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इस ब्लॉग्स का सृजन भारत वर्ष में आयोजित होने वाली समस्त प्रकार की प्रतियोगी एवं भर्ती परीक्षाओं में सभी प्रकार के प्रतिभागियों को संतुष्ठ करते हुए वांछित पाठ्य विषय वस्तु का संपादन और संगर्हण किया गया हैं , सभी विषय वस्तुए सर्वाधिकार सुरक्षित हैं ,न लाभ न हानि पर संचालित कि जा रही , इन सभी विषय वस्तुए को भारत वर्षमें हिंदी , गुजराती, मराठी , कन्नड़ , तमिल, तेलगु, बांग्ला , उर्दू, आदि में अनूदित कर के देखा जा सकता हैं , सभी को भविष्य कि हार्दिक शुभकामना सहित सुझाव सादर आमंत्रित हैं,

Saturday, December 21, 2013

RANGANATHAN, S.R.

इस ब्लॉग्स को सृजन करने में आप सभी से सादर सुझाव आमंत्रित हैं , कृपया अपने सुझाव और प्रविष्टियाँ प्रेषित करे , इसका संपूर्ण कार्य क्षेत्र विश्व ज्ञान समुदाय हैं , जो सभी प्रतियोगियों के कॅरिअर निर्माण महत्त्वपूर्ण योगदान देगा ,आप अपने सुझाव इस मेल पत्ते पर भेज सकते हैं - chandrashekhar.malav@yahoo.com

RANGANATHAN, S.R.----

Dr. Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan was born on August 9, 1892 Shiyali, Madras and died on September 27, 1972 in Bangalore. He earned an MA in Mathematics, and taught at Madras University. In 1924 he was appointed as the librarian of Madras University, a post he held for twenty years. As a newly appointed librarian he travelled to London's School of Librarianship and toured over one hundred libraries in the U.K.

While in England, Dr. SR Ranganathan saw that the Dewey Decimal Classification (DDC) was the most popular system in use. His analytical mind quickly discovered its fundamental deficiency and its inability to express all the aspects of a specific subject of a document. He also thought that a classification system should allow for future subjects to be combined in unexpected or unplanned ways. In his mind DDC was neither prepared nor adequate to provide for the future situations.

Whether people are looking for resource books to help them with literature courses, electronic courses on Mobile Phones, interior decoration or language study they should be able to find a wide variety of appropriate reading material quickly and easily.

The DDC is not necessarily the quickest or easiest; to keep in mind he decided to devise a system of his own. Shortly afterward he began work on his classification scheme which he called the Colon Classification (CC).Ranaganathan started a Library Science School in Madras in 1929 where he taught both DDC and CC. Over his lifetime, he wrote over 2000 research papers, 60 books and founded and edited five periodical publications.

Ranganathan's chief technical contributions to library science were in classification and indexing theory. His Colon Classification (1933) introduced a system that iswidely used in research libraries around theworld and that has affected the evolution of such older systems as the Dewey Decimal Classification. Later he devised the technique of chain indexing for deriving subject-index entries.

His Five Laws of Library Science (1931) was widely accepted as a definitive statement of the ideal of library service. He also drafted plans for a national and several state library systems, founded and edited several journals, and was active in numerous professional associations.

Colon Classification is the system of library organization developed by Ranganathan in 1933. It is general rather than specific in nature, and it can create complex or new categories through the use of facets, or colons. In it, there are 108 main classes and 10 generalized classes (broadly divided between the humanities and sciences), which are represented by a mixed notation of Arabic numerals and Roman and Greek letters. Each main class comprises five fundamental facets, or groups: personality,

Ranganathan's main contribution to classification was the notion of these fundamental facets, or categories. Instead of schedules of numbers for each topic, Colon Classification uses series of short tables from which component numbers are chosen and linked by colons to form a whole. The book number is an integral part of the call number, a departure from Dewey or Library of Congress systems.

Each main class has its appropriate facets and focuses; e.g., literature has language and form. In addition, there are four floating tables that correspond to subdivisions -- e.g., form, geography, time, and language. Further expansion of the tables is allowed through colon addition or omission (if the subject cannot be expanded).

The collection of the University of Madras, India, was utilized in the creation of Colon Classification.

Digitised E-Books of Dr. S.R. Ranganathan by DLIST, The University of Arizona Campus Repository (University Libraries)

Books on Dr. S.R. Ranganathan:

His Life @ a Glance

He was educated at the Hindu High School in Shiyali, at Madras Christian College (where he took B.A. and M.A. degrees in mathematics in 1913 and 1916), and at Teachers College, Saidapet.

 In 1917 he joined the faculty of Government College, Mangalore.

 From 1920 to 1923 he subsequently taught at Government College, Coimbatore, and at Presidency College, University of Madras, in 1921-1923

 In 1924 he was appointed first librarian of the University of Madras, and in order to fit himself for the post he traveled to England to study at University College, London.

 From 1925 to 1944 he took up the job at Madras in earnest in 1925 and held it until 1944.

 From 1945 to 1954 he served as librarian and as professor of library science at Hindu University in Varanasi (Banaras), and from 1947 to 1954 he taught at the University of Delhi.

 From 1954 to 1957 he was engaged in research and writing in Zürich.

 He returned to India in the latter year and served as visiting professor at Vikram University, Ujjain, until 1959.

 In 1962 he founded and became head of the Documentation Research and Training Centre in Bangalore, with which he remained associated for the rest of his life, and in 1965 he was honoured by the Indian government with the title of national research professor in library science.Dr. S R Ranganathan is considered to be the father, the doyen, messiah of library and information profession in India.

Ranganathan’s Association with ILA

Ranganathan was closely associated with ILA right from its inception till 1954 ie, for about two decades. In fact, Mr K M Asadullah who convened the first All India Library Conference in Calcutta in the year 1933, requested Dr Ranganathan to be its president. But Ranganathan declined this offer as he was busy with the work of Madras University Library and Madras Library Association. However, he agreed to be one of the Conveners of the Conference.Ranganathan drafted the Constitution of the proposed Indian Library Association on behalf of the Madras Library Association. There were two more drafts-one from the Working Committee and one from the Simla Library Association. Hence a two member committee with Mr Ranganathan and Mr Montague of Simla was appointed to finalise the Constitution. This was adopted on 13 Sep 1933 and thus ILA was founded.Ranganathan enrolled himself as the first life member of ILA. He was President, ILA for nearly a decade upto 1953.When Ranganathan become the President of ILA he was not a member of the Executive Committee of the Association. It was an embarrassment for him when it was pointed out at the EC meeting held in Patna in 1946. Ranganathan then realised the need for amendment to the constitution as the President had no powers except to preside the general body meeting once in two years. Ranganathan got the constitution of the Association revised and adopted in 1949 at the Nagpur Conference.In the revised Constitution of 1949, the functions of the President were clearly laid-down. He was made the custodian of the constitution with full control over the affairs of the Association.PublicationsPapers for the Biennial Conference: A few months before the biennial conference, Ranganathan appointed an ad hocCommittee to select two or three subject groups in which papers should be solicited for the conference. Facets of each subject group were spelt-out well in advance. The ad hoc committee was also assigned the task of selection of papers, editing, standardization, publication, etc.Publication Series in English: A publication series in English was initiated in 1949. A sub-committee consisting of the President, Secretary and one Assistant Secretary was appointed for this purpose. Between 1949-53, seven titles were published under this series.Publication Series in Hindi: A series was also initiated in Hindi. Three of the books of Dr Ranganathan translated into Hindi by Mr M L Nagar were published.

In 1949 itself, it was decided to publish a research periodical in English; Another periodical giving a few papers of a slightly lower standard; and a periodical in Hindi.Finally it was resolved to make all there quarterlies issued simultaneously under one and the same cover under the titleAbgila.A (Annals) B (Bulletin) G (GrantJialaya) of ILA (Indian Library Association). Union CatalogueDr Ranganathan took-up the project of the compilation of the Union Catalogue of Learned Periodicals in South Asia and completed it successfully on behalf of the ILA. This has fetched a few thousand rupees to ILA.During 1992 the Association organised functions to celebrate the Birth Centenary of Dr. S.R. Rnaganathan,the doyan of library science and librarianship in India. The Filately Division of the Department of Post, Government of India, released a Postel Stamp in honour of Ranganathan at the Official Opening of IFLA General Conference on August 30,1992. The stamp release function was performed by Hon'ble Minister of Human Resource Development Shri Arjun Singh in the Siri Fort Auditorium. The Plennary Session of IFLA was also devoted to Dr S R Ranganathan.The XXXVIII All India Library Conference of the Indian Library Association held at Utkal University, Bhubaneswar was dedicated to Dr S R Ranganathan. A large number of Indian and foreign Library Science journals released special numbers on S R Ranganathan.

