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Consistency versus Inconsistency: Issues in Chinese

Cataloging in OCLC
a
Yue Li
a
University of Florida , P.O. Box 117001, Gainesville , FL , 32611 E-mail:
Published online: 24 Oct 2008.

To cite this article: Yue Li (2004) Consistency versus Inconsistency: Issues in Chinese Cataloging in OCLC, Cataloging &
Classification Quarterly, 38:2, 17-31, DOI: 10.1300/J104v38n02_04

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1300/J104v38n02_04

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 Consistency versus Inconsistency:
Issues in Chinese Cataloging
in OCLC
Yue Li
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ABSTRACT. This article addresses some unresolved cataloging issues

related to pinyin romanization, vernacular application, field coding,
and other aspects of Chinese cataloging in OCLC. These issues lead to
inconsistencies in the way Chinese materials are cataloged, though
cataloging standards and romanization rules are made and the processes
of the projects like Pinyin Conversion, Manual Review, and Pinyin Clean-
Up have been completed. In this article, eight of the most commonly
encountered issues and inconsistent practices in Chinese cataloging are
discussed. Examples from Chinese records created with OCLC CJK soft-
ware in WorldCat are used to demonstrate the problems they raise.
With the discussion, it is hoped that these inconsistent practices can be
recognized and avoided in the future. [Article copies available for a fee
from The Haworth Document Delivery Service: 1-800-HAWORTH. E-mail ad-
dress: <docdelivery@haworthpress.com> Website: <http://www.HaworthPress.
com> © 2004 by The Haworth Press, Inc. All rights reserved.]

KEYWORDS. OCLC CJK, romanization, pinyin, pinyin conversion,

Chinese vernacular, inconsistency

Yue Li, MLS, MA, is Assistant Librarian, George A. Smathers Libraries, P.O.
Box 117001, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL 32611 (E-mail: yueli@mail.
uflib.ufl.edu).
The author wishes to thank John Van Hook and Gerald Langford for reading a
draft of this article and Betsy Simpson and Tatiana Barr for their helpful comments.
Cataloging Classification Quarterly, Vol. 38(2) 2004
http://www.haworthpress.com/web/CCQ
 2004 by The Haworth Press, Inc. All rights reserved.
Digital Object Identifier: 10.1300/J104v38n02_04 17
 18 CATALOGING & CLASSIFICATION QUARTERLY

INTRODUCTION

The creation of OCLC CJK Cataloging in 1987 has been a historic

achievement for the Online Computer Library Center (OCLC). This Windows-
based cooperative online cataloging system allows librarians to catalog
Chinese, Japanese, and Korean materials while applying both romanization
and vernacular scripts to the bibliographic records. Furthermore, OCLC CJK
Users Group was officially established at an organizational meeting held on
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April 10, 1991 in New Orleans, Louisiana. The group members now come not
only from North America but also from Australia, Mainland China, Taiwan,
Hong Kong, and many other countries and regions. After years of effort by the
Library of Congress, OCLC, and OCLC CJK Users Group, OLCC CJK
Cataloging is better serving a wide range of users all over the world and
playing an important role in information globalization.
Chinese cataloging is one of the major components of the OCLC CJK initia-
tive. In October 2000, the Library of Congress, OCLC and the Research Librar-
ies Information Network (RLIN) joined efforts to convert Chinese vernacular
romanization from Wade-Giles romanization to pinyin romanization in order to
conform to Chinese language transliteration practices in most parts of the world
and assure greater consistency. Chinese catalogers have received trainings and
they are equipped to create records using AACR2, the LCRIs, and the LC Pinyin
Romanization Guideline. Chinese cataloging in OCLC CJK is getting more and
more standardized and upgraded as a result. Up to now, there have been many
publications about the Library of Congress pinyin rules and various pinyin proj-
ects to upgrade bibliographic records, the national name and subject authority
files. However, there are very few publications focusing on some specific unre-
solved issues related to pinyin romanization, vernacular application, field coding,
and other aspects of Chinese records in OCLC. These issues often lead to incon-
sistencies in cataloging Chinese materials, though the projects like Pinyin Con-
version, Manual Review, and Pinyin Clean-up have been completed. In this
article, eight most commonly encountered issues and inconsistent practices in
Chinese cataloging in OCLC CJK are discussed. Examples from Chinese rec-
ords in WorldCat are used to demonstrate the problems they raise. After the dis-
cussion, it is hoped that these inconsistent practices can be recognized and
avoided in the future.

