Principle Issues: Catalog Paradigms, Old and New

Recent attempts to assess the adequacy of AACR as a descriptive cataloging code for the online environment have focused attention on cataloging principles. This paper looks at some old and new attempts to isolate the fundamental principles underlying AACR. It considers catalog objectives, principles, and rules and looks at how these relate to one another. It analyzes the relationship of these principles and rules to the final product, the library catalog, pointing out differences (in this regard) between catalogs that are paper-based and those that are electronic. Finally, it comments on the present effort of the Joint Steering Committee for Revision of AACR to formulate a statement of principles to be included in a new introduction to AACR. [Article copies available for a fee from The Haworth Document Delivery Service: 1-800-HAWORTH. E-mail address: Website: © 2002 by The Haworth Press, Inc. All rights reserved.]