Dr. S.R. Ranganathan Biography on Web

Most widely held works by S. R Ranganathan

Colon classification
The five laws of library science
Prolegomena to library classification
Ramanujan, the man and the mathematician
On the life and achievements of Srinivasa Ramanujan Aiyangar, 1887-1920, Indian mathematician.
Library book selection
Reference service
Classified catalogue code, with additional rules for dictionary cat...
Library manual, for library authorities, librarians, and honorary l...
Library administration
Free book service for all; an international survey
A Librarian looks back : an autobiography of Dr. S.R. Ranganathan by S R Ranganathan and P N Kaula

Articles on Dr. Ranganathan.

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Classification and Communication

HDL HANDLE:: http://hdl.handle.net/10150/105279
TITLE:: Classification and Communication
AUTHOR:: Ranganathan, S. R.
ISSUE DATE:: 1951
PUBLISHER:: University of Delhi (Delhi, India)
JOURNAL:: Five Laws of Library Science
CITATION:: Classification and Communication 1951, :i-xxxii Five Laws of Library Science
ABSTRACT:: This is a preliminary digitization of S.R. Ranganathan's Classification and Communication. Published by the University of Delhi in 1951. First Edition. Copyright permissions granted from the copyright holder: Â© Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science (SRELS). To purchase reprints of this work, please visit Ess Ess Publications at http://www.essessreference.com/. Table of Contents: Chapter 11: First sense--Primitive use; Chapter 12: Second sense--Common use; Chapter 13: Third sense--Library classification; Chapter 14: Field of knowledge; Chapter 15: Enumerative classification; Chapter 16: Analytico-synthetic classification; Chapter 17: Uses of analytico-synthetic classification; Chapter 18: Depth-classification--Confession of faith; Part 2--Communication; Chapter 21: Co-operative living; Chapter 22: Communication and language; Chapter 23: Commercial contact; Chapter 24: Political understanding; Chapter 25: Literary exchange; Chapter 26: Spiritual communion; Chapter 27: Cultural concord; Chapter 28: Intellectual team-work; Part 3--Classification and Its Future; Chapter 31: Domains in communication; Chapter 32: Domain of classification; Chapter 33: Time-and-Space-Facets; Chapter 34: Preliminary schedules; Chapter 35: Energy-Facet; Chapter 36: Matter-Facet; Chapter 38: Research and Organisation; Index.
KEYWORDS:: Library Science; Classification

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Documentation and its Facets: Being a symposium of seventy papers by thirty-two authors

HDL HANDLE:: http://hdl.handle.net/10150/105426
TITLE:: Documentation and its Facets: Being a symposium of seventy papers by thirty-two authors
ISSUE DATE:: 1963
PUBLISHER:: Asia Publishing House (Bombay)
CITATION:: Documentation and its Facets: Being a symposium of seventy papers by thirty-two authors 1963, 10
ABSTRACT:: This is a scan of Documentation and Its Facets: Being a symposium of seventy papers by thirty-two authors, edited by S.R. Ranganathan. In Part A Ranganathan provides a description of his introduction to Documentation (Information Science). Other authors, besides Ranganathan, describe the field of documentation. This is a title in the dLIST Classics project. © Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science (SRELS). Permission for non-profit use granted by SRELS. To purchase print reprints of this work, please visit Ess Ess Publications at http://www.essessreference.com/.
KEYWORDS:: Library Science; Classification; Information Science;Knowledge Structures; Knowledge Organization

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The Five Laws of Library Science

HDL HANDLE:: http://hdl.handle.net/10150/105454
TITLE:: The Five Laws of Library Science
AUTHOR:: Ranganathan, S. R.
ISSUE DATE:: 1931
PUBLISHER:: Madras Library Association (Madras, India) and Edward Goldston (London, UK)
CITATION:: The Five Laws of Library Science 1931,
ABSTRACT:: This is an updated scan of the Prefatory Matter (Title pages, Table of Contents, Preface by Madras Library Association, Foreword by Sir P.S. Sivaswamy Aiyer, Introduction by Mr. W.C. Berwick Sayers), Chapter 1: The First Law, Chapter 2: The Second Law and Its Struggle, Chapter 3: The Second Law and Its Digvijaya, Chapter 4: The Second Law and Its Implications Pages, Chapter 5: The Third Law, Chapter 6: The Fourth Law, Chapter 7: The Fifth Law, Appendix, and Index, from S.R. Ranganathan's The Five Laws of Library Science, Madras Library Association, 1931. Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan (1892-1972) was a pioneer in the field of Library and Information Science. S.R. Ranganathan's The Five Laws of Library Science, the main premise of which is "books are for use," is arguably the most influential work in LIS to date. © Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science (SRELS). Permission for non-profit use granted by SRELS. To purchase reprints of this work, please visit Ess Ess Publications at http://www.essessreference.com/.
KEYWORDS:: Library Science

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Index

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Library Book Selection

HDL HANDLE:: http://hdl.handle.net/10150/105935
TITLE:: Library Book Selection
AUTHOR:: Ranganathan, S. R.
ISSUE DATE:: 1966
PUBLISHER:: Asia Publishing House (Bombay)
CITATION:: Library Book Selection 1966,
ABSTRACT:: This is a preliminary and incomplete scan of Library Book Selection, Edition 2, by S.R. Ranganathan. Assisted by M. A. Gopinath. Edition 1 was published in 1952. This book discusses each of the five laws of library science in the context of book selection. The incomplete chapters are: Part H, J, K, L and Index) and they will be uploaded shortly. This is a title in the dLIST Classics project. Â© Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science (SRELS). Permission for non-profit use granted by SRELS. To purchase reprints of this work, please visit Ess Ess Publications at http://www.essessreference.com/.
KEYWORDS:: Library Science

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New education and school library: Experience of half a century

HDL HANDLE:: http://hdl.handle.net/10150/105744
TITLE:: New education and school library: Experience of half a century
AUTHOR:: Ranganathan, S. R.
ISSUE DATE:: 1973
PUBLISHER:: Vikas Publishing (Delhi, India)
CITATION:: New education and school library: Experience of half a century 1973,
ABSTRACT:: This is the last book written by S.R. Ranganathan printed in 1973 (India) based on his experience during the last fifty years. It includes a Foreword to Editition 1 (1942) by Sir John Sargent (Educational Commissioner, Govt. of India). Table of Contents: Part A - Preliminaries, Part B/E - Why of school library, Part F/J - What of school library, Part K/N - How of school library, Part P/R - Present difficulties, Part S/Y - Library techniques, Bibliography, Index. Â© Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science (SRELS). Permission for non-profit use granted by SRELS. To purchase reprints of this work, please visit Ess Ess Publications at http://www.essessreference.com/.
KEYWORDS:: Library Science

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Philosophy of Library Classification

HDL HANDLE:: http://hdl.handle.net/10150/105278
TITLE:: Philosophy of Library Classification
AUTHOR:: Ranganathan, S. R.
ISSUE DATE:: 1989
PUBLISHER:: Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science (Bangalore, India)
CITATION:: Philosophy of Library Classification 1989,
ABSTRACT:: This is a preliminary scan of S.R. Ranganathan's Philosophy of Library Classification (1989 Indian reprint edition). Contents include: Conspectus, 8 chapters, and Index: 1. Evolution of classification. 2. Library classification: an artificial language. 3. Library Classification and social forces. 4. Library classification as a transformation and its limitations. 5. Library classification and its symbiosis with library catalogue. 6. Capacity of library classification. 7. Increasing of dimensions and optional facets. 8. Organisation for research in library classification. Â© Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science (SRELS). This is a title in the dLIST Classics project; permission for non-profit use granted by SRELS. To purchase print reprints of this work, please visit Ess Ess Publications at http://www.essessreference.com/.
KEYWORDS:: Library Science; Classification; Knowledge Structures; Knowledge Organization

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Prolegomena to Library Classification

HDL HANDLE:: http://hdl.handle.net/10150/106370
TITLE:: Prolegomena to Library Classification
AUTHOR:: Ranganathan, S. R.
ISSUE DATE:: 1967
PUBLISHER:: Asia Publishing House (New York)
JOURNAL:: The Five Laws of Library Science
CITATION:: Prolegomena to Library Classification 1967, :1-73 The Five Laws of Library Science
ABSTRACT:: This is a preliminary digitization of S.R. Ranganathan's Prolegomena to Library Classification (Assisted by M.A. Gopinath). Published by Asia Publishing House (New York), 1967 (printed in India). Copyright permissions granted from the copyright holder: Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science (SRELS). To purchase reprints of this work, please visit Ess Ess Publications at http://www.essessreference.com/. Table of Contents: Part A: Introduction includes Preface to Edition 1 by Sayers, Genesis of Edition 1 (1937), Development of Edition 2 (1957), Development of Edition 3 (1967), Features of Edition 3 (1967); Part B: Summary of Normative Principles; Part C: Basic Concepts and Terminology of Classification; Part D: Normative Principles; Part E: Canons for Work in the Idea Plane; Part F: Principles for Helpful Sequence; Part G: Canons for Work in the Verbal Plane; Part H: Notational Plane; Part J: Canons for Work in the Notational Plane; Part K: Canons for Mnemonics; Part I: Notational System for a Growing Universe; Part M: Planes of Work; Part N: Foci in an Array; Part P: Formation, Structure, and Development of Subjects; Part Q: Classification as Transformation; Part R: Analytico-Synthetic Classification (Idea Plane); Part S: Analytico-Synthetic Classification (Notational Plane); Part T: Quasi-Subject and Subject Bundle; Part U: Book Number; Part V: Use of Collection Number; Part W: Universal & Special Classification; Part X: Reflections; Bibliographical References; Index.
KEYWORDS:: Library Science; Classification

