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IN

PRACTICAL CLASSIFICATION

WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE

TO THE

DECIMAL AND SUBJECT SCHEMES

BY

W. C. BERWICK SAYERS

DEPUTY LIBRARIAN OF THE CROYDON

PUBLIC LIBRARIES; INSTRUCTOR
IN CLASSIFICATION TO THE
LIBRARY ASSOCIATION

THE LIBRARY ASSOCIATION

1913

THE following pages are reprinted with corrections from THE LIBRARY ASSOCIATION RECORD.

The literature of bibliographical classification, which can be said to be of real service to the student, is limited, although much has been written on the subject. Limited as it is, I have not tried to give here a reading course embracing it. My purpose has been to expound two special classificatory schemes, and to give such readings-often of my own writings as seemed to promote that purpose. It is therefore in vain that the reader will seek mention of all recent articles on classification in these pages, and specially, I may add, I have avoided reference to controversial writings. The first edition, 1906, of the Subject Classification is that used.

I have to acknowledge the assistance of Miss Olive E. Clarke, of the Islington Public Libraries, who has done me good service in reading the proofs of these pages, and in checking in particular my references to the Subject Classification. Messrs. Maurice H. B. Mash and H. A. Twort have also assisted me in various ways, and are responsible for the brief index. I owe almost the whole of my interest in the subject of this little work-and indeed my interest in most things in librarianship-to the writings and teachings of Messrs. James Duff Brown and L. Stanley Jast; and, if my work had been worthy of the honour, I should have dared to dedicate it to them.

W. C. B. S.

A SHORT COURSE IN PRACTICAL CLASSF ICA

I.

WITH

TION, WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO THE
DECIMAL AND SUBJECT SCHEMES.
READINGS AND EXERCISES.

THE

Preliminary.

HE following papers do not make the smallest pretence of being a complete course of instruction in bibliographical classification. They are severely practical hints on the methods of approaching a classification scheme, the difficulties most frequently encountered in applying it and how to overcome them, and carefully selected book-titles which illustrate these things. They were designed for students who had pursued a course of reading in the subject such as is provided by the usual Correspondence Course of the Library Association, but whose circumstances made the daily application of classification difficult, and who therefore required some such systematic discipline as these papers provide before facing the ordeal of the Library Association Examination. The plan has been to give one lesson to each of the main classes of the Decimal Scheme, except Literature and Philology which are combined in one, and History and Geography which are divided into two; to study its scope and difficulties seriatim, and to make a similar and simultaneous study of the corresponding sections of the Subject Scheme. To obtain any real benefit from the lessons at least a fortnight should be devoted to each. This course was conducted under the auspices of the Library Association last year, but as the pressure upon my time makes it impossible for me to continue it, I have published it here for the use of such students as may desire this help. These remarks ex

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