries to hold their own 
might be about all that can be expected 
during the next few years. The possi­
bility, even probability, that less money 
will find its way into library budgets is 
clear: Some savings must be made. The 
cataloger, like others, must reduce the cost 
of his services. To introduce technical 
imperfections in the process of cataloging 
may be necessary, provided other values 
in librarianship are maintained. In the 
conflict of library values, the consumer, 
the scholar, should be able to offer valuable 
advice. 

In the abstract, it would seem that the 
scholar would prefer savings in every 
branch of library cost before the actual 
purchase of books and documents is cur­
tailed. To what extent cutting the cost 
of cataloging will maintain the stream of 
new books coming into the library is a 
question for the library technician to 
answer. It is obvious that a book must be 

available else it might just as well not be 
purchased, but it is clear also that there 
are degrees of availability and an imperfect 
catalog might be the lesser evil. In the 
abstract, therefore, if a choice must be 
made the scholar would prefer simplifi­
cation in cataloging if such simplification 
will enable the library to purchase a larger 
number of books. Yet any scholar knows 
that long-run issues are involved. It 
might be shortsighted to mutilate the sym­
metry' of the catalog in order to acquire a 
limited number of new titles; there might 
be even added cost at some later date in 
order to restore coherence to the catalog. 
Nevertheless, almost any scholar and 
teacher will urge that one of the vices of 
the modern university is excessive adminis­
trative and maintenance cost, all the way 
from the library to the athletic program. 
What simplifications in cataloging should 
be accepted should, therefore, be a matter 
for sustained discussion between the pro­
fessional librarian and the active scholar. 

Scholarly Needs Vary 

Scholarly needs vary greatly, yet it 
would seem there is in general a discrep­
ancy between the perfection of the biblio­
graphical data on the catalog card and the 
needs of the scholar. In effect the data 
used by scholars is in most instances gov­
erned by publishing practice, though 
notable and discouraging variations may be 
noted in the meticulosity of some doctoral 
dissertations. What a research man ordi­
narily takes from the catalog card is the 
data that will go into a published bibliog­
raphy; if he needs more there are appro­
priate means of getting it. Or, indeed, his 
reference may be and usually is made 
directly from the volume in hand. It is 
not suggested that the author-title cards· 

JUNE~ 1942 203 



in the catalogs should be correlated per­
fectly with the standards of research publi­
cation but a closer correlation is at least 
a possibility in the simplification of catalog­
ing. The ordinary student or graduate 
student may take even less data from the 
catalog card. 

Subject analysis, may be, perhaps, to the 
user, the most crucial of the issues in 
cataloging. Subject headings involve great 
expense but they are included in the 
catalog in order to make it more useful. 
Now many users of the library may urge 
that the subjects selected are or have be­
come traditional; that they do not keep 
up with the emergence of new subjects of 
inquiry. On the other hand, a perfect 
catalog might require an enormous amount 
of reclassification rather than the more 
simple and less expensive process of cross 
reference to older and obsolete headings. 
It can readily be understood that a cata­
loger does not want to have incomplete or 
dormant headings but the user might 
urge that new literature on new subjects 
might begin where 'the older and tra­
ditional division, let us say of a social 
science, leaves off. Certainly, the consul­
tation of the workers in a discipline, who 
may be invited from time to time to serve 
with a general committee, should be im­
portant in the constant evolution of sub­
ject headings. It might be urged, to be 
specific, that few scholars in the field of 
political science would use the subject 
heading of "Political Science" in the cata­
log. Clearly, no subject headings can be 
perfect, though new subjects might reflect 
the development of sustained research in­
terests, either throughout the field of 
scholarship or in particular universities. 
A consultative committee of scholars might 
be able to indicate the emergent fields of 
research which should be recognized in the 

catalog, especially those which cut across 
the social sciences. 

Subject Headings Should Vary 

Subject headings should vary, it would 
seem, with the changing interests of 
particular fields and with the changing pre­
dominances of research in particular uni­
versities. Thus, a university whose faculty 
has pioneered and attained recognition in 
a particular field will have both under­
graduates and graduates using the catalog 
for literature dealing with the subject. 
Why should not the cataloger follow this 
interest fully as much as the more or less 
traditional subjects worked out by the Li­
brary of Congress? For example, works 
on the totalitarian state have, we hope, a 
limited time interest but in future years 
even a dormant heading on this subject 
might be of great value in guiding the grad­
uate student in the preliminary stages of his 
research. 

Owing to the traditional procedures 
of American scholarship, it is doubtful 
whether the formal bibliography can be a 
substitute for the catalog in research. Al­
most any research project goes far afield; it 
crosses other disciplines and ignores the 
accepted classifications of subject matter. 
By definition, a real research project must 
do this. A research problem springs in part 
from the spirit, the intuition, and the reason 
of the investigator; the formality of a li­
brary catalog or a bibliography can never 
keep up with dynamic and determined 
scholarship. The bibliography can hardly 
fit a specific research need, though it may be 
of value to investigations on lower levels 
of originality. Bibliographies cannot be­
come substitutes for the catalog with its 
dispassionate revelation of all the material 
that a library may have. 

