Page 106 - Cataloging and Classification for Library Technicians, 2nd Edition

92 Cataloging and Classification for Library Technicians
The Li brary of Con gress Clas si fi ca tion (LCC) sys tem di vides knowl-
edge into twenty-one broad cat egories, us ing a let ter to rep resent each
subject field. The letters I, O, W, X, and Y are ex cluded. See Fig ure
6.6 for the out line of the schedules.
The Li brary of Con gress Clas sification sys tem is used much the
same way as the Dewey system, ex cept that let ters are substituted for
numbers to de note the par ticular sub ject field. To pro vide for ex pan-
sion, dou ble or tri ple let ters, when nec essary, are used for sub classes.
The let ter no tation along with a numerical value completes the LC
clas si fi ca tion num ber. On some oc ca sions, an other let ter-num ber com-
bination is nec essary to de scribe pre cisely the sub ject mat ter. For ex-
ample, the LC classification num ber for the book Training for Non-
Trainers is HF5549.5.T7. The fol lowing break down shows what each
part or num ber rep resents:

H Social science
HF Commerce
HF5549 Personnel management
HF5549.5 Employment management. By topic, A-Z
HF5549.5.T7 Training of employee
Note that .T7 is part of the classification number, not an
author number or book number.
Each of the LC class sched ules is pub lished sep arately in pamphlet
for mat. The in di vid ual sub ject schemes are in de pend ently cre ated by
subject spe cialists in each field and there fore do not fall into a con sis-
tent pat tern. Since this sys tem was de vised orig inally by the Library
of Con gress to or ganize its own col lection, some sched ules are more
detailed than oth ers. When needed, each sched ule can be ex panded
easily by add ing num bers, dec imals, and letters to the main class,
and, in fact, this is done reg ularly by the Library of Con gress. Each
schedule has a dif ferent pub lication date, and the new re visions are
printed at dif fer ent in ter vals.
Each sched ule in cludes a syn opsis first, then the sched ule, and fi -
nally an in dex. Be cause there is no gen eral over all in dex, it is the re -
spon si bil ity of the clas si fier to choose the ap pro pri ate sched ule for
the sub ject matter in hand. To help find the most ap propriate sched -
ule, the LC Clas si fi ca tion Out line provides some gen eral help. The