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Reference Service

HDL HANDLE:: http://hdl.handle.net/10150/106346
TITLE:: Reference Service
AUTHOR:: Ranganathan, S. R.
ISSUE DATE:: 1961
PUBLISHER:: Asia Publishing House (Bombay)
CITATION:: Reference Service 1961,
ABSTRACT:: This is a scan of S.R. Ranganathan's Reference Service, 2nd edition published 1961 by Asia Publishing House. Includes the Foreword to Edition 1, which was published in 1940. Â© Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science (SRELS). This is a title in the dLIST Classics project; This is a title in the dLIST Classics project. Â© Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science (SRELS). Permission for non-profit use granted by SRELS. To purchase reprints of this work, please visit Ess Ess Publications at http://www.essessreference.com/.
KEYWORDS:: Library Science

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Genre/Form:	Congresses
Additional Physical Format:	Online version: Ranganathan's philosophy. New Delhi : Vikas Pub. House, c1986 (OCoLC)558147172 Online version: Ranganathan's philosophy. New Delhi : Vikas Pub. House, c1986 (OCoLC)607694728
Named Person:	S R Ranganathan; Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan
Material Type:	Conference publication
Document Type:	Book
All Authors / Contributors:	T S Rajagopalan; Indian Library Association.; Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science. Find more information about:
ISBN:	0706930274 9780706930276
OCLC Number:	14272960
Notes:	Errata slip inserted.
Description:	xxxvi, 690 p., [1] leaf of plates : port. ; 23 cm.
Responsibility:	organised by the Indian Library Association and co-sponsored by Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science ; edited by T.S. Rajagopalan.

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S. R. Ranganathan

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

S.R. Ranganathan
S. R. Ranganathan's Portrait at City Central Library, Hyderabad
Born	Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan 12 August 1892 Shiyali, British India (present-dayTamil Nadu, India)
Died	27 September 1972 (aged 80) Bangalore, India
Occupation	Author, academic, mathematician, librarian
Nationality	Indian
Genres	Library Science, Documentation,Information Science
Notable work(s)	Prolegomena to Library Classification The Five Laws of Library Science Colon Classification Ramanujan: the Man and the Mathematician Classified Catalogue Code: With Additional Rules for Dictionary Catalogue Code Library Administration Indian Library Manifesto Library Manual for Library Authorities, Librarians, and Library Workers Classification and Communication Headings and Canons; Comparative Study of Five Catalogue Codes

Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan (

listen (help·info); 12^[1] August 1892 – 27 September 1972) was a mathematician and librarian from India.^[2]^[3] His most notable contributions to the field were his five laws of library science and the development of the first major analytico-synthetic classification system, the colon classification. He is considered to be the father of library science, documentation, and information science in India and is widely known throughout the rest of the world for his fundamental thinking in the field. His birthday is observed every year as the National Library Day in India.

He was a university librarian and professor of library science at Benares Hindu University(1945–47) and professor of library science at the University of Delhi (1947–55). The last appointment made him director of the first Indian school of librarianship to offer higher degrees. He was president of the Indian Library Association from 1944 to 1953. In 1957 he was elected an honorary member of the International Federation for Information and Documentation (FID) and was made a vice president for life of the Library Association of Great Britain.^[4]

[hide]

Early life and education[edit]

Ranganathan, born on 12^[1] August 1892 to Ramamrita, in Tanjore in British-ruled India.^[5]He was born in the small town of Shiyali (now known as Sirkazhi), in the state of Tamil Nadu in southern India.

Ranganathan began his professional life as a mathematician; he earned B.A. and M.A. degrees in mathematics from Madras Christian College in his home province, and then went on to earn a teaching license. His lifelong goal was to teach mathematics, and he was successively a member of the mathematics faculties at universities in Mangalore,Coimbatore and Madras (all within the span of five years). As a mathematics professor, he published a handful of papers, mostly on the history of mathematics. His career as an educator was somewhat hindered by a handicap of stammering (a difficulty Ranganathan gradually overcame in his professional life). The Government of India awarded Padmashri to Dr. S.R. Ranganathan in 1957 for valuable contributions to Library Science.^[6]

Early career[edit]

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In 1923, the University of Madras created the post of University Librarian to oversee their poorly organized collection. Among the 900 applicants for the position, none had any formal training in librarianship, and Ranganathan's' handful of papers satisfied the search committee's requirement that the candidate should have a research background. His sole knowledge of librarianship came from anEncyclopædia Britannica article he read days before the interview.

Ranganathan was initially reluctant to pursue the position (he had forgotten about his application by the time he was called for an interview there). To his own surprise, he received the appointment and accepted the position in January 1924.^[5]

At first, Ranganathan found the solitude of the position was intolerable. After a matter of weeks, complaining of total boredom, he went back to the university administration to beg for his teaching position back. A deal was struck that Ranganthan would travel to London to study contemporary Western practices in librarianship, and that, if he returned and still rejected librarianship as a career, the mathematics lectureship would be his again.^[7]

Ranganathan travelled to University College London, which at that time housed the only graduate degree program in library science in Britain. At University College, he earned marks only slightly above average, but his mathematical mind latched onto the problem of classification, a subject typically taught by rote in library programs of the time. As an outsider, he focused on what he perceived to be flaws with the popular decimal classification, and began to explore new possibilities on his own.^[8]

He also devised the Acknowledgment of Duplication, which states that any system of classification of information necessarily implies at least two different classifications for any given datum. He anecdotally proved this with the Dewey Decimal Classification (DDC) by taking several books and showing how each might be classified with two totally different resultant DDC numbers.^[9] (For example, a book on "warfare in India" could be classified under "warfare" or "India". Even a general book on warfare could be classified under "warfare," "history," "social organisation," "Indian essays," or many other headings, depending upon the viewpoint, needs, and prejudices of the classifier.) To a mind such as Ranganathan's, a structured, step-by-step system acknowledging each facet of the topic of the work was immensely preferable to the anarchy and "intellectual laziness" (as he termed it) of the DDC. The importance of this concept, given the poor technology for information retrieval available at that time, cannot be overestimated. Even in modern terms the concept is attractive for its simplicity, predictability, and depth in comparison to classification on a linguistic level, such as is used by search engines such as Google.

He began drafting the system that was ultimately to become the Colon Classification while in England, and refined it as he returned home, even going so far as to reorder the ship's library on the voyage back to India. He initially got the idea for the system from seeing a set of Meccano in a toy store in London. Ranganathan returned with great interest for libraries and librarianship and a vision of its importance for the Indian nation. He returned to and held the position of University Librarian at the University of Madras for twenty years. During that time, he helped to found the Madras Library Association, and lobbied actively for the establishment of free public libraries throughout India and for the creation of a comprehensive national library.^[10]

Ranganathan was considered by many to be a workaholic. During his two decades in Madras, he consistently worked 13-hour days, seven days a week, without taking a vacation for the entire time. Although he married in November 1928, he returned to work the afternoon following the marriage ceremony. A few years later, he and his wife Sarada had a son. The couple remained married until Ranganathan's death.

The first few years of Ranganathan's tenure at Madras were years of deliberation and analysis as he addressed the problems of library administration and classification.^[11] It was during this period that he produced what have come to be known as his two greatest legacies: his five laws of library science (1931) and the colon classification system (1933).^[12]

Regarding the political climate at the time, Ranganathan took his position at the University of Madras in 1924. Gandhi had been imprisoned in 1922 and was released around the time that Ranganathan was taking that job. Ranganathan sought to institute massive changes to the library system and to write about such things as open access and education for all which essentially had the potential to enable the masses and encourage civil discourse (and disobedience). Although there's no evidence that Ranganthan did any of this for political reasons, his changes to the library had the result of educating more people, making information available to all, and even aiding women and minorities in the information-seeking process.

The Northern Ireland crisis got an unexpected metaphorical reference in a book by S. R. Ranganathan, as "making an Ulster of the ... law of parsimony", complaining about the harmful effects of low budget on the good functioning of a library.