On the other hand, there are bodies of 

COLLEGE AND RESEARCH LIBRARIES 204 



particularly difficult material, such as gov­
ernment and institutional documents, 
where most scholars do not know the 
ramifications or the richness of what is 
available. Analytical bibliographies and 
subject analysis of government documents 
might be of great use to the scholar. In 
practice the researcher knows only a small 
segment of the publications of a govern­
ment and when he moves beyond his hard­
won documentary competence he is likely 
to feel lost. While no library should 
undertake to do all of the bibliographical 
labor a scholar needs, while a library can 
attempt to be too systematic in the organi­
zation of materials, it is nevertheless true 
that the librarian should concentrate on 
those phases of bibliography which prove in 
practice most difficult for the scholar. 
Even librarians must remember that some 
labor need not be saved and that some 
delays to the user of a library are adminis­
tratively justified. 

The Reference Librarian 

Rather than subject headings and rather 
than bibliographies, the scholar must turn 
to the reference librarian to bridge the 
gaps that are financially or administra­
tively necessary. It is unfortunate that so 
many research workers are unfamiliar with 
the assistance that can be got from the 
trained reference librarian. Any scholar 
should be in the habit of going to such a 
librarian with any or all of his biblio­
graphical difficulties. Faculty members as 
well as students need constant instruction 
in the use of the library, especially as the 
field of interest shifts from familiar to un­
familiar bodies of material. As simplifi­
cation in cataloging becomes more and 
more necessary, the reference librarian will 
become correspondingly more and more 
valuable to the scholar. For example, in 

JUNEJ 1942 

certain unsystematized problems of cata­
loging, such as films, the reference li­
brarian is invaluable to one engaged in 
research. This statement implies, how­
ever, no defense of such unsolved prob­
lems. 

Whatever is done with the catalog in 
the future, certain things must be remem­
bered by the administrator and the 
cataloger. The present and previous gen­
erations of American scholars have grown 
up and reached their maturity under exist­
ing cataloging practice. Long use has 
taught many researchers the difficulties of 
the present system and how to avoid them. 
The college library catalog is a funda­
mental part of the researcher's outlook on 
life. He knows the catalog is there and 
he knows some of the things that are in it; 
he knows that at any time it can direct him 
here and there through the riches of a re­
search library, as an elaborate map can 
direct the traveler or the soldier toward 
his objective. Fundamental changes in 
the cataloging system would entail almost 
revolutionary changes in the habits of the 
research mind. Indeed, it might generate 
in some a sense of frustration which would 
be translated into aggressiveness against 
the very librarian who is trying to adjust 
the library to his needs in the light of 
changing circumstance. 

Unity of the Single Catalog 

All true students want the resources of 
a library expanded and preserved. They 
want books to be available and to be 
guarded for the use of the future, as for 
the present, generation of students and 
scholars. But the diversity of materials in 
a library is brought at least to a symbolic 
unity in the single catalog. Our tradition, 
our use and wont, expects unity in the cata­
log if in nothing else about the library. 

205 



Yet all users of a library know that 
changes are necessary. If a scholar 
knows, through consultation, what the 
problems of the librarian are, he will 
accept those changes more willingly than 
if he is left in ignorance of the inner work­
ings of the librarian's mind. The simpli­
fication arising in cataloging from cost, 
all will accept, and any other changes 
which the common interest of librarians 
and scholars may dictate . . 

Any person who knows a library from 
the standpoint of independent research will 
know how complex the management of 
great stores of printed material is and like­
wise he will appreciate the effectiveness of 

the staffs of university libraries. What­
ever changes must be made, should be 
made in light of the observed needs of the 
users of libraries and in the light of the 
experience of the professional librarian. 
It must be, in the nature of the case, a slow 
process but one that is constant. The 
scholar and the librarian both have a pro­
found common interest in the preservation 
and expansion of the American library. 
The elements of professional jealousy and 
scholarly arrogance must fade in the com­
mon consciousness of the larger issues be­
fore us in the maintenance of the library, 
scholarly or otherwise, as a functioning 
element in our democratic way of life. 

In Anticipation of Reconstruction· 
AMERICAN LIBRARIANS in research insti­
~ tutions, harassed during the last sev­
eral months with missing issues and 
volumes of foreign journals, can sympa­
thize with their European and Asiatic 
colleagues. Those librarians have for the 
last few years had the multiple problem 
of delivery failures, extensive reductions in 
budgets, necessitating almost wholesale 
journal cancellations, and in many in­
stances destruction of important sets al­
ready held by the institutions. The size 
of this complex problem is impossible to 
estimate at the present time but we have 
sufficient evidence already to know that 
it is of huge proportions. And with no 
immediately cheerful prospects of change 
in the international situation we can as­
sume that the problems for both foreign 
and American institutions will continue to 
multiply. 

Whether we in the United States receive 
aid in completing our sets of foreign jour­
nals or not there is considerable satisfac­
tion to be derived from knowing that work 
has been accomplished in this country 
which will aid in the future rehabilitation 
of foreign institutions. The Rockefeller 
Foundation, with its constant interest in 
international scholarship, has given to the 
American Library Association grants total­
ing $I Io,ooo to be used to purchase cur­
rent issues of important American journals 
to be shipped to European and Asiatic 
research institutions at the end of hos­
tilities. The Committee on Aid to Li­
braries in War Areas has been responsible 
for the administration of this program. A 
brief report on the acquisition of this 
supply appeared in the April I g.p Issue 
of the A .L.A. Bulletin. 

(Continued on page 268) 

COLLEGE AND RESEARCH LIBRARIES 206 


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