025.431: The Dewey blog

Happy retirement, Michael!

Guest post by Julianne Beall

Last week we held a virtual retirement celebration for Michael Cantlon, who retired September 30, 2020, after 41 years of service as a Dewey classifier at the Library of Congress. His colleagues in the Dewey Program contributed slides and pictures to a PowerPoint presentation expressing their appreciation and best wishes for a happy retirement. One classifier, Cat Eiche, contributed to the presentation by raiding the Dewey archives for pictures of Dewey staff that included Michael before his hair turned gray—and other items that amused her, like a list of office equipment that included a Zenith 100 microcomputer (on which we first tried editing DDC on a computer) and a Diablo 630 printer.

Michael's primary areas of expertise were DDC 100s and 200s, but he also classified and trained classifiers in the 400s, 700s, 800s, and 900s. His colleagues expressed appreciation for the deep knowledge of the DDC that he shared.

Michael made many contributions to Dewey editorial work over the years, but mostly behind the scenes, making proposals and giving guidance directly to the editors. However, for DDC 20 and 21, he did much editorial work on the 200s and on the separate 200 Religion Class publications reprinted from those editions with expanded indexing. For the latter, see:

• 200 Religion Class (from DDC 20)
• 200 Religion Class (from DDC 21)

And today Michael has an exhibit among the EPC 142C exhibits now available for review at oc.lc/deweyexhibits: EPC 142C-S20.1 Religious conversion.

We all look forward to the day when the Library of Congress is fully open and we can give Michael our best wishes for a happy retirement in person.

Reclassifying the 200s at Lawrence Public Library

    Guest post by Emily McDonald, Lawrence Public Library

Lawrence Public Library (Kansas) is always looking for ways to be more inclusive and celebrate diversity in our collections and catalog. Our Celebration Picture Book collection was expanded to include more non-Christian holiday stickers and "Undocumented immigrants" was added to all the necessary catalog records before we outright replace "Illegal aliens" later in the year, what was next? When Kate Ray, former LPL cataloger, shared Rebecca Green’s guest post on the 220-299 optional arrangement with me back in May 2019, we knew this arrangement was the perfect fit for our library.  We wanted to use this arrangement because of its equitable treatment of religions rather than giving the bulk of the schedule to Christianity. It has the added benefit of allowing all the religions packed into the 290s to have room to be built out more than what we can do in our system with the current DDC. The Dewey call numbers at LPL are limited to 8 characters (including the decimal), which means we are not able to drill down to specific topics in certain areas, such as Buddhist doctrines. While the optional arrangement can still exceed our 8 character limit, it helped us get specific topics next to each other on the shelf.

After receiving project approval from the supportive leadership team in June, the project was planned for mid-August. Mid-August is a slow time at the library in between the end of Summer Reading and the beginning of school, making it ideal for big projects like this. It also left us with some time to prep the collections before the update and inform staff about the changes. The first thing we did was coordinate with Collection Development to weed the 200s. We did not want to update more books than we had to because of the size of this project. A week before the project, we shelf read, looked for any missing items, and purged old records out of the system. We also posted "coming soon" signs before the project to let patrons know big changes were coming and that the collection would be off the shelf for a while.  

The first collection we updated was our biggest collection, adult non-fiction. On August 12, 2019, almost 1,500 books were pulled off the shelf to be reclassified. While the books were in the cataloging department, we updated the bibliographic call number, item call number, a local classification field, and the spine label. Even with 4 full-time catalogers, we expected it would take us a week to update the adult collection. We were pleasantly surprised when it only took us three days. On the afternoon of August 14th, the collection was back on the shelf. We spent another few days updating the various children’s collection, large print, audiobooks, graphic novels, and DVDs (about 500 more items). Staff holds were placed on any checked out items and system alerts were set up for any non-viable (lost, missing, etc.) items that might go through our automated returns sorter to prevent books being reshelved with the old DDC. By the end of the project and after the checked out items trickled in, 2,500 items were updated from our adult and children collections. 

It took weeks of planning, weeding, and prep to make this project go off without a hitch. The biggest help was creating a crosswalk between the DDC numbers and the optional numbers. I also recommend making a "pull list." Kate used our crosswalk to pull books off the shelf in their new order. For example, she pulled 299.511 first because the new number is 221.1. She also labeled the books she pulled first as "shelf 1," which corresponded with the first shelf in the collection.This made it easier to return items to the shelf without rearranging them and required minimal book shifting.