ISSUE ONE:
INCONSISTENCY IN ROMANIZING CHINESE VERNACULAR

On October 1, 2000, known as DAY 1, the Library of Congress, OCLC,

and RLIN all formally converted their bibliographic records, as well as name
 Yue Li 19

and series authorities from Wade-Giles romanization to pinyin. In October

2001, OCLC completed its conversion of non-Chinese bibliographic files
and in December 2001, the Library of Congress and NACO libraries finished
the cleaning up of undifferentiated personal name authority records. (1)
However, there are still inconsistencies in the romanization of Chinese ver-
nacular when cataloging Chinese materials.
Romanizing the Chinese vernacular “⇥೑” provides a typical example.
The Republic of China, Zhonghua Minguo (Ёढ⇥೑), is often abbreviated
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and romanized as “Minguo” (⇥೑). In the Chinese Rules of Application

Romanization 1. ALA-LC Romanization, (2) “⇥೑” was correctly changed
to the Romanization, “Minguo” not long ago. According to the latest infor-
mation from Cathy Yang, Pinyin Coordinator for NACO, the Library of
Congress cooperative for names and series authorities, the legitimate ro-
manization of “⇥೑” should be “Minguo.” (3) However, in the “Library of
Congress Pinyin Conversion Project, New Chinese Romanization Guide-
lines,” (4) “⇥೑” is still romanized as “Min guo” with a space between
“Min” and “guo.” Both the “Chinese Rules of Application Romanization 1.
ALA-LC Romanization” and “the Library of Congress Pinyin Conversion
Project, New Chinese Romanization Guidelines” are authoritative guidelines
for librarians and users to follow; nevertheless, there is obvious inconsis-
tency in the two documents.
The search of “Minguo” in OCLC CJK by Chinese vernacular title “vt ⇥
೑” on January 25, 2003 for only the records from 1998 to 2002 revealed
overwhelming prevalence of inconsistency in actual practice (Table 1).
It turns out that the most recent authoritative and correct romanization
“Minguo” makes up only 8.43 percent of the 415 titles, while the inappropri-
ate romanizations, “Min guo, Min’guo, Min kuo” make up more than 90 per-
cent of the total titles. Furthermore, various romanazations of “⇥೑” are also
found in 260 publication fields as well as other fields, for example:
# 44470407 260 [Taibei Shi: $b Zhonghua min'guo qiao wu wei yuan hui yin xing,

$c 1989.

#13364665 260 Taibei : $b Lian he bao she : $b Zong jing xiao Lian jing chu ban

shi ye gong si, $c min guo 69 [1980]

#25471437 260 [Taipei] : $b Zhonghua min guo qiao wu wei yuan hui, $c Min

guo 80 [1991]

#27535531 710 2 Chung-hua min kuo guan guang ju.

 20 CATALOGING & CLASSIFICATION QUARTERLY

TABLE 1. Search Results by Title “vt ⇥೑” in OCLC CJK from 1998-2001

Year Titles Rom. 1 Rom. 2 Rom. 3 Rom. 4

1998 (1) 99 2 Minguo 95 Min guo 2 Min’guo
1998 (2) 46 1 Minguo 45 Min guo
1999 97 8 Minguo 86 Min guo 1 Min’guo 2 Min kuo
2000 (1) 99 2 Minguo 97 Min guo
2000 (2) 18 0 Minguo 8 Min guo
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2001-02 56 22 Minguo 34 Min guo

Total: 415 35 ( 8.43 %) 365 ( 90.36 %) 3 (0.7 %) 2 (0.48 %)

Note: Rom. = romanization

Such inconsistency or the various romanization of “⇥೑” can sometimes

be found in articles on Chinese cataloging in the library literature. For exam-
ple, in the article, “Chinese Serials: History, Characteristics and Cataloging
Considerations,” published in Cataloging & Classification Quarterly, volume
36, number 1 (2003), page 47, “⇥೑” was still romanized as “Min guo.”
Different romanizations of Chinese characters result in different access
points and greatly affect information retrieval results. It may lead to confu-
sion for both users and librarians. What is more, it is not convenient for the
users and librarians concerned to try all these variants in order to do their
research, study, and work. Therefore, it is necessary and urgent to restate the
guidelines, build a consensus among the librarians concerned both in public
and technical services, unify the practice at least in North America, and ex-
tend the rules and consistent practice to the other parts of the world.
One remaining question is how to accommodate the non-standard romani-
zations actually used for titles, publishers’ names, corporate bodies, etc., in
Chinese materials. No doubt the Library of Congress, RLIN, and OCLC will
find this a long and arduous process. The longer such a situation is put off,
the more difficult it is to change the inconsistent romanizations in the records
being used and still produced today.

