Peircean semiotics and subject indexing: Contributions of speculative grammar and pure logic

The semiotics of C S. Peirce presents fundamental concepts to discover aspects of the indexing process, including representation and classes of signs. However, we still know little of its theoretical potential for subject indexing. We believe that the main difficulty in the proposals to understand the process of subject indexing based on Peircean semiotics stems from an incomplete interpretation of his semiotic system. This paper attempts to describe the contributions of Peircean semiotics to subject indexing. First, we analyze some of the concepts of the branches of semiotics, after which, we discuss strategies for conceptual approximation. Secondly, and aiming to raise the level of interlocution between the areas, we intend to argue that subject indexing is an inferential process, as explained by the second branch of semiotics. Thus, we seek to go beyond the level of speculative grammar, the first branch of semiotics, to forge a closer link with pure or critical logic, the second branch. We conclude that the indexer's work does not produce a mere reflection of what already exists in documents, but involves an instigating action to discover, through the inferential matrix, the meaning of a text in order to find the subject and the most appropriate subject added entry to the information system.

Use of Online Information Resources for Knowledge Organisation in Library and Information Centres: A Case Study of CUSAT

The paper discusses the use of online information resources for organising knowledge in library and information centres in Cochin University of Science and Technology (CUSAT). The paper discusses the status and extent of automation in CUSAT library. The use of different online resources and the purposes for which these resources are being used, is explained in detail. Structured interview method was applied for collecting data. It was observed that 67 per cent users consult online resources for assisting knowledge organisation. Library of Congress catalogue is the widely used (100 per cent) online resource followed by OPAC of CUSAT and catalogue of British Library. The main purposes for using these resources are class number building and subject indexing

Criação de uma Lista de Cabeçalhos de Assunto para a Documentação da Biblioteca Universitária João Paulo II

O aspecto fulcral desta dissertação centra-se-à volta do desafio de procurar facilitar o acesso à informação contida na base de dados bibliográfica da Biblioteca Universitária João Paulo II (BUJPII) da Universidade Católica Portuguesa (UCP) cujo conteúdo temático tem sido até agora representado pela Classificação Decimal Universal (CDU), linguagem documental pouco acessível a grande parte dos nossos utilizadores, na sua maioria estudantes universitários que a consideram um instrumento de pesquisa pouco amigável porque estão muito pouco ou nada familiarizados com este tipo de classificação numérica preferindo o uso de palavras-chave no acesso ao conteúdo temático das obras. Com este objectivo em vista, propusemo-nos levar a cabo este trabalho de investigação fazendo a harmonização (correspondência) entre as notações da CDU, usada na classificação da colecção de fundos da BUJPII e uma lista simplificada de Cabeçalhos de Assunto da Biblioteca do Congresso, com o propósito de iniciar um processo de atribuição de cabeçalhos de assunto, mapeados a partir das notações da CDU, a parte dos referidos fundos, cuja recuperação de conteúdo tem sido feita até agora através da Classificação Decimal Universal. O estudo incidiu experimentalmente numa amostragem de monografias de áreas não indexadas mas já classificadas, cujos registos bibliográficos se encontram na base de dados da Biblioteca Universitária João Paulo II. O projecto consistiu na atribuição de cabeçalhos de assunto, traduzidos manualmente para português a partir da lista em inglês dos Cabeçalhos de Assunto da Biblioteca do Congresso (LCSH). Procurou-se que estivessem semanticamente tão próximos quanto possível dos assuntos que correspondiam às notações da Classificação Decimal Universal (CDU) com as quais as monografias tinham sido anteriormente classificadas. O trabalho foi primeiro elaborado de forma manual e depois “carregado” no software Horizon, dado ser este o sistema informático de gestão integrada em uso na Biblioteca Universitária João Paulo II, sendo o objectivo futuro a indexação de todas as áreas do seu acervo bibliográfico, como forma complementar privilegiada no acesso à informação.

A situação atual da indexação nas tarefas bibliotecárias

Na atualidade a atribuição dos descritores de assuntos ou indexação do conteúdo dos livros, nem sempre está associada ao contexto concreto de cada biblioteca, provocando, em muitos casos, que a recuperação por assuntos não resulte adequada. Neste trabalho analisam-se os principais desafios e perspectivas da indexação dos livros, os avanços de análises de assuntos nos catálogos de bibliotecas, examinam-se procedimentos, instrumentos, regras e condutas utilizadas nas análises e representação do conteúdo dos livros. Também se mostra a interação entre o ensino, a pesquisa e a atuação profissional necessária para que os estudantes possam desenvolver competências na análise, na representação e na procura da informação, assim como os princípios - provavelmente menos evidentes- da organização do conhecimento. Este trabalho coloca em evidência que as políticas de gestão da informação, mais quantitativas que qualitativas, deixam num segundo plano o processamento intelectual do conteúdo prejudicando, desta maneira, a recuperação por assuntos através do catalogo da biblioteca. Finalmente, se recolhe uma serie de propostas docentes relacionadas com a atribuição de descritores de assuntos em contextos bibliotecários.

Perspectivas metodológicas para a identificação do aboutness em textos narrativos de ficção

Proposal of a theoretical and methodological use of the generative meaning trajectory postulated by Greimas with the intention of developing a methodology for the identification of concepts in narrative texts of fiction to facilitate its subject indexing and classification.

