Navigation Menu Introduction Classification Systems Subject Headings Quiz

Introduction: How Libraries Organize Information In order to make information available to people it must be organized in a useful way. Many people are not aware of just how difficult it is to catalog and organize large collections of information so that the information can be easily located. The difficulty in organizing information is due to the fact that cataloging and indexing are subjective acts. A librarian or indexer must determine what a specific piece of information is about and then try to anticipate all the different ways people might search for the information. People who look for information have different reasons for wanting the information and will approach searching for it in different ways. Another difficulty resides in the librarian's or indexer's interpretation of the author's intent. Trying to create a catalog record that accurately represents the author's main ideas in a meaningful way is very difficult. Another problem for libraries is the fact that many people who seek out information are not sure exactly what they need. Many people who look for information do so with a vague idea of what they want. It often proves difficult to focus a person's information request in such a way as to match their request to the information in a book, periodical, web page, or other form of published resource.