Re: [LM_NET] Doing without Dewey?

[Barbara Paciotti <barupa@SWBELL.NET>]

I can't help but weigh in on this topic. While I love Dewey, I think 
it's beneficial to have a balanced perspective on what Dewey is, and 
isn't. I like to remember that Dewey was designed to enable LIBRARIANS 
to find books FOR patrons--not as a browsing or promotion tool. While 
the library environment has changed considerably since Dewey was 
designed, Dewey is still just a locator tool--a way to find something in 
a predetermined location--and does offer much flexibility.

Dewey groups books by discipline (economic & academic viewpoints), not 
by subject, and certainly not by public school curriculum subjects. 
However, a close examination of Dewey #s shows that the same subject 
appears in many Dewey disciplines. The environment is just one 
example--it's in 300s, 500s, and 600s, depending on conservation, 
threatened/endangered, economic or scientific view, etc., and all have 
more particular subject #s. The folks who do CIP assign Dewey #s based 
on which adult professional, in which particular economic/technical 
discipline, the book is most likely to be of benefit to, when they go to 
find a book. If we apply that same thought to our students, we may well 
need to locate books in a different place than that for a Nobel 
Prize-winner in physics or the CEO of a major corporation.

I keep in mind that Dewey is merely a guideline for arrangement, not a 
proscribed-by-law requirement, so I can put whatever number I want on a 
book. OCLC and LOC do NOT have Dewey police touring the country making 
sure books are properly labeled with the CIP Dewey#--thousands of books 
were given totally different Dewey #s before CIP was imprinted on the 
verso.  If I give it a different number, who's to know? My library 
coordinator doesn't have time to inspect my collection--does yours? And 
kids don't care--I've yet to hear a kid say, 'Hey Ms P, the Dewey# on 
this book isn't the same as the one on the copyright page!'

I also consider that Dewey has had, and continues to have, many 
adjustments and changes--my abridged is on #14. I finally had time this 
year to redo spine labels for science changes in the environment and 
animal sections that appeared two editions back. One number on several 
books had been eliminated! This tells me that Dewey is intended to be a 
flexible system that meets the needs of those using it, and while no one 
expects us to pull and change all the books whenever a change is made by 
OCLC, we can take advantage of changes that make it easier for our users 
to find books. And, if I think a book belongs in a better location for 
my students, I can find an appropriate Dewey # for it, sometimes by 
checking the expanded Dewey volumes. Or I might even create a special 
Dewey# where there's a gap or unassigned number, confident that those 
Dewey guardians at the OCLC will eventually put just such a number in a 
future edition! I call it "The Creative Dewey System" and as long as I 
keep track of it in my Dewey #14 book I'm safe, and kids will find & use 
the books more often at the new location.

How does creative Dewey--or any other creative arrangement--affect our 
primary users, the kids? Not at all. Kids quickly learn where their 
favorites are located, and how often do we completely rearrange our 
library shelves? If we teach them to use the OPAC by stressing that the 
Dewey# (or letters) are merely locators, like a street address, they can 
easily find any book, regardless of what we put on the label. And in 
fact this enhances their ability to transfer knowledge to any other 
library--just as we can go anyplace in the world and know how to locate 
a house by its street address, we can also find a book in any library in 
the world by looking it up on the OPAC and using the locator number--the 
book's "shelf address", whether it's Dewey or LC or anything else. I 
believe it doesn't matter how we arrange books in the library, as long 
as we group them in a consistent manner, label them in a logical way, 
and then teach our students how to locate what they want by searching 
the OPAC and using the book's "shelf address" to find it. It's about 
teaching the process, not the (Dewey) content!

Now as for confusing the next librarian, well, that's another issue 
altogether--documentation seems to be the key. I think the next 
librarian would appreciate having materials in convenient places, and 
most of us are too busy to worry about perfect Dewey assignments anyway. 
Plus we, too, can use the OPAC!

Barbara Paciotti, SLMIS
Barbara Bush MS, Irving TX
barupa@swbell.net

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