Authority

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Martin Sigaard | October 12, 2005 3:45 AM

I could not have said it better. But then again, I'm a librarian struggling with no-service search engines replacing multi-field databases, pre-prints and homemade online magazines replacing peer-reviewed articles in journal from physically verifiable publishers, and so on...
"Tagging" as you call it is probably yahoo for surfers, but for reference work it is worthless at best.
Looking forward to the hierarchy renaissance.

Peter Morville | October 12, 2005 11:06 AM

Not all librarians agree. Check out the reactions on LISNews...

http://geek.lisnews.com/article.pl?sid=05/10/12/0737258&tid=

...and the emerging thread on Web4Lib:

http://lists.webjunction.org/wjlists/web4lib/2005-October/038575.html

Grant Campbell | October 12, 2005 12:14 PM

Yes, this is an important, well-written and illuminating article. Not that you particularly need MY affirmation, Peter, but here it is, anyway: congratulations.

Since I'm not in the mood to field endless student inquiries about their essays, I'd like to tackle one issue that Peter addresses early on: the issue of authority. He states:

"In the good old days, not so long ago, in the context of the written word, authority was a term used primarily by librarians as a criteria of evaluation. Along with accuracy, objectivity, and currency, we judged source authority. Who is the author? Who is the publisher? What are their individual and institutional qualifications and reputations? Have the contents been edited and refereed? Is this an authoritative source?"

That's quite true. But it has also been used in another way, and the collision of these two meanings of "authority" goes, I think, to the core of the social software message.

Here's Lois Mai Chan's definition of a Name Authority Record in a library catalogue:

"A record that shows a personal, corporate or geographic heading in its established form, cites the authorities consulted in determining the choice of form of name, and indicates the references made to the heading."

Here's the DRA Authority Record for one of my icons, Bette Davis:

Heading:

* Davis, Bette, 1908-

Used for:

* Devis, Bett, 1908-
* Davis, Elisabeth Ruth, 1908-
* Davis, Ruth Elizabeth, 1908-

Source data found:

* Duke, V. Two's company.
* Champion, I. Bette Davis, c1986: t.p. (Bette Davis) cover flap (Elisabeth Ruth Davis) p. 5 (Ruth Elizabeth Davis)
* Stine, W. "I'd love to kiss you-- " c1990: CIP t.p. (Bette Davis) galley (d. 1989)

Notice something? According to the "authorized" heading, the old girl is still alive, still trashing her daughter, still griping about Joan Crawford, still smoking and drinking up a storm. The source data notes that she died in 1989.

But the heading still says, Davis, Bette, 1908- .

Why does this matter?
It doesn't.

Why doesn't it matter?
Because an authority file derives its value, not from being complete, but from being unique.

"Authority," in an authority file, means the FORM OF THE NAME THAT THE LIBRARY HAS DECIDED TO USE. There is no explicit obligation to libraries to answer for the accuracy, completeness, or appropriateness of the heading, as long as there are no other Bette Davises who could be confused with that heading.

There's nothing wrong with using authority files, or with calling them authority files. But let's be clear: "authority," in this case, does not mean "accuracy, objectivity and currency." It means uniqueness for the purposes of the information system. It does not mean "Davis, Bette, 1908- " is the best, most intuitive, most accurate, most complete representation of that entity who once cried "What a dump!" It simply means that "Davis, Bette, 1908- " is the name we've decided to call that entity, and whether that's her real name or not, whether she's dead or not, whether or not she was really James Cagney in a boustier, if you want to find her movies in our library, you'll have to use that name.

Every system, even the loosest system, has rules, and if you want to use the system, you have to play by the rules. But not every system calls its disambiguation rules "authority," while at the same time trumpeting the virtues of authority as the presence of accuracy, objectivity and currency.

I cheerfully use authority files, and I cheerfully teach my students how to make them and use them. Authority files fascinate me.

But I really can't blame the tagsonomists and folksonomists for saying "enough, already."

But enough, already. I've droned on longer than I intended.

aqotwf_emr | October 12, 2005 8:05 PM

This is a very interesting article for a person like myself, who had always considered the Encyclopaedia Britannica as an infalliable resource (to the publication time of the particular edition) and has been tackling categorisation/nomenclature at an near intrinsic level since discovering the social construct of classification.

I also happen to be one of Grant Campbell's students, and since I'm not in the mood to enter the concluding paragraph to his assigned essay (due tomorrow), I offer a reflection on "Authority in an authority file" - since I had to sit through the entire 150 minute lecture that included the "Bette Davis 1908-" allusion nearly word for word as transcribed here (and I believe I was the first to spot the actual death date in the source data).

We have learned (reluctantly) that 1908- does not matter in a heading, because "an authority file derives its value, not from being complete, but from being unique". In the case where authority records were being made for persons with the same names, for example, we generally could use the birth date of that inidivual as the "uniqueness tag", as odds are in favour of them having completely different birthdates. For us novice cataloguing students, this "unique" facet of an authority file can satisfy our end-user needs. However, what about authority outside the realm of the library - a realm such as this one, where I deliberately left my name off as an identifier for the purpose of creating this example.

The authority file is aqotwf_emr, and the source is all this text I have typed out.

aqotwf_emr is an adequate authority for a dispassionate statement posted on a site like this (except for Grant Campbell, who is probably wondering which of his graduate students had the nerve to post this), but suppose the situation was where I posted on a site associated with criminal activity, and the RCMP (another authority representation) needed a name for a warrant (leaving the possibility of tracking my IP out of the scenario). The authority file is simply aqotwf_emr, which is NOT as unique as one may think - this is derived partially from an email address, and at the time the account was established, the tag "aqotwf" had already around 8 or 9 subscribers, and to avoid being "aqotwf09", I added "_emr". The reason why this occurred is that the letters actually represent the title of an internationally-known novel, and presumably, the other subscribers out there had the same penchant for it when establishing their authority files.

aqotwf_emr is definitely unique in the sense that no one else has yet to use it, or if they have, the domain name after @ would differentiate it as such... but is such a moniker the best model for authority? This gives no indicator of the person behind the authorship, and thereby abdicates any responsibility on CONTENT. At the catologue level, this does not matter, because the purpose is to be able to look up aqotwf_emr in a database to find corresponding works, but I don't support this as an ideal in Real Life (excluding situations where altered authority is necessary in the face of a true imminent threat) as authority and responsibility go hand in hand. As a writer, who has had commentaries (often on controversial "hot topics") published in newspapers, it is my practice to sign my name in full - not because I want to flaunt adeptness in expression or be cited by someone else (if ever that were the privelage), but because I claim responsibility for the content I wrote - accolade and adversary alike. Nothing infuriates me more when I read a full-length letter to the editor and see it signed as Mr. and Mrs. [first and last name here], because unlike the torrent of multiple authored journal articles I read, I am quite certain that the majority of such letters are written only by the "Mr." or the "Mrs." and yoking the titles with AND does not split responsibility 50-50, but rather nearly eliminates it entirely.

How far should we carry a construct of authority in practice? Should we have a single representation that emcompasses theory and practice, or does every situation require a different set of authority principles?

That being said, and since I have mentioned my own philosophy of responsibility, I will reveal my real name on this forum on October 14th, 2005... unless Grant Campbell has been able to deduce which student I am, in which case he can post it.

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