RDA (Resource Description and Access) is the cataloguing standard that replaces the Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules, 2nd revised edition (AACR2). RDA was released worldwide in 2010, and Australian libraries began implementation in 2013.
RDA Essentials author Thomas Brenndorfer is currently a librarian at Guelph Public Library in Ontario, Canada. His qualifications include a Bachelor of Arts in English Language and Literature from the University of Western Ontario, and a Master of Library and Information Science. Brenndorfer has given oral presentations about RDA since 2011, and his concise and comprehensible style is continued in written form. In the book’s introduction, Brenndorfer describes the background to the formation of RDA. He emphasises the change to not only recording attributes of entities but also their relationships to other entities and agents, and the influence on the standard of the FRBR (Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records) user tasks of identify, select, find and obtain. RDA as a standard is extensive and intricate: Brenndorfer focuses on key aspects, and is almost aggressively transparent about the limited scope of the book. Omissions include detailed instructions for capitalisation and abbreviations, displaying elements, and encoding in MARC. What he has produced he describes as ‘a quick reference source ... basic instructions for recording values for each RDA element’ (p. ix).
There are four sections in the book, totalling 32 chapters:
Section 1, Elements: Chapters 1–13;
(I predict that Chapter 1 Identifying Manifestations and Items, and Chapter 2 Describing Carriers, will be well-thumbed by readers);
Section 2, Guidelines: Chapters 14–25;
(I highlight Chapter 14 Transcription)
Section 3, Constructing access points: Chapters 26–30;
Section 4, Other additional instructions: Chapters 31–32
RDA Essentials is the first textbook published by RDA’s co-publishers the American Library Association (ALA), the Canadian Federation of Library Associations (CLA) and the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals (CILIP), although RDA in Print – a loose-leaf version of the toolkit at a particular point in time – has been available since the toolkit’s launch. However, RDA keeps evolving, and periodic updates meant parts of the loose-leaf version became out-of-date. The book is similarly affected: it is described as ‘current with RDA instructions through the April 2015 update to RDA’ (back cover), and since then another update has occurred, in April 2016.
Using the book requires workspace-planning, due to its size: The book is 28 cm long and 22 cm wide, and it has almost 400 pages. The margins are generous, and there is lots of white space. The layout includes side-margin marking to clearly indicate alternatives, exceptions and optional additions when recording elements. However, the readability of the book would have been enhanced by a slightly larger font size.
The cover is basic, and predominantly orange, yellow and white. I was surprised that these colours were chosen, because they do not match the scheme of the RDA toolkit website. Colour is absent from the pages, but the grayscale printing provides sufficient distinction between parts of the text. The book passes the usability test of remaining open at a required page, and there is an index (pp. 359–376).
The book’s target audience is broad, ranging from students to experienced cataloguers, and for all sizes of institutions. This potential market will increase as the application of RDA escalates, and I anticipate revision and re-publication of the book in the mid-future. I am familiar with both AACR2 and RDA: I welcome the clarity provided by RDA Essentials, and believe it to be worth acquiring.
Curtin University
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© 2016 Leith T. K. Robinson
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00048623.2016.1262739