Later career[edit]

This section does not cite any references or sources. Please help improve this section byadding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed.(April 2012)

After two decades of serving as librarian at Madras – a post he had intended to keep until his retirement, Ranganathan retired from his position after conflicts with a new university vice-chancellor became intolerable. At the age of 54, he submitted his resignation and, after a brief bout with depression, accepted a professorship in library science at Banaras Hindu University in Varanasi, his last formal academic position, in August 1945. There, he cataloged the university's collection; by the time he left four years later, he had classified over 100,000 items personally.

Ranganathan headed the Indian Library Association from 1944 to 1953, but was never a particularly adept administrator, and left amid controversy when the Delhi Public Library chose to use the Dewey Decimal Classification system instead of his own Colon Classification. He held an honorary professorship at Delhi University from 1949 to 1955 and helped build that institution's library science programs with S. Dasgupta, a former student of his. In 1951, Ranganathan released an album on Folkways Records entitled, Readings from the Ramayana: In Sanskrit Bhagavad Gita.

Ranganathan briefly moved to Zurich, Switzerland, from 1955 to 1957, when his son married a European girl; the unorthodox relationship did not sit well with Ranganathan, although his time in Zurich allowed him to expand his contacts within the European library community, where he gained a significant following. However, he soon returned to India and settled in the city of Bangalore, where he would spend the rest of his life. While in Zurich, though, he endowed a professorship at Madras University in honor of his wife of thirty years, largely as an ironic gesture in retaliation for the persecution he suffered for many years at the hands of that university's administration.

Ranganathan's final major achievement was the establishment of the Documentation Research and Training Centre as a department and research center in the Indian Statistical Institute in Bangalore in 1962, where he served as honorary director for five years. In 1965, the Indian government honored him for his contributions to the field with a rare title of "National Research Professor."

In the final years of his life, Ranganathan finally succumbed to ill health, and was largely confined to his bed. On September 27, 1972, he died of complications from bronchitis.^[13]

Upon the centenary of his birth in 1992, several biographical volumes and collections of essays on Ranganathan's influence were published in his honor. Ranganathan's autobiography, published serially during his life, is titled A Librarian Looks Back.

References[edit]

^ Jump up to:^a ^b http://publications.drdo.gov.in/gsdl/collect/dbit/index/assoc/HASH5351.dir/dbit1205003.pdf
Jump up^ Broughton, Vanda (2006). Essential Classification. London, Facet Publishing. ISBN 978-1-85604-514-8
Jump up^ Indian Statistical Institute Library and Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science. “S. R. Ranganathan – A Short Biography.” Indian Statistical Institute.
Jump up^ "Ranganathan, Shivala Ramanrita (1892–1972)." The Hutchinson Unabridged Encyclopedia with Atlas and Weather Guide. Abington: Helicon, 2009. Credo Reference.
^ Jump up to:^a ^b Garfield, Eugene (6). "A Tribute to S. R. Ranganathan, the Father of Indian Library Science. Part 1. Life and Works". Essays of an Information Scientist 7: 37–44. Retrieved 26 April 2012.
Jump up^ Srivastava, A.P. (1977). Ranganathan: A pattern maker. New Dehli: Metropolitan Book Co., p. 125.
Jump up^ Garfield, Eugene (6). "A Tribute to S. R. Ranganathan, the Father of Indian Library Science. Part 1. Life and Works". Essays of an Information Scientist 7: 37–44
Jump up^ Srivastava, A.P. (1977). Ranganathan: A pattern maker. New Dehli: Metropolitan Book Co., p. 46.
Jump up^ Srivastava, A.P. (1977). Ranganathan: A pattern maker. New Dehli: Metropolitan Book Co.
Jump up^ Srivastava, A.P. (1977). Ranganathan: A pattern maker. New Dehli: Metropolitan Book Co.
Jump up^ Srivastava, A.P. (1977). Ranganathan: A pattern maker. New Dehli: Metropolitan Book Co., p. 30-31
Jump up^ Kabir, A. (2003). Ranganathan: A Universal Librarian. Journal Of Educational Media & Library Sciences, 40, 453-459.
Jump up^ Srivastava, A.P. (1977). Ranganathan: A pattern maker. New Delhi: Metropolitan Book Co., p. 2.

External links[edit]

Portal on Dr. S R Ranganathan from India
Ranganathan for Information Architects by Mike Steckel
Ranganathan's Monologue on Melvil Dewey, Recorded 1964 – transcript
India's First IT Guru
Ranganathan- Profile in Brief
Works by or about S. R. Ranganathan in libraries (WorldCat catalog)
Full-view works by S.R. Ranganathan at HathiTrust Digital Library.

Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan

Born: Aug. 9, 1892 at Shiyali, Madras, India
Died: Sept. 27, 1972 at Bangalore, Mysore

Indian librarian and educator (mathematician) who was considered the father of library science in India and whose contributions had worldwide influence.

Ranganathan's chief technical contributions to library science were in classification and indexing theory. His Colon Classification(1933) introduced a system that is widely used in research libraries around the world and that has affected the evolution of such older systems as the Dewey Decimal Classification. Later he devised the technique of chain indexing for deriving subject-index entries.

In it, there are 108 main classes and 10 generalized classes (broadly divided between the humanities and sciences), which are represented by a mixed notation of Arabic numerals and Roman and Greek letters. Each main class comprises five fundamental facets, or groups: personality, matter, energy, space, and time.

Each main class has its appropriate facets and focuses; e.g., literature has language and form. In addition, there are four floating tablesthat correspond to subdivisions -- e.g., form, geography, time, and language. Further expansion of the tables is allowed through colon addition or omission (if the subject cannot be expanded).

The collection of the University of Madras, India, was utilized in the creation of Colon Classification.

His Life in Short:

- He was educated at the Hindu High School in Shiyali, at Madras Christian College (where he took B.A. and M.A. degrees in mathematics in 1913 and 1916), and at Teachers College, Saidapet.
- In 1917 he joined the faculty of Government College, Mangalore.
- From 1920 to 1923 he subsequently taught at Government College, Coimbatore, and at Presidency College, University of Madras, in 1921-1923.
- In 1924 he was appointed first librarian of the University of Madras, and in order to fit himself for the post he traveled to England to study at University College, London.
- From 1925 to 1944 he took up the job at Madras in earnest in 1925 and held it until 1944.
- From 1945 to 1954 he served as librarian and as professor of library science at Hindu University in Varanasi (Banaras), and from 1947 to 1954 he taught at the University of Delhi.
- From 1954 to 1957 he was engaged in research and writing in Zürich.
- He returned to India in the latter year and served as visiting professor at Vikram University, Ujjain, until 1959.
- In 1962 he founded and became head of the Documentation Research and Training Centre in Bangalore, with which he remained associated for the rest of his life, and in 1965 he was honoured by the Indian government with the title of national research professor in library science.

Main works:

Five Laws of Library Science (1931)
Colon Classification (1933)
Classified Catalogue Code (1934)
Prolegomena to Library Classification (1937)
Theory of the Library Catalogue (1938)
Elements of Library Classification (1945)
Classification and International Documentation (1948)
Classification and Communication (1951)
Headings and Canons (1955).

From: Michael May - Mon Jul 10 08:07:55 EDT 2006 - [Web4lib] Open Access to S. R. Ranganathan at dLIST
«dLIST, the Digital Library of Information Science & Technology, are pleased to announce that the dLIST Classics Project has received permission from the Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science (SRELS) to provide open electronic access to the following works by S. R. Ranganathan:

Five Laws of Library Science, 1931.
New Education and School Library, 1973.
Philosophy of Library Classification, 1950.
Prolegomena to Library Classification, 3rd ed., 1967.
Classification and Communication, 1951.
Documentation: Genesis and Development, 1973.
Documentation and Its Facets, 1963.
Library Book Selection, 2nd ed., 1966
Reference Service, 2nd ed., 1961.

