The Misreading of Call Numbers

Sorry for the not so appealing title for this post, but today while searching, I found my search on the shelf with some others where the cutter of the call number was read wrong.  The search had the call number PN1040 .A513 1997 and was shelved just after the PN1040 .A53 's.  It then clicked in my brain that a lot of patrons get confused on how to read the numbers of a call number.   Patrons’ confusion over reading call numbers is important because that is how we discover where they are miss-shelved.

Take for example the above call number, PN1040 .A513 1997 should be read where .A513 should be viewed as if you were reading a decimal.  In decimal reading, .513 is smaller than .53 and not larger.  Sometimes patrons don’t read it this way and see the .513 as 513 (five hundred thirteen), which is more than 53 (fifty-three) if you exclude the decimal point.  In addition, sometimes patrons think in the opposite direction when it comes to decimals as well where they stick a .513 before a .5.  Just because a decimal may have more numbers, does not mean it should go before a decimal with less numbers. 

Also sometimes, though rarer than the decimals, patrons read that PN1040 as being next to a PN104.  1040 is not one hundred forty, but one thousand forty as we would really read a 4 digit whole number this way without a decimal.  To continue on with numbers with decimals after the letters corresponding to the subject, 1040.56 is obviously more than 1040.5 (add a zero to the 5 and it becomes .50 which is less than .56 since zero is smaller than 6), but patrons also forget about that as well.

Therefore, we can use how patrons understand decimals and the other numbers in the LC call number system to our aid when searching for books by thinking the way they are misreading the numbers.

Hopefully in this explanation I have not confused you all and my attempt has not been in vain.

Happy Searching! J

Books Hiding Other Books

A good tip and a cardinal rule really is to always remember is to look behind the shelf of books of which you are searching even if that shelf is not where the book ought to be but could be. 

Well for a couple of weeks, I have been breaking this rule and ignoring my own tip when one of my student assistants found one of our missings hiding behind some other books on a shelf several shelves below where it ought to have been.  It didn’t look like it had fallen between the shelves (our shelves are metal with a nice sized gap formed with the sections from the next row.  Instead, after the book had already been miss-shelved, another shelver (whether it was patron or employee is unclear) had crammed several books in front of our poor missing book to the back and thus concealing it from view.

In case anyone was wondering what missing book it was, Practical Research Planning and Design Q180.55.M4 L43 2013, a nasty section on its own because of the decimal (there happens to be several books bearing 180.5) and because there are several “M” cutters that tend to confuse the eye.

So an important lesson and Cardinal Rule #1: Always check behind the books on the shelf of which you are learning.

Happy Searching! J

The Miss-shelving Book Hider

Recently, while searching, I have encountered on several occasions books from 2 or 3 rows over crammed at the end of a shelf of books.  Also, on a shelf where the book end was slipping and some of the books leaning over, someone decided to cram a book (again 2 rows off where it should have been) in the little gap between the remaining upright books and the leaning ones. 

I’m unsure of who is doing this other than it is good practice for everyone who searches for missing items to occasionally look at the end of every shelf on every row as well as browse the books you pass by as you walk down the row.  Recently, I have found several miss-shelved items this way and on the rare occasion one that I had been looking for several months.  The most recent subjects this seems to be a reoccurring theme are all the G-GV’s, N’s, PN’s, PR , and PS.

Keep your eyes peeled and look out for books on the end of the shelves as well as the random miss-shelved ones in the middle of the shelf.

Happy Searching! J

The "ff" at the beginning…

This weekend as I was searching for another book on the 9^th floor, I searched in the oversized collection (anything above 28 inches in dimension for our library) for that floor's call number range.  I found something rather odd, a ffN shelved at the very end for the collection, which is A, B, and C’s.

So I got to thinking about why there was an oversized N on the 9^th floor with the A,B,C’s and the only think I could think of was someone got confused by the ff at the beginning of the call number, or maybe they thought that all ff’s were shelved together.

Certainly a first for me!  Usually when ff’s go missing they are usually shelved as if they were a regular sized book (imagine all of the creative placements for attempting to put an oversized book on a teeny, tiny shelf!), or since people get confused with E’s and F’s too, they find themselves with the F’s as well as in the F’s ffs (say that 10 times fast!).