Display showing the new 200s numbers at Lawrence Public Library

After the project, we posted signs with the new numbers to inform patrons of the changes. We anxiously waited for patron feedback, but never received any. However, we did get a few positive comments on a social media post about the project. We also created a 220-299 Project Packet for libraries interested in making the change. The packet contains a DDC to optional arrangement crosswalk, action plan, and a copy of the optional arrangement schedule.

Going forward, we hope to make the 220-299 optional numbers more accessible to any library interested in making the change. As we catalog new books, we are updating the master record in WorldCat, adding a new 082 field containing the optional number with the $m optional designation. We are trying to keep the arrangement inclusive by adding numbers of our own as needed. During the project, we created our own number within the arrangement for Satanism. It is a recognized religion and we moved it from 133.42 to 299.71, our local number. Since the Witchcraft update, we have updated our documentation to make sure 299.9 is expanded to include any potential built numbers.

Revisions to witchcraft and Wicca

Editorial Policy Committee meeting 142B wrapped up at the end of July, with six proposals considered and approved. One of those proposals was on the topic of witchcraft, a frequently critiqued topic in the DDC, so I wanted to take this opportunity to elaborate on the changes approved, now available in WebDewey.

There are three primary areas where books about modern Western witchcraft are classed:

• 133.43 Magic and witchcraft and 133.44 Spells, curses, charms
• 203.3 Witchcraft
• 299.94 Religions based on modern revivals of witchcraft [caption prior to revision]

The most prominent complaint about the treatment of witchcraft was that most works were ending up in the 133.4 hierarchy, a class focused on occultism. This was especially a problem with works about spells and charms—since the 130s were the only area that had an explicit place for spells, nearly all works about spells were being classed there, even if they had titles naming a religious practice, such as The only book of Wiccan spells you'll ever need. The Manual note 130 vs. 200 directed catalogers to use the 200s for religious works, but then went on to tell catalogers to prefer the 130s if they weren't sure if a work was religious or not; since there is still a significant cultural stigma surrounding witchcraft in many areas, this meant catalogers were not recognizing when these works should be classed in the 200s. How could we revise the DDC to direct attention to the fact that a significant number of these works are religious/spiritually based, and thus should be classed in the 200s?

The proposal text has more information about the multiple approaches I considered, in consultation with people who practice various forms of witchcraft and Paganism (you can view the full 8-page proposal). The final proposal which was approved has a mix of new numbers, new notes, and new manual instructions to help classifiers find the best place for these works.

New numbers include 203.32 Spells, curses, charms for works that are not based in a specific cultural tradition of witchcraft, and 299.942 Wicca. With the add instructions given at 299.942, numbers can now be built for works about Wicca spells (299.942332) and, for example, therapeutic Wicca spells (299.9423326). (This new spells number can also be used with other religions with "Add as instructed under 290" notation, such as Santería.)

A new note at 203.3 Witchcraft helps clarify what should not be classed in that number. This note, what we call a scatter class-elsewhere, now reads "Class specific cultural traditions of witchcraft with the tradition, e.g., witchcraft as practiced in African religions in 299.6133, religions based on modern revivals of witchcraft in the Western world in 299.94". So what should be classed at 203.3? A new class-here note reads "Class here interdisciplinary works on witchcraft". Works about comparative studies of witchcraft should be classed in 203.3 when they don't focus on a specific cultural tradition.

Finally, what I consider the most significant change: instead of a manual note that directs catalogers to place works in the 130s if in doubt, the manual note, now renamed 200 vs. 130, directs catalogers who are not sure if a work is religious/spiritual to prefer a number in the 200s. This helps ensure that even when catalogers are not as familiar with witchcraft as they are more widely practiced religions, they should take time to discern where a specific work should be classed and not default to the 130s. My hope is these changes, taken together, result in more appropriate placement of works about witchcraft, and more of those works being classed in the 200s.

Thank you to everyone who gave feedback on this proposal, including Jane Cothron (Lincoln County Library District), Helen Imre (Franklin Township Public Library), and Rebecca DeLio (Denver Public Library), as well as others, including both witchcraft practitioners and library workers. Their feedback was incredibly helpful in making these revisions happen.