ISSUE TWO:
INCOMPATIBLE SPACING IN PINYIN AND VERNACULAR FIELDS

With the rapid development of information technology, especially the

implementation of Unicode, more and more libraries and institutions have
the capability of searching and displaying Chinese, Japanese, and Korean
 Yue Li 21

vernacular scripts. The vernacular search and display provide faster and more
precise information retrieval and more accurate access points for both the
users and the librarians since one romanization will usually correspond to
many characters. For example, a search on pinyin “da” in OCLC CJK brings
out 28 characters and another search on “yi” brings out as many as 231 char-
acters. Furthermore, cataloging with vernacular characters greatly promotes
the globalization of information as well and better serves a wider range of
information seekers, both in North America and other parts of the world.
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Therefore, CJK catalogers are encouraged to catalog CJK materials with ver-
nacular characters in order to assist more effective and user-friendly retrieval.
For pinyin romanization, the guideline is to “separate the romanization of each
Chinese character with a space. This includes corporate names, terms of ad-
dress, and titles of royalty, separation of syllables of general, non-specific
geographic terms,” (2) although there was once a heated debate and dis-
agreement on this decision among the East Asian Studies community in
North America. Nevertheless, this guideline has been passed and imple-
mented.
Nonetheless, there remains the issue of whether aggregation or the logic
group is needed to facilitate better understanding of the information in Chi-
nese vernacular. Clearly, vernacular aggregation has had its own advantages
in that it makes it easier for readers to read and understand. Sometimes, read-
ing Chinese characters without spaces can be confusing, especially for the
classic Chinese literature, where distracting ambiguities occur when there are
no vernacular separations and appropriate punctuation as indicated in the
following example:

1. No spacing or logic group: “ ϟ䲼໽⬭ᅶ໽⬭៥ϡ⬭”

2. First spacing or logic group: “ϟ䲼໽ ⬭ᅶ໽ ⬭៥ϡ⬭”

3. Second spacing or logic group: “ϟ䲼 ໽⬭ᅶ ໽⬭ ៥ϡ⬭”

1. With no spacing or logic group, it is very difficult to figure out the

exact meaning of this sentence.
2. With first spacing or logic group, the sentence could be understood
as: “It is raining, the weather would let guests stay, will you let me
stay or not?”
3. With the second spacing or logic group, the sentence could be un-
derstood as: “It is raining, the weather does allow guests to stay; but
I will not.”
 22 CATALOGING & CLASSIFICATION QUARTERLY

Although different spacing here leads to completely different meaning for

the same sentence, few such ambiguities remain in modern Chinese. Thus,
there is no space necessary to separate vernacular for the modern Chinese
because appropriate punctuation helps readers to pause at different meaning
groups to understand. In cataloging Chinese materials, the consistent practice
is to put the Chinese characters together without any spacing or aggregation
like: ໪᭛ߎ⠜⼒ ᄭЁቅ Ё೑᭛࣪໻䴽ੑ᭛ᑧ, etc. However, Chinese
characters are often separated with spaces or aggregation in Chinese records
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in OCLC like,

໪᭛ ߎ⠜⼒ ᄭ Ёቅ Ё೑ ᭛࣪໻䴽ੑ ᭛ᑧ.

Take the following as another example:

#48231969:

245 00 Zhongguo yin yue wen hua da guan / $c Jing Jing, Guan Jianhua, Qing

Rong zhu bian.

245 00 Ё೑ ䷇Ф ᭛࣪ ໻㾖 / $c ᇚ 㦕䯸 ㅵ ᓎढ䯸 䪅 㤌 Џ㓪DŽ

The consistent and common practice is without any space between characters:

245 00 Ё೑䷇Ф᭛࣪໻㾖 / $c ᇚ㦕, ㅵᓎढ, 䪅㤌Џ㓪DŽ

Some records even use wrong and inappropriate aggregation, which causes
more confusion and inconsistency in practice. For example:

#46859171

710 2 Shichua Sheng she hui ke xue yuan.