A preliminary scan of the prefatory matter and first chapter from the original 1931 edition of S.R. Ranganathan's Five Laws is now available at dLIST: http://dlist.sir.arizona.edu/1220»

I am indebited to Encyclopaedia Britannica, and A.C. Foskett's The Subject Approach to Information, for the above document

.........http://www.slideshare.net/anilmlis/ranganathan-biography-1830888

...........Ranganathan Biography

Document Transcript

1. 9th August ‘117th Birth Anniversary of Dr. S. R. Ranganathan and 12th August Librarians’ Day. Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan The Father of Library Science 1
2. 2
3. 3
4. Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan Born: Aug.9, 1892 at Shiyali, Madras, India Died: Sept. 27, 1972 at Bangalore, Mysore Indian librarian and educator (mathematician) who was considered the father of library science in India and whose contributions had worldwide influence. Ranganathan's chief technical contributions to library science were in classification and indexing theory. His Colon Classification (1933) introduced a system that is widely used in research libraries around the world and that has affected the evolution of such older systems as the Dewey Decimal Classification. Later he devised the technique of chain indexing for deriving subject-index entries. His Five Laws of Library Science (1931) was widely accepted as a definitive statement of the ideal of library service. He also drafted plans for a national and several state library systems, founded and edited several journals, and was active in numerous professional associations. Colon Classification is the system of library organization developed by Ranganathan in 1933. It is general rather than specific in nature, and it can create complex or new categories through the use of facets, or colons. 4
5. In it, there are 108 main classes and 10 generalized classes (broadly divided between the humanities and sciences), which are represented by a mixed notation of Arabic numerals and Roman and Greek letters. Each main class comprises five fundamental facets, or groups: personality, matter, energy, space, and time. Ranganathan's main contribution to classification was the notion of these fundamental facets, or categories. Instead of schedules of numbers for each topic, Colon Classification uses series of short tables from which component numbers are chosen and linked by colons to form a whole. The book number is an integral part of the call number, a departure from Dewey or Library of Congress systems. Each main class has its appropriate facets and focuses; e.g., literature has language and form. In addition, there are four floating tables that correspond to subdivisions -- e.g., form, geography, time, and language. Further expansion of the tables is allowed through colon addition or omission (if the subject cannot be expanded). The collection of the University of Madras, India, was utilized in the creation of Colon Classification. His Life in Short:  He was educated at the Hindu High School in Shiyali, at Madras Christian College (where he took B.A. and M.A. degrees in mathematics in 1913 and 1916), and at Teachers College, Saidapet.  In 1917 he joined the faculty of Government College, Mangalore. 5
6.  From 1920 to 1923 he subsequently taught at Government College, Coimbatore, and at Presidency College, University of Madras, in 1921-1923.  In 1924 he was appointed first librarian of the University of Madras, and in order to fit himself for the post he traveled to England to study at University College, London.  From 1925 to 1944 he took up the job at Madras in earnest in 1925 and held it until 1944.  From 1945 to 1954 he served as librarian and as professor of library science at Hindu University in Varanasi (Banaras), and from 1947 to 1954 he taught at the University of Delhi.  From 1954 to 1957 he was engaged in research and writing in Zürich.  He returned to India in the latter year and served as visiting professor at Vikram University, Ujjain, until 1959.  In 1962 he founded and became head of the Documentation Research and Training Centre in Bangalore, with which he remained associated for the rest of his life, and in 1965 he was honoured by the Indian government with the title of national research professor in library science. Main works: Five Laws of Library Science (1931) Colon Classification (1933) Classified Catalogue Code (1934) 6
7. Prolegomena to Library Classification (1937) Theory of the Library Catalogue (1938) Elements of Library Classification (1945) Classification and International Documentation (1948) Classification and Communication (1951) Headings and Canons (1955). • Five Laws of Library Science, 1931. • New Education and School Library, 1973. • Philosophy of Library Classification, 1950. • Prolegomena to Library Classification, 3rd ed., 1967. • Classification and Communication, 1951. • Documentation: Genesis and Development, 1973. • Documentation and Its Facets, 1963. • Library Book Selection, 2nd ed., 1966 • Reference Service, 2nd ed., 1961. Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan The Father of Library Science 7
8. This document is a factual account of the life work of S.R. Ranganathan. Some elements such as our alive today page are fictitious and are told in the first person. This document includes: a biography, his contributions to library science, awards and honours, a sample list of publications, positions held and resources used. Biography Dr. Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan (1892-1972) was perhaps the greatest librarian of the 20th century. As an educator, librarian, and thinker, his contributions to the field of library science surpassed all others, and placed the country of India permanently on the world library stage. Ranganathan made two indispensable contributions to the library profession: the Five Laws of Library Science (1931) and Colon Classification (1933). Besides these two major contributions, Ranganathan also studied a wide variety of library topics, including the education of librarians, library administration and organization, reference services, and collection management, among others. Ranganathan was born in Madras, India on August 9, 1892, and was first trained as a mathematician, becoming a lecturer of mathematics at the University of 8
9. Madras . In 1924, he was offered a position of librarian at the University, on condition that he would travel to University College in London to study contemporary librarianship. During his studies in Great Britain, Ranganathan visited countless numbers of public and college libraries throughout the country, which helped him to focus his thoughts in the areas of classification, cataloguing, and library services. Ranganathan saw libraries as essential elements in helping societies grow and thrive through the spreading of literacy, which made him focus his studies in the area of library services. He also saw libraries as places of service and intellectual dialogue, and he perceived library workers, as both scholars, who should continue to research and explore in the field, as well as teachers, sharing their knowledge with members of society. Ranganathan based his studies from his mathematical background and his beliefs in Hindu mysticism and the Analytico -Synthetic Method ( Pruiett ) . In this method, he examined complex phenomena, broke his observations into small pieces, and then attempted to connect the pieces together in a systematic way. Girja Kumar wrote in a biography of Ranganathan, "There had not been a day of the life of Ranganathan since 1924 when he did not breathe, think, talk, and even dream of librarianship and library science." (Kumar, 1992). Kumar also says, [Ranganathan] spent two decades as librarian of Madras University. Never did he take any vacations during this period, and during his entire twenty-year tenure as librarian at the University, he did not take even one day leave. He spent 13 hours every day for seven days a week on the premises of the library. (Kumar) After leaving the University of Madras in 1945, Ranganathan served as a librarian and professor of library science at Hindu University in Varanasi , and he also taught at the University of Delhi from 1947 to 1954. During 1954 to 1957, he was engaged in research and writing in Zurich, Switzerland, and he returned to India in 1957 and served as visiting professor at Vikram University until 1959. In 1962, he founded and became head of the Documentation Research and Training Centre in Bangalore, and in 1965 he was honoured by the Indian government with the title of national research professor in library science. 9
10. Ranganathan wrote his 62 major books in the evenings, during his off hours from the University. Besides Colon Classification and the Five Laws of Library Science, other important works written by him, include Classified Catalogue Code (1934), Prolegomena to Library Classification (1937), Theory of the Library Catalogue (1938), Elements of Library Classification (1945), Classification and International Documentation (1948), Classification and Communication (1951) and Headings and Canons (1955), among many others. In addition to the large number of books and articles written by Ranganathan, he also created many professional and educational organizations, primarily in India, and he participated in library movements around the world. When he died on September 27, 1972 in Bangalore, Mysore, the world lost one of the pioneers, maybe even the creator, of the library and information science field, and his writings will continue to be a significant impact and influence on the library world, especially in today's growing electronic environment. A DAY IN THE LIFE Although countless numbers of books provide great insight into S.R. Ranganathan's ideas, thoughts, and theories of library science, not many provide a look into his everyday life or what the experience was like for students in his classes. TEACHING METHODS Ranganathan used the powerful teaching method of exposition, and attempted to bring the scientific method to the library world. He did not simply lecture or read prepared notes to his students, but instead created a continuous give-and-take between himself and his students. Questions, answers, discussion, and practical application would freely flow back and forth between teacher and student. Ranganathan felt the most important component of teaching was to first build a teacher-student relationship of familiarity. A student once said: "From the first day to the last you will never feel that you are with someone who is high and far beyond your reach he gradually tries to help you in casting off your fears, reserves, and emotions completely so you may be very frank and expressive with him" (Shukla 570). 10
11. If a difficult point was attempting to be taught, Ranganathan would use an anecdote, narrative experience or an analogy, of which he would never fail to be without. He felt this would provide the students with a better grasp of the topic at hand, and help them to understand the intricacies of librarianship. His ideal was "to make a dull student bright, a dumb student talk, a blind student see, and a weak student write" (Kaula 656). Also, he believed repetition was important in ensuring students fully comprehended the material, and he believed terminology and idea were inseparable. For example, Ranganathan would put questions to the students to get them involved with a new idea, and make them give the answers in precise terminology, in full sentences, and until correct answers were given by all. He attempted to make his students think and use what they have learned. He would not forget the weaker students, and patiently teach each and every member of his classes, while using his humourous anecdotes and stories to prevent anyone else from becoming bored. Another student once said: "I remember that at times his lectures were so thrilling that we could not help but discussing amongst ourselves the class room proceedings even after the class was over" (Guha 578). Students in his classes had the main part to play in reasoning out all details and Ranganathan acted simply as a guide to help them proceed along the right lines. Everyone in his classes had to be alert to think quickly and provide a contribution to the discussion of the topic. Following the discussion, Ranganathan would then provide a reshaping of the classes' contributions, taking everyone's points into consideration, and provide guidance for additional study, reading, and homework. AN AVERAGE DAY: An average day for Ranganathan began at dawn, as he got up when it is still dark to begin working on whatever he was currently engaged in (e.g. a book, a new article). Then he went out for his morning walk, along with fellow librarians, visiting scholars, and students, to discuss various library science issues. Classes and lectures may be scheduled throughout the day, between which, he continued to work on his research, while also answering letters well into the evening, and tending to discussions with various groups who come to visit him. When he completed all his articles and work, and answered all his letters for the day, he headed to bed. Even his sleep was rarely 11
12. peaceful, as his mind continued to think about various issues and problems for the next day's articles and discussions. Some other interesting facts about Ranganathan included the following: • Ranganathan lived a very simple life of non-extravagance and austerity, as he enjoyed doing the majority of his work from a mat on the floor; his powerful concentration allowed him to work for long hours, both early in the morning and late at night, and through anything, even several Indian civil wars. • Ranganathan was said to breathe libraries at all times, and he would talk nothing but library science. He would sometimes even be so engrossed deeply in his work that he would forget to eat his food, and go for days without any sleep or rest. • Ranganathan made huge impacts in any library meetings, conferences and discussions that he attended, due to his strict routine of advanced preparation, in which he would review agendas and make notes prior to meetings. He always wanted to be prepared for any point or question which may have come his way. • Ranganathan was constantly recognized for his punctuality. He would never be late for any meeting, and was always the first to enter the library and last to leave at night. Also, in his correspondence, he was meticulously prompt. He would always reply to a letter the same day it was received, and he read each and every letter, and provided the author with a hand-written response. • Beyond the classroom, Ranganathan organized weekly teaching seminars, making senior students the leaders, and provide yet another forum for discussion and deliberation. As well, he encouraged all of his students to contribute papers to various conferences and symposiums throughout India . Finally, Ranganathan enjoyed taking regular morning walks, during which he and his colleagues, and students would discuss the papers, various library problems, go around helping students, etc. 12
13. • Ranganathan appreciated the people who were just as hardworking as he was, and one of his weaknesses was that he would judge others by using himself as a measuring rod. He attached the highest value to the character of a person, and only dealt with those people who met his high standards of character. He was not one who easily took the middle road or was open to compromise, and was not one who believed in any time-wasting. However, he still was extremely accessible to all, and was an unassuming man, who always had time for discussion on anything. Contributions S.R. Ranganathan (1892-1972) I am an inventor, educator, librarian, philosopher and mathematician. In 1928 I became involved in the development of the library at the University of Madras. This was a period in library history when the world was grappling with fundamental questions: What is a library? What is library service? I believed that all human activities were susceptible to analysis using the scientific method and that such a careful examination of the phenomena of library work could lead to the formulation of empirical "laws." These are not laws in the sense that, say, the Second Law of Thermodynamics is a law. However, they are more than mere generalities because they are founded on observation and analysis. The principles I enunciate in my 5 Laws of Library Science are the first and, to date, the only clear definition of a library's functions and responsibilities. Although simply stated, the Laws demand contemplation and experience before the richness and import of their meaning will be revealed. The Laws provide essential guidelines for librarians with the potential for planning and providing patron services in 13