Results of EPC meeting 142B

The Editorial Policy Committee meets in person once a year to review proposals to revise the DDC, but there are also periodic online meetings. The most recent online meeting, EPC 142B, took place from July 6-31, 2020. EPC reviewed six exhibits; you can find the full text of those proposals at oc.lc/deweyexhibits. The results of EPC 142B:

• EPC 142B-S00.1 Conspiracy theories: approved
• EPC 142B-S20.1 Witchcraft: approved with two changes:
  • Added a new class-elsewhere note at 299.675 for hoodoo not presented as religious practice, replacing existing see-also note
  • Added Relative Index term "Hoodoo—religious practice" to 299.675
• EPC 142B-S28.1 Pentecostalism: approved with one change:
  • Changed caption of 269.4 to "Pentecostalism and charismatic movement"
• EPC 142B-S35.1 Space forces: approved
• EPC 142B-S64.1 Fermented foods and drinks: approved with three changes:
  • Changed caption at 641.46 to "Pickling, smoking, other forms of chemical preservation"
  • Added a new class-here note at 641.46 for comprehensive works on chemical preservation
  • Instead of just one base number for side dishes made with a specific food derived from plant crops and domesticated animals (641.811), created separate base numbers for side dishes from plant crops and domesticated animals (641.8113-641.8117) and from game, seafood, miscellaneous foods (641.8119)
• EPC 142B-S79.1 BASE jumping: approved

We're working on implementing these revisions to WebDewey; look for them to be published in the next few weeks. Please let us know if you have any questions about these changes or about the revision process itself.

EPC 142B exhibits available for review

Three new proposals to revise Dewey are now available for public review at oc.lc/deweyexhibits. These exhibits will be part of EPC meeting 142B, and the Editorial Policy Committee will review and vote on them in July. The proposals now available are: 

• EPC 142B-S20.1 Witchcraft
• EPC 142B-S28.1 Pentecostalism
• EPC 142B-S79.1 BASE jumping

The editorial team has a few more exhibits in the works for this meeting, which we'll post to oc.lc/deweyexhibits when they're ready for review.

We're happy for any feedback, whether positive or negative; feel free to provide comments on this post, in the Dewey Contributors Google Group, or by email to [email protected] or an EPC member.

Flash exhibit: Hermits

David Stanley / Flickr (CC BY 2.0)

Feeling like a hermit these days? Me too, and that’s what inspired our latest flash exhibit!

We had the LCSH “Hermits” mapped to 305.568 Alienated and excluded classes, which didn’t seem right. Yes, hermits are excluded from much of society, but they don’t quite fit with the other marginalized classes there. In the traditional sense, which is also the LCSH’s sense, a hermit is secluded for religious reasons. I moved the LCSH to 204.247 Asceticism in the religion schedules to reflect this. This would be the comprehensive number for religious hermits, or hermits in comparative religion, though works on hermits in specific religions would go elsewhere (e.g., 248.47 for Christian hermits, 297.446 for Sufi hermits).

Though sometimes treated as synonyms, there are separate LCSHs for hermits and recluses. Violet and I thought that was a better fit for 305.568, since living reclusively may be influenced by hostility from society. Of course, the distinction may come down to works in hand.

I also added the LCSH “Hermit crabs as pets” to the built number 639.67, under 639.6 Crustacean culture. Did you know that hermit crabs aren’t true crabs?

Finally, there’s something curious going on with the famous Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg, Russia. It’s the second-largest art museum in the world after the Louvre, and among the world’s top 10 most visited. It was already represented in a built number in WebDewey at 708.721, for art museums in Saint Petersburg, but you might not know it. We had the LC name authority record mapped, but following LC romanization rules, it’s “Gosudarstvennyĭ Ėrmitazh (Russia)”. You probably wouldn’t find that on a keyword search! I ended up creating an electronic-only Relative Index term “Hermitage Museum (Russia)”, which happens to be the Children’s Subject Heading form. We had started doing something like this with the names of world leaders where LC’s romanization diverges from more popular usage. There’s nothing wrong with keyword searching as an initial approach, so I hope this is helpful.

If you want to alleviate forced hermetism, here’s an ironic resource: last month, Apple released a one-take video that’s a virtual trip around the Hermitage Museum, shot entirely on a new iPhone. At a whopping five hours and 20 minutes, it’s great for slow TV fans or might be nice background material while working from home. It’s free on YouTube. Enjoy!

Flash exhibit: Cooking and baking

Last week we announced we'd be doing a series of flash exhibits, where we focus on a specific topic and publish small but hopefully helpful additions to the schedules. Since many folks are staying safe at home to prevent the spread of COVID-19, there's a lot of discussion of what everyone is eating. While the Dewey schedules already have a lot of provisions in these areas, we found a few more to add to help classify works about food and cooking.

First off, we've added the new number 641.5677 Islamic cooking, where we've added a Relative Index term for Halal cooking. This number was built using 641.567 Cooking for religious limitations and observances and adding the -7 from 297 Islam, Babism, Bahai Faith. We've also mapped Halal food to 297.576 Individual observances, along with Islamic dietary laws. Whether a work is classed in 641.5677 or 297.576 depends on the focus of the work, but hopefully it's clear which discipline the work belongs with: religion or cooking.