710 2 ಯᎱⳕ ⼒Ӯ⾥ ᄺ䰶.

The correct aggregation is: 710 2 ಯᎱⳕ ⼒Ӯ ⾥ᄺ䰶.

The consistent and correct practice should be: 710 2 ಯᎱⳕ⼒Ӯ⾥ᄺ䰶.

Furthermore, such kind of inconsistency is also found within one record

where Chinese characters appear both with and without spaces:
 Yue Li 23

# 46859171

260 Beijing: $b Ren min chu ban she : $b Xin hua shu dian jing xiao, $c 1999.

260 ࣫Ҁ: $b Ҏ⇥ ߎ⠜⼒ : $b ᮄढкᑫ㒣䫔, $c 1999.

The consistent and correct practice should be:

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260 ࣫Ҁ : $b Ҏ⇥ߎ⠜⼒ : $b ᮄढкᑫ㒣䫔, $c 1999.

This issue is not a serious problem, yet it still contributes to inconsistency

in recording Chinese vernacular in bibliographic records and needs a unified
practice. By the way, there are some mistakes in romanizing the Chinese
characters in the examples and they are not corrected in this article.

ISSUE THREE: LACK OF CULTURAL KNOWLEDGE

While cataloging Chinese materials, some problems can be prevented by

reference to Chinese culture, history, and geography. For example, places of
publication and the pronunciation of authors’ names are sometimes incor-
rectly recorded due to lack of background knowledge. Take the following
record as an example:

# 44721513

020 7810580590

100 1 ∾Б♢.

245 10 Han yu xie zuo / $c Wang Liyan zhu.

245 10 ∝䇁‫ݭ‬԰ / $c ∾Б♢㨫.

260 Beijing : $b Shanghai da xue chu ban she, $c 1998.

260 ࣫Ҁ : $b Ϟ⍋໻ᄺߎ⠜⼒, $c 1998.

It can be seen that this book is published by “Shanghai da xue chu ban
she” (Shanghai University Press), which is not in Beijing. Common sense
should have told the cataloger that the field 260 had to be in error. If in
doubt, some research or inquiry should be done before the information is
used in a record. Look at another example:
 24 CATALOGING & CLASSIFICATION QUARTERLY

#41342142

020 7224046787 (pbk.) : $c $40.00 (2 vol. set)

245 00 Feng jing xiao shu / $c Jia ping'ao zhu bian.

245 00 亢ᚙᇣ䇈 / $c 䌒ᑇߍ Џ㓪.

246 1 $i PINYIN: $a Feng Qing xiao shu

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260 Xi'an : $b Shan xi ren min chu ban she, $c 1998.

260 㽓ᅝ : $b 䰱㽓Ҏ⇥ߎ⠜⼒, $c 1998.

700 1 Jia, Ping'ao.

700 1 䌒ᑇߍ.

Many Chinese characters can have more than one pronunciation; “ߍ” is
one of them, which can be pronounced as “ao” and “wa.” It is difficult to get it
right just by looking up the character in a dictionary; for example, “䌒ᑇߍ” is
a very famous contemporary novelist in mainland China. The character “ߍ”
here is pronounced as “wa” rather than “ao.” It is pronounced the same as
“⌐” and it is often used as a place name. (5) By the way, mistakes of roman-
izing Chinese characters in the example is not corrected in this article. Cata-
logers should have access to authority files, which can help eliminate such
errors. When a bibliographical record is created before the author’s authority
record is established, knowledge of Chinese culture, literature, history, and
geography is essential to avoid making such mistakes.

ISSUE FOUR:
U.S. DOLLARS vs. CHINESE YUAN IN FIELD 020

Another commonly seen inconsistency involves an item’s price, which is

coded in subfield “c” in field 020. An inconsistency usually emerges when
the price of an item in Chinese Ren Min Bi Yuan (RMBY) is miscoded as
U.S. dollars. Look at the following example:

# 41342142 020 7224046787 (pbk.) : $c $40.00 (2 vol. set)

According to the volume itself, its true price is 40.00 Chinese Ren Min Bi
Yuan. The Library of Congress practice should be:
 Yue Li 25

# 41342142 020 7224046787 (pbk) : $c RMBY40.00 (2 vol. set)

Another commonly seen dilemma is whether the recorded price should be

based on the price calculated by the exchange rate from Chinese currency
into U.S. dollars, the real purchase price of U.S. dollars, or other prices. For
example:

#51332570 020 060157722 (pbk) : $c $15.00

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According to the book in hand, the price of this book is 30.00 Chinese
Ren Min Bi Yuan and the price of 15 dollars could not be found anywhere in
the book. This coding does not agree with the Library of Congress practice
rule either.