14. all types of libraries. For a complete examination of these laws, please read my book. This is just a brief summary of my theories. Five Laws of Library Science • Books are for use • Every reader his/her book • Every book, its reader • Save the time of the reader • A library is a growing organism First Law: Books are For Use It is wrong to conclude from my words that books are the only library materials that matter to me. My point is that libraries must acquire materials and make them accessible so they can be used. This law gives definition both to the concept of an open-stack library and to a library that is appointed with tools and furnishings that make the books it contains useful. Books are to be taken from locked back rooms and brought out to welcoming rooms with open shelves. Shelves need to be accessible to more than one user at a time. Libraries are to be located in the midst of their communities. Whatever be the library location, hours of operation, type of furniture and the way in which books are kept, it is the Library Staff that ultimately make or mar a library. A Modern Librarian who has faith in this law is happy only when the readers make the shelves constantly empty. Second Law: Every Reader His or Her Book This law reveals the fundamental issue of tension between the cost of materials and the basic right of all persons to have access t the materials they need. This makes acquisitions very important; each acquisition should call to mind a potential user. One must always be mindful that since no one individual can own all the 'books', the libraries must acquire a body of literature or research materials that will benefit each of its readers and researchers. The collection must be appropriate to the Library's Mission. Librarians must know the materials, its uses, and how to use it. Reference service gains its legitimacy and its purpose from this law. Clearly, it is the business of librarians to 14
15. know the reader, to know the books, and to actively help in the finding by every person of his or her book. Third Law: Every Book its Reader This law addresses the fundamental issue of open access. Open access means that the collection can be examined with as much freedom as if it was the reader's private library. In addition, when a library user comes to the library, or gains access to the library's services, there are certain materials that will meet his or her needs. It is the library's job to ensure that the connection between the user and the materials are made, and that the connection is as speedy and practical as possible. There are many ways in which a library can connect its users to its resources: Distribution of acquisition lists New Book displays Providing Research Guides Newsletters Book Lists The use of a structured, well-thought out classification scheme is a necessity for connecting library users to materials, as it ensures uniformity of treatment of various materials on similar topics. Also important is the accurate arrangement of materials, as mis-shelving a book can make it all but invisible to the user. Fourth Law: Save the Time of the Reader Perhaps this law is not so self-evident as the others. None the less, it has been responsible for many reforms in library administration. A Library must examine every aspect of its policies, rules, procedures, and systems with the one simple criteria that saving the time of the reader is vital to the library's mission. Policies must formulate with the needs of the library's user in mind. For example, hours of operation must be set in order to ensure appropriate and convenient access, and the collection must be arranged in an inviting, clear, and obvious way so as not to waste the time of the users. Saving time of the user means providing efficient, thorough access to materials. 15
16. Fifth Law: The Library is a Growing Organism The 5th law tells us about the vital and lasting characteristics of the library as an institution and enjoins the need for a constatnt adjustment of our outlook in dealing with it. Libraries grow and change, and will always do so. Collections increase and change, technology changes and budgets change. Change comes along with growth, and in order to be healthy, that change and growth requires flexibility in the management of the collections, in the use of space, in the recruitment, retention and deployment of staff, and the nature of our programs. My Laws Still Apply Today My laws are meant to be elemental, in order to capture essential meaning and to convey a deep understanding of libraries. As libraries change with time these laws are meant to endure. However, I would like to express how these Laws pertain to the present state of information management and access. Books are for Use Limiting access to books has prevailed through time, and exists even today. The maintenance of special collections with limited access, storing materials off- site, restricting access to libraries based on membership or fees, and even by selecting materials that are contracted in such a way as to limit use, such as when print resources are eliminated in favour of an electronic version of the material that is only accessible to certain patrons with passwords, are all modern equivalents of chaining books to the shelves. Another aspect of this first law that is still relevant is that libraries are about service or they are about nothing. In order to deliver and reap the rewards of services, libraries must identify the benefits that society can reasonably expect and then devise means of delivering those benefits. Service always has a purpose, and our careers of service still have purpose. 16
17. Every Reader His or Her Book Any library that limits access in any way must ensure that this restriction does not prevent adequate access to the collection by the people that the library was created to serve. Access policies also have implications for interlibrary loan, cooperative acquisitions, and consortia to which the library may belong. Libraries must also be concerned with programs that provide for the preservation of materials in alternate formats, such as microfiche, CD-ROM, and other electronic formats. Librarians need to ask them selves:Which formats are appropriate? Which format will be most useful for the user? What additional hardware or software must be acquired to facilitate their usage? Who will or won't have access? What are the issues surrounding access to printing, passwords, etc? Librarians must acknowledge that users of the libraries, themselves included, use and value different means of communications in the pursuit of knowledge, information and entertainment. Libraries must value all means of preserving and communicating the records and achievements of the human mind and heart. Every Book its Reader In the digital age, getting the 'book' to its reader presents librarians with unique challenges, and the challenges presented by the emergence of electronic resources cannot be overstated! Libraries today must deal with electronic resources that are available 'within' the library but are neither owned nor shelved by the library. Libraries also have the additional challenge of providing access to 'cyber visitors' who use the library's web site for research. Technology, when intelligently applied, is a wonderful, life-enhancing thing. Technology exists to support the mission of librarians to assist in ready and free access to recorded knowledge and information, and to deliver library services effectively. However, technology must be useful, affordable, and cost- effective, and anything beyond that is on the path to dashed expectations and skewed priorities. 17
18. Save the Time of the Reader When a library subscribes to electronic resources, appropriate access to them must be provided. When electronic databases are made available to the public, public access terminals and printing resources must also be made available. Naturally, libraries must also make the best use of available IP and networking technology. If materials are stored off-site (which in essence breaks the first law), provision must be made for easy and timely retrieval of those items. Well-planned and executed library handbooks, stack guides, and library tours, or research instruction sessions also serve the goal of saving the time of the reader. The library must also provide adequate staffing of reference, information, and circulation desks, as well as telephone and chat reference. Ultimately, employing the best available technologies to provide quick access to materials saves the time of the reader. The Library is a Growing Organism I have shown, both in my original writings and in the adaptations of those laws to the present, how libraries have changed over time. The most obvious change I've addressed here is the shift to electronic resources. This shift has had a major impact on library funding and budget management. It is a common fallacy among many library administrators (professionals and non-librarians alike) who control library budgets that one way to save money is to merely cancel groups of subscriptions and then restart them in a year or so. As a living organism, libraries consume information, and any cessation in the flow of information starves the organism. Cutting a library off from its resources at any arbitrary point will surely make it ill, and perhaps may even kill it. Positions Held • Member Imperial Library Committee (1932-1934) • Committee on National Central Library (1948) • International Committee Of Library Experts, United Nations (1948) • Faculty, UNESCO International School on Public Librarianship (1948) 18
19. • Advisory Committee of INSDOC, New Delhi (1951) • International Committee on Bibliography of UNESCO (1951-1953) • Board of Studies in Library Science, Osmania University (1960) Secretary • Lunch Club, Presidency College, Madras (1922-1923) • Mathematics and Science Section, Madras Teachers' Guild (1922-1923) • Madras Library Association (1928-1948) • Library Service Section of All Asia Educational Conference, Benaras (1930) • Indian Adult Education Association (1949-1953) • FID committee on general classification. (He was also the Chairman of the FID Committee) (1954-1964) President/Chairman • President, Indian Library Association (1944-1953) • Chairman, Documentation Committee of Indian Standards Institution (1947) • Vice President, FID (1953-1956) • Vice President, Indian Adult Education (1953) • Chaiman, FID Committee on General Classificiation. (He was also the Secretary of the FID Committee) (1954-9164) • President, Madras Library Association (1958) • Chairman, Library buildings , fittings and furniture committee of the Indian Standards Institution (1958) • Vice President, FID (1958-1961) • Chairman, Library Committee University Grants Commission, New Delhi (1958-1959) • Chairman, Review Committee on Library Science, University Grants Commission (1960) • Chairman, Library Science Courses Committee, University of Madras (1960) • Chairman, Expert Committee on Library Science, Banaras Hindu University (1960) • Chairman, Committee for Library Science Course, Mysore University (1960) 19
20. • Chairman, Preservation of Documents Section, Indian Standards Institution, Kanpur (1961) • Chairman, Committee to draft the Library bill for Mysore State (1962) Founder • Professor B. Ross endowment in Mathematics at the Christian College, Madras (1925) • Abgila (1949) • Library Research Circle, Delhi (1950) • Delhi Seminar in Library Science, University of Delhi (1950) • FID Committee on General Classification (1954) • Annals of Library Science (1956) • MP Library Association (1958) • Documentation Research and Training Center, Bangalore (1962) • Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science (1963) • Library Science with a Slant to Documentation (1965) Editor • Editorial Board, Modern Librarian (1937-1947) • Editorial Board, Indian Librarian (1947) • Abgila , Indian Library Association (1949-1953) • Associate Editor, Libri (1951) • Annals of Library Science (1956-1963) • American Documentation (1959) • Library Science with a Slant to Documentation (1965-1972) Consultant • UNESCO for preparing the place of machinery in literature search (1950) • Jaffna Public Library (1952) • Library Development Plan for Kerala State 20
21. Positions held in Conferences/Seminars • President, Pudukkotta Library Conference (1926) • Local Secretary, All India Public Library Conference held in Madras (1927) • President, First Library Conference of Central Provinces and Berar (1946) • President, All India Adult Educational Conference, Mysore (1948) • President, All India Library Conference, Nagpur (1949) • President, Gwalior Library Conference (1950) • Secretary, Seminar on Literature for Neoliterates, Okhla, Delhi (1953) • Director, Seminar on Social Service Research on Libraries (1959) • President, Bengal Library Conference at Nawadwip (1959) • Director, UGC Seminar on Work flow from publisher to reader - workflow in college and university libraries (1959) • Chairman, Indian Library convention, Delhi (1959) Chairman, Documentation Section, Second Indian Standards Convention, Hyderabad (1959) • Director, Govt. of India, Seminar on School Libraries, Bangalore (1962) • Director, Govt. of Andra Pradesh Seminar (1962) • Director, National Seminar , DRTC, Bangalore (1963) • Director, MWF - Masters' course and T, Th and PhD course, University of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA (1964) • Chairman, International Study Conference on Classification, Elsinor, Denmark (1964) • Director, International Seminar on Colon Classification, Rutgers University, USA (1964) Honours/Awards • Rao Sahib Govt. of India (1935) • D.Litt (Honoris causa), Delhi University (1948) • Honorary Fellow, Virginia Bibliographic Society (1951) • Patron, Delhi Library Association (1954) • Honorary member, Indian Association of Special Libraries and Information Centers (1956) • Padmashree, Govt. of India (1957) 21
22. • Honorary Vice President, Library Association, London (1957) • Honorary Fellow, International Federation for Documentation (1957) • D.Litt (Honoris causa), University of Pittsburgh, USA (1964) • National Research Professor for Library science, Govt. of India (1965) • Honorary Fellow, Indian Standards Institution (1967) • Margaret Mann Award, American Library Association (1970) • Grand Knight of Peace , Mark Twain Soceity, USA (1971) Honourary Works • Professor in Library Science, University of madras (1929-1944) • Visiting Lecturer in Library Classification, University of Bombay (1944) • Professor of Library Science, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi (1945-1947) • Member of the Faculty, UNESCO International School for Public Librarianship, Manchester(1948) • Professor in Library Science, University of Delhi (1949-1955) • Visiting Lecturer of Library Schools, United Kingdom (1956) • Visiting Professor of Library Science, Vikram University, Ujjain (1957-1959) • Visiting Lecturer of Library Schools, USA, Canada and Japan (1958) • Honorary Professor, Documentation Research and Training Centre, Bangalore (1962) • Visiting Lecturer of Library Schools, University of Pittsburgh (1964) Publications Prof. S R Ranganathan contributed over 1500 articles to the literature General Works Five Laws of Library Science (First Edition in 1931). Education for Leisure (First edition in 1945). Preface to Library Science (First edition in 1948). Library Service for all (First edition 1965). 22
23. Library Organization and Library System Model Library Act (First edition in 1935). Post-War Reconstruction of Libraries in India (First edition in 1944). National Library System: A plan for India (First edition in 1946). Library Development Plan for India (First edition in 1950). Library Legislation, A Handbook to Madras Library Act (First edition in 1953). Education and Library System of the Nation (First edition in 1971). Book Selection Library Book Selection (First edition in 1952). Classification Colon Classification (First edition in 1933). Prolegomena to Library Classification (First edition in 1937). Library Classification: Fundamentals & Procedures (First edition in 1944). Elements of Library Classification (First edtion in 1945). Classification and International Documentation (First edition in 1948). Classification, Coding and Machinery for Search (First edition in 1950). Cataloguing Classified Catalogue Code (First edition in 1934). Dictionary Catalogue Code (First edition in 1945). Library Administration Library Administration (First edition in 1935). Library Organization (First edition in 1946). Library Manual (First edition in 1951). 23
24. Thank you Source: http://www.digitallantern.net/school/ranganathan.htm> (March 21, 2004). Anil Kumar Mishra, Information Consultant, Learning Resource Centre (LRC), Indian School of Business (ISB), Hyderabad, India. 24