If you receive a request for an ff, not only should you look in the f’s (over-folio, the big, BIG stuff over 40 inches for our library) as well as the regular sized book as if the patron disregarded the ff, but also on every other floor in their ff section.  This may sound tedious, but you never know where ff books might pop up...or miss-shelved rather.

Happy Searching!

Thesis/Dissertation Search Tutorial

Frequently, I receive search requests from Interlibrary Loan (ILL) to look for theses/dissertations and usually they are really out of place.

Here is a guide on how to search for theses/dissertations:

In our library, they are cataloged under the AS call number range, more specifically as AS36 .N64 if it is a dissertation, AS36 .N65 if it is a thesis.  Underneath this call number, there will be the academic department in an abbreviated form (i.e. Hist for History, Educ. for Education, and so on), and then there will be a year (i.e. 12 for 2012) and then a dash and another number denoting the number order it issued especially if there are multiple theses/dissertations awarded for a particular year.  The completed call number might look like this: AS36 .N64 Music 06-05 (only vertically of course and on the spine of the book).  On the top of the spine, there should be the student’s last name, although this may vary on binding practices over the years as well as if they had to obtain another copy because it went missing or was lost/stolen.

Seems fairly easy to shelve right?  Well, wrong on you for thinking that because there is a multitude of ways that it could be miss-shelved.  See below for a list of common miss-shelving mistakes rating for the most-likely to the rarer:

      1.   Theses are shelved with the dissertations and vice versa.  As if the color isn’t a key indicator (theses are usually green and dissertations black), I guess the 5 can become a 4 in some folks’ minds.

      2.  Sometimes they are shelved at the beginning of the dissertations because folks are just confused on how to shelve them or patrons are trying to help out by reshelving them.

      3.  If it is an oversized one (they are all shelved together not in the ff’s), they will most likely be miss-shelved lying flat on the shelf.

      4.  The years and order number at the bottom of the call number confuses everyone. Today I found one that was at the beginning of the Music range rather than toward the end where it ought to have been.  Call number: AS36 .N64 Music 06-05 and a bunch of others were crammed at the beginning, which happens to be in the 1970s if I remember correctly.

      5.  Education theses/dissertations frequently find themselves shelved with the English and vice versa.  Why? Well…I have no idea, same with the P.E. and the Psychology and the Political Science ones; along with the HHP, Hist. and the H.Ec’s.  Maybe the same beginning letter messes with folks’ heads.

      6.   Of course they might be randomly shelved within the theses/dissertations (usually numerically correct with the year published), so if all else fails, shelf-read, or at least look for your missing thesis/dissertation by the last name.

Thus, ends the tutorial of searching for theses/dissertations.  I hope this helps in looking for them and I haven’t left anyone completely confused and lost.

Happy Hunting!

The Next Shelf Over

Frequently books are found on a shelf above, below, to the left, or the right of where it ought to be.  These books sometimes are shelved right by the cutter, but wrong by the number and the call number initial letter.

Such is the case for the books listed below:

PN2286 .B67 1986 shelved as PN2287 .B67 1986 right next to a PN2287 .B6

GT4965 .G35 2002 shelved as GT4935 .G35 2002 right next to a GT4935 .G53 (oddly enough).

Happy Searching!

E’s and Decimals

Another heavily used part of our collection is the E185s, otherwise known as African American history and boy are there a lot of them!  They range from 185-185.98 and beyond. 

Common miss-shelving errors in this section can be found in the E184s, or immigration history as well as a lot of decimal errors such as E185.615 can often be found with the E185.61, E185.86, or E185.68 for example.

Other less common errors are once again the cutter confusion and letter miss-reads within the cutters and rest of the call number.  One from last week that one of my students found, was E185.86 .C58214 1998 found shelved as E185.68 .B58214 1998. 

One time I found one with both a decimal miss-shelve as well as a letter mix up within the cutter as well so it was a combo doozy of a find!

A best search analysis since these can be found anywhere within this call number range, which in our library takes up about a row and a half, is shelf-reading.  I know it’s not everyone’s favorite, but it can be anywhere within this range.

Good luck and happy searching!