ISSUE FIVE: INCORRECT LANGUAGE CODE IN FIELD 041

Issue five relates to a technical inconsistency in recording language codes

as applied in Chinese records. Recently, the University of Florida obtained a
set of books with the series title: Jing dian de hui sheng (Echo of classics, 㒣
‫ⱘ݌‬ಲໄ). This series offers dual language versions of classics and it was
published by Beijing Foreign Languages Press. A search of this series in
OCLC on Jan. 25, 2003 retrieved twenty-eight titles. It turns out that there
are six different ways that the series’ dual-language status is recorded:

1. 041 0 engchi $h eng 1

2. 041 1 chieng $h chi 13

3. 041 0 chi $h eng 2

4. 041 0 chieng 9

5 041 0 chi $h chi 1

6. No 041 but with 500 note “Text in Chinese and English” 2

First of all, the books in this series were published in Chinese before. Re-
cently, these works were republished in Chinese with English translation, so
the first indicator will be “1” (“Item is or includes a translation”). This series
contains both Chinese and the English translation; therefore, subfield “a” will
be “chieng.” Also, the original language is Chinese; therefore, subfield “h”
will be “chi” (“Language code of original and/or intermediate translations of
text”). (6) Thus, number two is the correct recording.
 26 CATALOGING & CLASSIFICATION QUARTERLY

Some items are originally published as the bilingual text and the typo-
graphical predominance on the title page is often reflected in the record. In
this case, the readership of the item should govern what the fixed field cod-
ing should be, “eng” or “chi,” and the 041 coding: 041 0 $a engchi. Catalog-
ers should be very careful in applying the correct coding in the future.

ISSUE SIX:
FAULTY INPUT OF CHINESE LANGUAGE SCRIPTS
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Generally speaking, there are two ways of writing Chinese vernacular: the
traditional form and the simplified form. When catalogers create Chinese
records with vernacular, they are required to record exactly what they see
from the item in hand. If the item uses traditional form, it should be recorded
with traditional form, and if the material adopts the simplified form, the sim-
plified one should be used. If there is a combination of both traditional and
simplified forms, catalogers should record them exactly the way the vernacu-
lar appears in the item. AACR2 does not allow catalogers to use either form
at will. Chinese catalogers familiar with the traditional form need to get used
to the simplified one, while those who are not familiar with the traditional
one need to study it as well. The following records, which have violated
these guidelines, are examples frequently encountered in OCLC CJK Cata-
loging:
# 50691433

245 00 Taiwan xin wen xue si chao shi gang / $c zhu bian L㫞u Zhenghui, Zhao Xiaqiu.

245 00 ৄ⑒ᮄ᭛ᄺᗱ╂৆㒆 / $c Џ㓪৩ℷᚴ䍉䘤⾟.

260 Beijing : $b Kun lun chu ban she, $c 2002.

260 ࣫Ҁ : $b ዥይߎ⠜⼒, $c 2002.

A check of the book shows that the publisher used the simplified Chinese
vernacular for “kun lun” and therefore it is inappropriate to record the pub-
lisher by using the traditional form in field 260. The correct recording of the
publisher should be in the simplified form:

260 ࣫Ҁ : $b ᯚҥߎ⠜⼒, $c 2002.

In the next example, the original book used mixed forms with traditional and
simplified forms, the record, however, encoded all in the simplified form:
 Yue Li 27

#48625003

245 00 Kong xue shu hua.

245 00 ᄨᄺк⬏.

710 2 Zhongguo Kong xue hui.

710 2 Ё೑ᄨᄺӮ.
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The correct reading is:

245 00 Kong xue shu hua.

245 00 ᄨᄺ᳌⬿.

On Monday, May 5th, 2003, the first LC authority record with Chinese
vernacular was posted to the Council of East Asian Libraries (CEAL)
listserv. The record, the first LC authority record created using HKCAN as a
source, was created on February 3, 2003 and was acknowledged by the Li-
brary of Congress. (7) The problem mentioned above also exists in this rec-
ord, which used traditional vernacular form for the simplified one in the
original. Therefore, there still seems no consensus on this issue now even in
the very high level of administration concerned.