.....Ranganathan, Shiyali Ramamrita (1892-1972)

Indian mathematician and library scientist. Founder of "Colon Classification System" and influential thinker within library classification (in the facet analytic approach).

According to Moss (1964) Ranganathan based his system of five categories (PMEST: Personality, Matter, Energy, Space and Time) on that of Aristotle without recognizing this.

Henning Spang-Hanssen found that Ranganathan's distinction between idea-plane and verbal-plane is problematic because the description of the two planes will lead to one and the same structure. Of this reason there can be no motivation to speak about the two planes. (Quote in Danish:)

”I diskussionen efter min fremlæggelse af disse synspunkter på seminaret 3.-8. december 1973 nævnte Tor Henriksen, at der kan være en værdi i at skelne mellem indholdssubstans og indholdsform for dermed at kunne parallelisere med Ranganathans 3 planer: Idéplan (indholdssubstans) Verbalplan (indholdsform), Notationsplan (udtryks-form). Jeg finder selve sammenligningen værdifuld, men for mig er spørgsmålet netop, om Idéplanet i klassifikationssystemer er anderledes end Verbalplanet, dvs. om man kan opstille en struktur i idéplanet, som er forskellig fra Verbalplanets. Hvis beskrivelsen af de to planer fører til en og samme struktur, finder jeg det umotiveret at tale om to planer (men man vil til visse formål kunne tale om to sider af planet) .” (Spang-Hanssen, 1974, p. 39)

Lancaster et al. (1992) write about the way Ranganathan is quoted in the literature:

"Nevertheless, it is also necessary to point out that many of the references are very superficial ones, acknowledging some intellectual debt to Ranganathan without actually explicating Ranganathan's work or even explaining in detail the nature of the debt. A few authors seem to make such non‑substantive references to Ranganathan in more or less every article they write"... (Lancaster et al. 1992, p. 276).

