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MARC PROPOSAL NO. 2008-03

DATE: Dec. 7, 2007
REVISED:

NAME: Definition of first indicator value in field 041 (Language code) of the MARC 21 bibliographic format

SOURCE: British Library

SUMMARY: This paper proposes defining a new first indicator value for "Unspecified/unknown" in field 041 (Language code) of the MARC 21 bibliographic format when there is no indication of whether a resource is a translation or includes a translation.

KEYWORDS: Field 041 (BD), Language code (BD), Translation indication indicator in field 041 (BD)

RELATED:

STATUS/COMMENTS:

12/5/2007 - Made available to the MARC 21 community for discussion.

02/14/2008 - Results of the MARC Advisory Committee discussion - Approved as amended. Value blank (#) will be defined as "No information provided." The documentation will make it clear that value blank means unevaluated.

02/14/2008 - Results of LC/LAC/BL review - Approved.

Proposal No.: 2008-03: Definition of first indicator value in field 041

1 BACKGROUND

The British Library participates in a variety of retroconversion and digitization projects. In such initiatives, workflows mostly involve batch processing with little access to individual resources. Although there may be some indication of which languages are present in items (either in the existing card records or from the OCR'd texts), there is, however, very often no way of knowing with certainty whether a resource is or includes a translation. Likewise, there is currently no way to encode this uncertainty in field 041 (Language code) of the MARC 21 bibliographic record.

2 DISCUSSION

2.1 Definition of a first indicator value for Unspecified/unknown

Field 041 (Language code) in the MARC 21 bibliographic format includes codes for languages associated with an item when the language code in field 008/35-37 of the record is insufficient to convey full information. This includes records for multilingual items, items that involve translation, and items where the medium of communication is a sign language.

The first indicator of field 041 (Language code) is currently defined as follows:

First - Translation indication

• 0 - Item not a translation/does not include a translation
• 1 - Item is or includes a translation

It is proposed to define a new first indicator value "Unspecified/unknown" in field 041 (Language code) of the bibliographic format when there is no indication of whether the item is or includes a translation. This new indicator value would be available for use in any context (for example, current processing, retroconversion or digitization projects). Value blank (#) is suggested as it has already been used in other fields, such as field 260 (Publication, distribution, etc. (Imprint)), with the meaning of "No information provided."

3 PROPOSED CHANGE

In the MARC 21 Bibliographic Format:

• Define first indicator value blank (#) for "Unspecified/unknown" translation in field 041 (Language code)

4 EXAMPLES

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