ISSUE SEVEN:
TRANSLATION OF NON-CHINESE CHARACTERS
IN THE PARALLEL DESCRIPTION FIELDS

Currently, more and more Chinese records for different materials and in
different formats contain Chinese translations of English data, such as the
GMDs “electronic resource” and “videorecording,” in 880 parallel vernacu-
lar data fields. For example:
#50857336

245 00 Ce kong ji shu $h [electronic resource]

245 00 ␀᥻ᡔ㸧 $h [䳏ᄤ䊛⑤]

#47774066
245 00 Fa xian cao yuan $h [videorecording] : $b Chengjisihan jue qi de mi mi /
$c dao yan Han Yali.

245 00 ⱐ⧒㤝ॳ $h [䣘‫ڣ‬䊛⑤] : $b ៤ঢ়ᗱ∫ዯ䍋ⱘ⾬ᆚ / $c ᇢⓨ䶧䲙呫.

 28 CATALOGING & CLASSIFICATION QUARTERLY

This issue also crosses up in the field 310 (serials frequency) and in many
sorts of 5xx notes, such as those beginning with “Sponsored by.” MARC21
specifies that field 880 contain “the fully content-designated representation,
in a different script, of another field in the same record. In other words, 880
should be the same words in a different script.” (8) There is no provision for
translating data from a corresponding field into field 880. Chinese vernacular
characters ought to be present only to represent corresponding romanized
Chinese words, and those characters are mostly data transcribed from the
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item itself. “The perspective of OCLC quality control staff is that translating
data in field 880 is incorrect and results in a record which is a hybrid of two
languages of cataloging.” (9) Therefore, it is not acceptable to translate the
data in field 880. This issue was strongly restated recently in the letter to
OCLC CJK Users Group listserv by Hisako Kotaka, OCLC Senior Product
Manager: “OCLC prohibits users to create hybrid CJK records in WorldCat
by linking the English version notes to CJK vernacular script notes.” (10)

ISSUE EIGHT:
LACK OF TIMELY MAINTENANCE BY MEMBER LIBRARIES

As OCLC CJK contributors, librarians have been doing a great job over
all in cataloging as carefully as possible to guarantee the accuracy of infor-
mation and quality of the records. However, it is very difficult to reach the
goal of being one hundred percent correct. This raises the issue of maintain-
ing the high quality of the OCLC database. Many libraries, institutions, and
users may use the records in the OCLC database. They all should feel
obliged to promote the accuracy and safeguard the quality of the Chinese
records, not only the creators of the original records but everyone who uses
the database subsequently. Every use of a record should be regarded as a
good opportunity for review of the record. Whenever and wherever problems
or mistakes are found, they should be corrected or reported. Look at the fol-
lowing record:

020 7532607410

090 DS734 $b .L395 2001

049 FUGG

245 00 Li dai ming ren bing cheng ci dian / $c [bian zhu zhe Long Qian'an,

Li Xiaosong, Huang Hun].

 Yue Li 29

245 00 ग़ҷৡҎᑊ⿄䕲‫ ݌‬/ $c [㓪㨫㗙 啭┯ᒉ, ᴢᇣᵒ咗ᯣ]

250 Di 1 ban.

250 ㄀ 1 ⠜.

260 Shanghai : $b Shanghai ci shu chu ban she, $c 2001.

260 Ϟ⍋ : $b Ϟ⍋䕲кߎ⠜⼒, ßc 2001.

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500 Includes index.

651 0 China $x Biography $v Dictionaries $x Chinese.

700 1 Long, Qian'an.

700 1 啭┯ᒉ.

700 1 Li, Xiaosong.

700 1 ᴢᇣᵒ.

700 1 Huang, Hun.

700 1 咗ᯣ.

987 PINYIN $b OU $d c

This record was created and updated holdings in OCLC CJK on May 15,
2002 and its physical description field 300 was missing. Later, twelve librar-
ies or institutions copied this record and added it to their own local catalogs
without reporting the error or doing any correction on the record. At least
some of the libraries noticed the missing 300 field because it was added in
their own OPAC. It was not until April 7, 2003 that the Hong Kong Univer-
sity of Science and Technology (HNK) corrected the record. The need for
record maintenance cannot be emphasized enough within the OCLC CJK
Users Group as well as to the catalogers using RLIN and the Library of Con-
gress catalog.

