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NACO/CONSER/SACO 
Listen-and-Learn 
Session
Presented by 
Richard A. Lammert, 
Concordia Theological Seminary 
Atla PCC Funnels Coordinator

ABSTR ACT This listen-and-learn session was primarily intended 
for participants in the Atla funnels for the NACO, CONSER, and SACO 
programs of the Program for Cooperative Cataloging. It provided an 
update from the PCC meeting in May, with an opportunity for partici-
pants to ask questions about the programs.

The information for this session is based (primarily) on the 
meeting of the Program for Cooperative Cataloging (PCC) Operations 
Committee (OpCo) in Washington, DC, May 2–3, 2019. The agenda 
for that meeting, as well as links to most of the documentation, can be 
found at this URL: http://www.loc.gov/aba/pcc/documents/OpCo-2019/
Agenda-OpCo-2019.pdf.

NACO CJK FUNNEL REFERENCES PROJECT

In 2008, OCLC prepopulated the LC/NACO Authority File with non-
Latin references derived from non-Latin bibliographic headings 
in OCLC WorldCat. OCLC updated 480,000 NACO records. These 
records were identified with a 667 field, “Machine-derived non-
Latin script reference project.” Although it was known that some of 
the added cross references were incorrect, cleanup work was left 
as a future project. The NACO CJK Funnel has now picked up this 
project, identifying 80,956 CJK records that contain multiple non-
Latin references. During the course of the project, estimated to last 
from one to two years, incorrect references will be removed, and the 
record recoded to RDA (if it is not already RDA-compliant).

http://www.loc.gov/aba/pcc/documents/OpCo-2019/Agenda-OpCo-2019.pdf
http://www.loc.gov/aba/pcc/documents/OpCo-2019/Agenda-OpCo-2019.pdf


186  ATL A 2019 PROCEEDINGS

NACO AND INTERNATIONAL LIBRARIES

The NACO Program is expanding with the addition of international 
libraries. Library and Archives Canada (LAC) joined the NACO 
Program in 2017, and the librarians were trained in 2018. Nine 
universities in the Netherlands (the Netherlands UKB Consortium) 
joined the NACO Program in 2018. These institutions were trained in 
2019. Seven universities in Hong Kong plus the University of Macau 
joined the NACO Program in 2019. Training was scheduled for May 
2019. The inclusion of these libraries in the NACO Program means 
that there will be more authoritative records for names from these 
areas of the globe.

OCLC RECORD MANAGER AND NACO

NACO catalogers should remember that OCLC Record Manager is 
available for NACO work, and can be used in addition to or instead 
of Connexion Client. Paul Frank, Coordinator, NACO and SACO 
Programs, remarked that he found checking records in Record 
Manager easier than checking them in Connexion Client. Recalling 
past searches was easier, and the consistent use of the dollar sign 
for the delimiter simplified input. However (something that Paul 
did not mention), OCLC does not keep statistics for authority record 
transactions in Record Manager, so any Atla NACO cataloger using 
Record Manager will need to be careful to record statistics by hand.

NACO 024 FIELD MORATORIUM

Attendees at the NACO OpCo were reminded that there is a tempo-
rary moratorium on the use of MARC field 024 in authority records. 
This moratorium is not in official NACO documentation. The reason 
for the moratorium is that use of the field is dependent on the (even-
tual) definition and use of subfields $0 and $1. The Policies Commit-
tee of PCC has convened three groups to work on the use of this field: 
PCC Identity Management TG, Standing Committee on Standards, 
and Linked Data Advisory Committee. These groups will answer 
such questions as what sources can be used in the 024 field.



Listen and Learn  187

NACO 672 FIELD

MARC field 672, “Title Related to the Entity,” was added to the MARC 
authority format in 2013. However, its use has been on hold pending 
some guidelines for its use. (Atla’s “Best Practices” document advises, 
“Use sparingly until PCC issues guidelines.”) Some groups within the 
PCC are now thinking about the use of this field. However, the recom-
mendations so far do not go further than the best practices established 
several years ago by Atla: “Use to record a title of a work not expected 
to be written by the person being established. For example, a book on 
fly fishing written by a Reformation Historian.” One difficulty that will 
have to be worked out is that the field is defined to accommodate any 
type of relationship between a title and an entity, not just the “creator” 
relationship that we might first think about.

NACO ADVISORY GROUP

Paul Frank reported that he is creating a NACO Advisory Group that 
will be composed of five NACO catalogers. These catalogers will be 
selected by the chair(s) of the PCC Standing Committee on Standards 
and the PCC Secretariat. The group will operate as a corporate body, 
responding to NACO-related PCC listserv discussions when a topic is 
not resolved through member contributions, or when there is a lack 
of consensus on a particular NACO-related topic. In the past, ques-
tions that could not be answered authoritatively by contributors to 
the list would simply remain unanswered. This group will serve to 
provide an answer to such questions.

SACO TOPICS

SACO catalogers should be aware that a new interface is coming to 
Classification Web. The functionality will be the same, but the look 
will be somewhat different, providing better ways to navigate the 
interface. The LCSH Multiples Project is underway, as the Library of 
Congress removes all bracketed multiples in the Library of Congress 
Subject Headings (LCSH). Distribution of revised headings began 
in May. Once a multiples heading has been canceled, new headings 
will need to be proposed through the SACO subject heading proposal 
system—which is where Atla SACO catalogers can step in.



188  ATL A 2019 PROCEEDINGS

RDA 3R PROJECT

The OpCo attendees received an update on the RDA 3R Project. The 
RDA beta site is no longer under constant revision: the project has 
reached the stabilization phase. This means the site is stable, but not 
unchanging; changes for mistakes can and will still be made. Stabili-
zation does not mean “official.” Several steps have to be taken before 
the new RDA becomes official. Major translations of the code need 
to be completed, as well as policy statements completed. After that, 
the RSC and RDA Board must unanimously agree that the 3R Proj-
ect is complete. At that point, the one-year countdown clock begins.

DIACHRONIC WORKS IN RDA

A diachronic work is a work that is planned to be embodied over 
time, rather than as a single “act of publication.” The essence of 
a diachronic work is a plan for the change of content, which can 
be done either by accumulation or by replacement. So far (other 
than the terminology) the concept is well known to catalogers. The 
new RDA, however, takes a concept from IFLA LRM and applies it to 
all diachronic works. IFLA LRM (5.8 Modelling of serials) regards 
any serial as “a distinct instance of the work entity.” The new RDA 
extrapolates the modeling of all diachronic works from this model: 
any work with a diachronic extension plan may be realized in one 
and only one expression and embodied in one and only one mani-
festation. In the new code, Religion past & present is not a translation 
of Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart. It is a new work (albeit related 
work), a transformation by audience of the original. How this will be 
represented in MARC remains to be seen.

AGGREGATES IN RDA

A second area in which catalogers can expect changes is in the area 
of aggregates. An aggregate is “a manifestation that embodies multi-
ple expressions of works.” Again, the concept is not new, although 
the terminology is. An example might be the collected poems of 
Robert Frost. Under the current cataloging code (and all codes up 
to now, as far as I know), we considered that the volume of poems 
contained the individual poems. The new RDA redefines the rela-



Listen and Learn  189

tionship between these parts. The aggregating work (the book of 
all the poems) does not include the content. There is no whole/part 
relationship between the aggregated works (the individual poems) 
and the aggregating work (the volume of poems). How this will be 
represented in MARC remains to be seen.