Since I've been craving sweet stuff, we added the LCSHs Doughnuts and Cupcakes to 641.8653 Cakes. Cupcakes obviously belong at that number, but you could make an argument for placing doughnuts at 641.8659 Danish, French, related pastries, and in fact, some libraries have classed works about doughnuts classed there. But more have used 641.8653. Maybe we need a new class number for doughnuts, but it would be a missed opportunity if the number didn’t have a zero in it for the sake of donut-shaped aesthetics!

Awhile back we also added the LCSH Smart cookers to 641.587 Steam and pressure cooking. That's the subject heading for Instant Pot and other "multi cookers," which are still enjoying a lot of popularity after being the hot new item a few years ago.

Are there other trends that we should be providing for? Do you see areas where additional numbers or revisions would be helpful? We’d be happy to work with you to make improvements! Get in touch at [email protected].

Reclassifying the 200s at Simmons University

Guest post by Ken Mathis, Simmons University Library

No library has a perfect system of organization and occasional checks of the stacks are necessary. It's important to check on how the collection has grown and understand when it needs to be worked on.

Beatley Library uses a combination of the Dewey Decimal Classification and Library of Congress Classification. The bulk of the collection falls under the LCC system while the juvenile section for non-fiction and special topics are under Dewey. This collection is primarily used by the Children's Lit faculty and graduate students in the program. 

In order to create a more accurate and welcoming religion section in Juvenile Literature, classified in Dewey, we decided that the optional arrangement provided in the print version of DDC 23 in 2011 (and developed in greater detail by Rebecca Green in 2019) would be a great alteration to the juvenile collection. The project was completed by Ken Mathis, a Collections & Systems Library Assistant, who joined the Simmons University Library team last July. The project took approximately 2 months, from November-December 2019 and changed a total number of 360 physical items.

While the project involved time and effort, it did offer better arrangement of material by offering a more chronological view of religion and more room for subjects that had been previously squished into the 290s in the original 200s arrangement in order to be more inclusive of non-Christian religions. There were a few logistical issues that needed to be addressed in order to be successful. How would the books themselves be processed in a way that's efficient and time appropriate? How would this change be communicated to the students and patrons of the Beatley Library? What would the reaction to this change be?

Signs were created in order to explain the decision to switch over to the optional arrangement and display how to navigate the new order of the section. All the items in the religion section were taken off the shelves at one time and Research & Instruction librarians emailed faculty in order to avoid any items being checked out and all could be accounted for.

Communication was necessary between the Collections & Systems department and User Services in order to make sure there was a smooth transition between the change in the Dewey organization of the religion section and no confusion about the future of navigation or how to access the materials in the in-between time period. The transition needed to be swift, yet accurate. It was necessary to make sure the change was noticed, acknowledged and understood by patrons of the library.

While the optimal arrangement itself was straightforward and there were instructions through WebDewey that offered guidance on how to change the call number of an item, it did require attention to detail and investigation to make sure all individual items made it to the right spot. As the religion section had books of various ages, some books needed to be evaluated in order to make sure they fit neatly into the new arrangement. This was to be expected as the DDC had been changed and updated over time. Some books were too specific in their classification number while others were too vague. Consistency needed to be considered for long term accessibility.

The physical processing of all of the items was the most time-consuming part of the transition and was done in batches as the project was being completed. All items needed new labels, stickers and label protectors. After the initial reclassification was finished, all the books were arranged by their new classification numbers and evaluated as a cohesive unit before being put back into their home in the stacks. The reaction from the Simmons community to the optional arrangement was not large, but certainly welcoming. The transition was smooth enough that no patrons were affected or burdened.

The project took time and effort but proved to be the right decision for the Simmons University Library. The change was welcomed and seen as an improvement to the juvenile collection. The library will continue to improve the organization of information and provide accessible material in an appropriate manner for all patrons.

Details of the optional arrangement can be seen at the manual note for 220-290 or this 2019 blog post: Mapping 220‒290 standard notation to the Optional arrangement for the Bible and specific religions.

EPC 142A exhibits available

For the next four weeks, the Editorial Policy Committee will hold its electronic Meeting 142A via listserv. We welcome all comments on the following proposals, available on the Dewey Google Drive:

• EPC 142A-S28.1 286.63 Restoration movement--Specific denominations
• EPC 142A-S36.1 362.88 Victims of crime; 364.1 Criminal offenses
• EPC 142A-S52.1 Cartography, map making vs. Maps
• EPC 142A-S62.1 Sanitary engineering for rural and sparsely populated areas
• EPC 142A-S96.1 ANC presidents discussion paper

The committee will vote on the exhibits in the first full week of March. You can give feedback here, in the Google Group, or by email to [email protected] or an EPC member.