CONCLUSION

According to the latest information from OCLC Senior Product Manager

Hisako Kotaka, there are 150 users in 12 countries using the OCLC CJK in-
terface. There are currently 2,523,232 CJK records in WorldCat, of which
 30 CATALOGING & CLASSIFICATION QUARTERLY

1,067,770 are Chinese records. This number is increasing every day. (11) As
can be seen, Chinese records make up almost half of the CJK records in
WorldCat and serve users all over the world. This article has addressed eight
issues that related to pinyin romanization, to the process of pinyin conversion,
and to other aspects of Chinese cataloging in OCLC CJK. The romanization of
“⇥೑” is a typical example of the problem related to the romanization and
conversion of personal names, place names, corporate bodies, and other entities.
In this case, it would be desirable for the Library of Congress to correct the
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romanization of “Minguo” in the “Library of Congress Pinyin Conversion

Project, New Chinese Romanization Guidelines” as soon as possible. The
good news is that after intensive discussions with the OCLC Post-Pinyin
Conversion Cleanup Project team leaders and advisors, Hisako Kotaka will
request that OCLC quality control staff scan Chinese records for “Minguo”
variants and use macro application to convert them to the correct form. (12)
The other seven issues are related to very common inconsistent practices
in cataloging of Chinese materials in OCLC CJK Cataloging. It is hoped that
this article will be helpful by raising these issues and emphasizing cataloging
standards, rules, and the related guidelines among the Chinese catalogers and
librarians. The development of programs addressing cataloging Chinese ma-
terials by the Association for Library Collections and Technical Services,
Cataloging and Classification Section: Asian and African Materials, OCLC
CJK Users Group, and the Council on East Asian Libraries would be most
useful in this regard. Such programs would help the catalogers and other li-
brarians to recognize the problems and mistakes, and reach consensus with
the rules and standards so as to achieve greater consistency in the cataloging
of Chinese materials.

Received: July, 2003

Revised: January, 2004
Accepted: January, 2004

REFERENCES
1. The Library of Congress, “OCLC, RLIN. Pinyin Conversion Project” http://
www.loc.gov/catdir/pinyin/timeline.html (June 2, 2003).
2. The Library of Congress, “ALA-LC Romanization Tables” http://www.
loc.gov/catdir/cpso/romanization/chinese.pdf (June 2, 2003).
3. Cathy Yang. “Cataloging Tips on Pinyin,” The eastlib mailing list of the Coun-
cil on East Asian Libraries (May 28, 2002).
4. The Library of Congress. “The Library of Congress Pinyin Conversion Project,
New Chinese Romanization Guidelines” http://www.loc.gov/catdir/pinyin/romcover.
html (Jan. 7, 2004).
 Yue Li 31

5. Ci Hai Bian Ji Wei Yuan Hui. “Ci hai,” Shanghai: Shanghai ci shu chu ban she,
1999.
6. Online Computer Library Center. “OCLC Bibliographic Formats and Stan-
dards” http://www.oclc.org/bibformats/en,/ (June 2, 2003).
7. Lydia C. Hsieh. “First LC Authority Record Created Using HKCAN as a
Source” The eastlib mailing list of the Council on East Asian Libraries, sent by
Abraham Yu (May 05, 2003).
8. The Library of Congress. “MARC 21 Concise Bibliographic: Holdings, Location,
Alternate Graphics, etc. Fields (841-88X),” http://www.loc.gov/marc/bibliographic/
ecbdhold.html#mrcb880 (June 2, 2003).
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9. Robert Bremer. “Translation of Romanized Data,” CONSRLST@sun8.LOC.

GOV ( March 4, 2003).
10. Hisko Kotaka. “No hybrid record as parallel record, please,” OCLC-CJK@
OCLC.ORG ( Dec. 15, 2003).
11. Hisko Kotaka. “OCLC CJK Users Group Update,” The Council on East Asian
Libraries OCLC Users Discussion Group Meeting, Flushing Library, New York
(March 28, 2003).
12. Hisako Kotaka. “Request for Conversion of ‘Minguo,’” The eastlib mailing list
of the Council on East Asian Libraries (Nov. 18, 2003).