December 19, 1994

Press contact: Guy Lamolinara (202) 707-9217

---

Library of Congress Publishes Name Authority Cataloging Guide

The Library of Congress has just published the NACO Participants' Manual, a detailed, field-by-field guide to the theory and practice of authority record creation.

NACO, the Name Authority Cooperative Project, involves 140 research institutions. NACO participants, including the Library of Congress, create authority records o a preliminary step in the cataloging process o for inclusion in an international database called the Anglo-American Authority File (AAAF). At present, the AAAF contains standardized forms of more than one million names of authors, organizations and publishers' series.

Librarians worldwide are able to search the AAAF on-line and reuse its data in their libraries' catalogs. For catalogers, this saves time and effort, reduces the possibility of error and expands the intellectual access to collections which libraries provide for their patrons.

The NACO Participants' Manual is a must for NACO participants and an invaluable reference for any cataloger doing authority work. The manual is also a valuable resource for users of Library of Congress name and subject authority files.

The NACO Participants' Manual is available for $18.00 in North America, $20.00 outside North America. Paper bound, it is 147 pages. To order, contact: Library of Congress, Customer Services Section, Cataloging Distribution Service/Dept. EQ, Washington, DC 20541-5017; telephone: 1-800-255-3666 (U.S. only) or 202-707-6100; TDD: 202-707-0012; Fax: 202-707-1334.

# # #

PR 94-192
12/19/94
ISSN 0731-3527