Estudio observacional del contexto sociocognitivo de la catalogación de matérias em bibliotecas universitárias

A study of the subject indexing process in university libraries is presented, using a socio-cognitive approach to analyze the procedures, difficulties and perceptions of the librarians, users, and managers that take part in the process. Individual and group verbal protocols were applied in the real environment of the cataloguers, the university libraries. The results were the absence of systematic procedures for book subject analysis and representation, the incompatibility of the indexing language, and problems in subject retrieval from the catalog. It is concluded that there is a tendency in catalogs to act as databases. Therefore, the cataloguer should present a level of commitment in his task similar to that of an indexer who works in the production of bibliographic databases.

Perspectivas metodológicas para a identificação do aboutness em textos narrativos de ficção

Proposal of a theoretical and methodological use of the generative meaning trajectory postulated by Greimas with the intention of developing a methodology for the identification of concepts in narrative texts of fiction to facilitate its subject indexing and classification.

Avaliação da indexação em catálogos de bibliotecas universitárias por meio da recuperação da informação

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Accuracy of medical subject heading indexing of dental survival analyses

PURPOSE: To assess the Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) indexing of articles that employed time-to-event analyses to report outcomes of dental treatment in patients.

MATERIALS AND METHODS: Articles published in 2008 in 50 dental journals with the highest impact factors were hand searched to identify articles reporting dental treatment outcomes over time in human subjects with time-to-event statistics (included, n = 95), without time-to-event statistics (active controls, n = 91), and all other articles (passive controls, n = 6,769). The search was systematic (kappa 0.92 for screening, 0.86 for eligibility). Outcome-, statistic- and time-related MeSH were identified, and differences in allocation between groups were analyzed with chi-square and Fischer exact statistics.

RESULTS: The most frequently allocated MeSH for included and active control articles were "dental restoration failure" (77% and 52%, respectively) and "treatment outcome" (54% and 48%, respectively). Outcome MeSH was similar between these groups (86% and 77%, respectively) and significantly greater than passive controls (10%, P < .001). Significantly more statistical MeSH were allocated to the included articles than to the active or passive controls (67%, 15%, and 1%, respectively, P < .001). Sixty-nine included articles specifically used Kaplan-Meier or life table analyses, but only 42% (n = 29) were indexed as such. Significantly more time-related MeSH were allocated to the included than the active controls (92% and 79%, respectively, P = .02), or to the passive controls (22%, P < .001).

CONCLUSIONS: MeSH allocation within MEDLINE to time-to-event dental articles was inaccurate and inconsistent. Statistical MeSH were omitted from 30% of the included articles and incorrectly allocated to 15% of active controls. Such errors adversely impact search accuracy.

Medical subject headings, tree annotations, 1978 : technical notes, Medlars indexing instructions /

"PB 271 246."

Indexing Heterogeneous XML for Full-Text Search

XML documents are becoming more and more common in various environments. In particular, enterprise-scale document management is commonly centred around XML, and desktop applications as well as online document collections are soon to follow. The growing number of XML documents increases the importance of appropriate indexing methods and search tools in keeping the information accessible. Therefore, we focus on content that is stored in XML format as we develop such indexing methods. Because XML is used for different kinds of content ranging all the way from records of data fields to narrative full-texts, the methods for Information Retrieval are facing a new challenge in identifying which content is subject to data queries and which should be indexed for full-text search. In response to this challenge, we analyse the relation of character content and XML tags in XML documents in order to separate the full-text from data. As a result, we are able to both reduce the size of the index by 5-6\% and improve the retrieval precision as we select the XML fragments to be indexed. Besides being challenging, XML comes with many unexplored opportunities which are not paid much attention in the literature. For example, authors often tag the content they want to emphasise by using a typeface that stands out. The tagged content constitutes phrases that are descriptive of the content and useful for full-text search. They are simple to detect in XML documents, but also possible to confuse with other inline-level text. Nonetheless, the search results seem to improve when the detected phrases are given additional weight in the index. Similar improvements are reported when related content is associated with the indexed full-text including titles, captions, and references. Experimental results show that for certain types of document collections, at least, the proposed methods help us find the relevant answers. Even when we know nothing about the document structure but the XML syntax, we are able to take advantage of the XML structure when the content is indexed for full-text search.

Male Homosexuality in Brazilian Indexing Languages: Some Ethical Questions

Studies on ethics in information organization have deeply contributed to the recognition of the social dimension of Information Science. The subject approach to information is linked to an ethical dimension because one of its major concerns is related to its reliability and usefulness in a specific discursive community or knowledge domain. In this direction, we propose, through an exploratory research design with qualitative and inductive characteristics, to identify the specific terminology that Brazilian indexing languages allow for terms relating to male homosexuality. We also analyzed the terms assigned to papers published in the Journal of Homosexuality, Sexualities and Journal of Gay & Lesbian Mental Health between the years 2005 to 2009. From this analysis of terms and the Brazilian indexing languages, we see (1) the Brazilian context, (2) imprecision in the terminology, (3) indications of prejudices disseminated by political correctness, (4) biased representation of the subject matter, (5) and the presence of figures of speech.

Subject headings for the aeronautical index /

Mimeographed.