Interested in being a part of this process? Browse info for contributors, or join our webinar tomorrow. We'd love to work with you!

What’s the distinction between myth and religion in Dewey? An explainer

Have you reviewed the materials in your library classed at 398.2 Folk literature lately? Are there works there that should be classed in the 200 Religion hierarchy instead?

Just as we constantly revise the DDC, classification decisions from the past should be reviewed periodically, especially in culturally sensitive areas. The topic of myths and legends highlights the need for an iterative approach to classification, as previous classification decisions may have inappropriately centered familiar beliefs while disregarding others that seemed foreign. The "mark it and park it" approach to classification (that is, making a classification decision about a work and never revisiting it) can lead to alienation between the organization of our library's collections and our professional goals of equity and inclusion.

So how do you determine which works should be classed in 398.2 versus 200? Dewey asks you to look at the presentation of the work in hand to determine whether it is presented as a religiously-based work, especially for works that might be described as myth.

Terminology challenges

The relationship between religion and myth can be difficult to pin down, because it depends on one's understanding of the definition of a myth. The Oxford English Dictionary gives two distinct definitions:

1.       A traditional story, typically involving supernatural beings or forces, which embodies and provides an explanation, aetiology, or justification for something such as the early history of a society, a religious belief or ritual, or a natural phenomenon.

2.       A widespread but untrue or erroneous story or belief; a widely held misconception; a misrepresentation of the truth. Also: something existing only in myth; a fictitious or imaginary person or thing.

Over the past century scholars have assigned various definitions to the word "myth," diverging in opinion on whether it implies that a story is sacred or related to religious rituals. Joseph Campbell famously gave his favorite definition of mythology as "other people's religion." The popular meaning of myth as being distinct from fact (as in the second OED definition above) means that assigning a value of "myth" to a particular story or set of stories is a value-laden proposition.

Dewey and myth

From its beginning, the DDC has asked classifiers to make a distinction between works that are presented as mythology and those presented as religion. The wording of the distinction has varied through editions, but the current language providing guidance was established in Edition 22 in 2003; it can be found in Manual note 398.2 vs. 201.3, 230, 270, 292-299 Myths and legends:

Use 398.2 for myths or mythology presented in terms of cultural entertainment or, especially, as representative of the early literary expression of a society, even if they are populated by gods and goddesses. Use 201.3 and similar numbers elsewhere in 200 for mythology presented from a strictly theological point of view or presented as an embodiment of the religion of a people. For example, use 398.2 for Greco-Roman myths retold for a juvenile audience; but use 294.382325 for Jataka tales illustrating the character of the Buddha.

Use 398.2 for mythology having a nonreligious basis that deals with beliefs and stories that can be referred to as superstitions, legends, fairy tales, etc., where the religious content or interest is not apparent. Use 201.3 and similar numbers elsewhere in 200 for mythology having a religious basis that deals with the most basic beliefs of people and with religious beliefs and practices.

Class specific myths and legends presented as examples of a people's religion with the subject in religion, e.g., legends of Jesus' coming to Britain 232.9.

Use 398.2 for interdisciplinary works on mythology, since this number includes folk narratives with a broader focus than religion alone. If in doubt, prefer 398.2.

In following these instructions, a work like Bulfinch's mythology, which clearly states that people no longer religiously believe in the gods and goddesses portrayed, is easily classed in 398.2. But for less clear examples, we know that catalogers will make judgments based on their own cultural context.

Questions about moving forward

One of the most frequent comments I hear about Dewey are questions about Indigenous stories being categorized as myth (for example, see Dr. Debbie Reese's 2018 post Some thoughts on a big word: MYTH and a 2013 post DDC 398.2 vs. 290s in Public Libraries by Reddit user MeepleWatcher). As librarians strive to equitably represent multiple worldviews in their libraries, these questions will continue to come up. How can we encourage catalogers to make culturally appropriate classification decisions in this area? Is it possible to make a clear distinction between religious beliefs and myths? Is that distinction valuable to users?

Should we change these instructions in the DDC? One potential option would be to revise the manual note to put all stories based in religion in the 200s regardless of a work's presentation. Another option would be to categorize all works about religions that are currently practiced in the 200s. Would those (or other) options solve any problems or just create new ones? There are no easy answers, but we want to open up the discussion to the profession at large.

In the meantime, take a look at the works that have been classed within 398.2 in your library. Do they accurately represent what your library's users would describe as myths and legends? Should some of them be reclassified? Has your library made any local adaptations to the DDC to more appropriately classify works representing "the most basic beliefs" of Indigenous or other peoples?