Document (#27473)

Author

Ranganathan, S.R.

Title

Elements of library classification

Issue

3rd ed.

Imprint

Bombay : Asia Publ. House

Year

1959

Pages

IX,108 S

Abstract

A medium-length book, based on lectures, aimed at classificationists, not cataloguers or classifiers. Ranganathan begins with his Five Laws and a definition of classification and its purposes. He gives a list of 108 subjects in "unhelpful alphabetical sequence" and shows how they can be grouped into subjects, and then how each each subject's terms can be organized in a helpful and useful way, thereby demonstrating and building up his basic canons, postulates, and principles of classification. All of that, roughly the first half of the book, will be of interest to anyone starting to make classification systems. It has all of what makes Ranganathan's work so delightful to read: his unending concern for the user, his deep thought, and his warmth, humour, and spirituality. The second half of the book, however, has what can make his work difficult: his unyielding belief that the Colon Classification is the only system worth using. The reader will not be very interested in repeatedly classifying books under various systems and then reversing the process to see how closely the call number matches the subject. However, the reader can take the ideas so clearly presented in the first half of the book and then veer off to build his or her own system, while remembering that if his classification laws are likened to Euclid's laws of geometry, there is no room for a Riemann or Lobachevksy in Ranganathan's strict world.

Footnote

2nd ed. London 1959

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