Francis Miksa writes:

"I for one am also tempted to conclude that Ranganathan's faceted universe of subjects has been adopted as much for what appears to be some sort of intuitive correctness as for any other reason, but a claim of this sort is little more than unsupported speculation. Still, one cannot easily miss how nicely his formulation of the facet idea seems to fit certain subject areas, and this may be reason enough to adopt it as a standard approach, regardless of whether it has any sound scientific basis or whether it always serves well. " (Miksa, 1998, p. 75)

Ranganathan is not very much cited in Library and Information Science (LIS) today. A search performed 26-12-2005 made a set of 329 CR=RANGANATHAN SR,? (to compare, the same date in Social SciSearch: 567 CR=INGWERSEN P,?). This low rate of citation of a leading figure may be interpreted in different ways. His influence would probably be larger if measured by citations in textbooks used in schools of LIS. It may also be interpreted as a relatively poor performance of facet analysis compared to other approaches to knowledge organization and information retrieval. Finally it may be interpreted as a relatively weak representation of library classification compared to retrieval techniques developed in other fields such as computer science.

"Ranganthan in his unique style of design research firmly postulated the categories (in a way rationalist), and claimed they existed until proven otherwise – linking the ontological status of his PMEST to a more pragmatic concept of usefulness. The epistemology, theory, and methodology of this design discourse starts from the assumption of utility based on purpose, not on a rational realism of constantly existing things called categories. When we read Ranganathan, we can see that knowledge of facets is not permanent or fixed. We are told (Ranganathan 1967, 398): One may ask “Why should the Fundamental Ideas [Categories] postulated be five? Why not 3? Why not 6?” It is possible. There is absolute freedom for everybody to try it out. A person may be fond of six. He must classify on the basis of some thousands of assorted articles. If they produce satisfactory results in arranging the subjects of the articles along a line, that postulate may be accepted. This is not a strict rationalist stance, but more of a pragmatic, if not neo-pragmatic epistemic stance and method (cf. Rorty 1982, 1999). Try it, and if it works, if it is useful, don’t worry about real or true. For Ranganathan utility was the final judge. His fundamental categories were used to classify in order to save time for the reader. This interpretation differs from others’, but is an attempt to align an implicit epistemic stance with the technique of writing in order to design a system." (Tennis, 2008, p. 108).

Tennis point out an important contradiction in Ranganathan (or in the interpretation of Ranganathan by Hjørland, 1992). No doubt Ranganathan in the quote above states a pragmatic standpoint. But is there any indication in the methodology of facet analysis that he (or his followers) actually practiced a pragmatic approach. Did he (they) examine the fruitfulness of different systems of categories? (if so: did they argue for the best approach in the literature, or did they just follow their intuitions?). In other terms: Are there scholarly or scientific evidence of a pragmatic approach in the tradition of facet analysis?

Literature:

Afzal, R. K. & Cathrine Pedersen, C. (1993). En analyse af Ranganathans emne- og klassifikationsteori - og dens indflydelse på vidensklassifikation indenfor biblioteks- og informationsvidenskaben. Specialeopgave. Kandidatuddannelsen i Biblioteks- og Informationsvidenskab.

Ellis, D. & Vasconcelos, A. (1999). Ranganathan and the Net: Using Facet Analysis to Search and Organise World Wide Web. Aslib Proceedings: New Information Perspectives 51(1), 3-10.

Foskett, D. J. (1992). Ranganathan and 'User-Friendliness'. Libri 42(3), 235-241.

Garfield, E. (1984). A tribute to S. R. Ranganathan, the farther of Indian library science. Current Contents, February 6http://www.garfield.library.upenn.edu/essays/v7p037y1984.pdf

Glassel, A. (1998). Was Ranganathan a Yahoo!? End User's Corner. http://www.scout.wisc.edu/Projects/PastProjects/toolkit/enduser/archive/1998/euc-9803.html

Hjørland, B. (1992). The Concept of "Subject" in Information Science". Journal of Documentation, 48(2), 172-200.

Hjørland, B. (1993). Emnerepræsentation og informationssøgning. Et bidrag til en teori på kundskabsteoretisk grundlag. Göteborg: Valfrid.

Ingwersen, P. & Wormell, I. (1992). Ranganathan in the perspective of advanced information retrieval. Libri, 42, 184-201.

Lancaster, F. W., Zeter, M. J., & Metzler, L. (1992). Ranganathan's influence examined bibliometrically. Libri, 42(3), 268281.

Metcalfe, J. (19739. When is a Subject not a Subject? IN: Towards a theory of Librarianship. Ed. by Conrad H. Rawski. New York: Scarecrow Press.

Miksa, F. (1997). Influence of Mathematics on Classification Theory of S.R. Ranganathan. In Knowledge Organization for Information Retrieval. Proceedings of the Sixth International Study Conference on Classification Research Held at University College London, 16-18 June 1997, pp. 167-179. FID 716. Hague: International Federation for Information and Documentation.

Miksa, F. (1998). The DDC, the Universe of Knowledge, and the Post-Modern Library. Albany, NY: Forest Press.

Moss, R. (1964). Categories and Relations: Origins of Two Classification Theories. American Documentation, 296-301.

Ranganathan, S. R. (1931) The Five Laws of Library Science. Madras Library Association (Madras, India) and Edward Goldston (London, UK).

Ranganathan, S. R. (1933). Colon Classification. Madras: Madras Library Association. (1st edition).

Ranganathan, S. R. (1937). Prolegomena to Library Classification. The Madras Library Association. 2nd Ed, The MadrasLibrary Association, 1957. 3rd edition. London: Asia Publishing House, 1967. Digital version available at:
http://dlist.sir.arizona.edu/1151/

Ranganathan, S. R. (1944). Library Classification: Fundamental and Procedure with 1008 Graded Examples and Exercises. Madras: The Madras Library Association.

Ranganathan, S. R. (1945). Elements of Library Classification. Poona: N. K. Publishing House. (2nd Ed., Asia Publishing House, 1960; 3rd Ed. Asia Publishing House, 1962).

Ranganathan, S. R. (1948). Preface to Library Science. Delhi: University of Delhi.

Ranganathan, S. R. (1951a) Classification and Communication. University of Delhi (Delhi, India).

Ranganathan, S. R. (1951b) Documentation Genesis and Development. Vikas Publishing House (Delhi, India).

Ranganathan, S. R. (1951c). Philosophy of Library Classification. Copenhagen: Munksgaard.

Ranganathan S. R. (1953). Depth Classification and Reference Services and Reference Material, Indian LibraryAssociation.

Ranganathan, S. R. (1957). The Five Laws of Library Science. 1st edition: Madras Library Association, 1931. 2ed. edition. London: Blunt & Sons.

Ranganathan, S. R. (1965). Classified Catalogue Code with additional rules for dictionary catalogue code. 5th edition. Bombay: Asia Publishing House, 1965. (Ranganathan series in Library Science, 12).

Ranganathan, S. R. (1960). Colon Classification. 6th edition. London: Asia Publishing House. [7.ed. ed. by M. P. Satija, 1989]

Ranganathan, S. R. (1967) Prolegomena to Library Classification. Asia Publishing House (New York).

Ranganathan, S. R. (1989) Philosophy of Library Classification. Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science (Bangalore, India).

Samurin, E. I. (1967). Geschichte der bibliotekarisch-bibliographischen Klassifikation. Band I-II. München: Verlag Dokumentation.

Sharma, P. S. K. (1978). Treatment of Indian philosophy and religions in Colon Classification. International Library Review, 10, 283-300.

Spang-Hanssen, H. (1974). Kunnskapsorganisasjon, informasjonsgjenfinning, automatisering og språk. In:Kunnskapsorganisasjon og informasjonsgjenfinning. Oslo: Riksbibliotektjenesten, pp. 11–61. Spang_Hanssen_1974.pdf

Tennis, Joseph T. (2008). Epistemology, Theory, and Methodology in Knowledge Organization: Toward a Classification, Metatheory, and Research Framework. Knowledge Organization, 35(2/3), 102-112.

See also: Chain indexing (Lifeboat for KO); Colon Classification (Lifeboat for KO); Facet and facet analysis (Lifeboat for KO).

Generic group: Information science, biography

..............................................................

DR. S .R .RANGANATHAN

FATHER OF INDIAN LIBRARY SCIENCE

NAME: Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan

LIFE SPAN: 1892-1972.

Ranganathan Was Born in 1892 in Shiyali in The Tanjur district Of Madras State.
His Family Belonged to the Brahman Community.

QUALIFICATION: M.A.(maths) -- then Librarianship.

He received his B.A. in 1913, and an M.A. in Mathematics in 1916.

In 1917,he received a Professional Teaching Certificate from Teacher's College, Saidapet, Madras.
He then taught Physics and Mathematics at Government College ,Mangalore; Government College, Coimbatore;
and Presidency College, Madras.

Then he studied at the School of Librarianship, University College, London , under W.C. Berwick Sayers,
the chief librarian of the Croydon Public Library.

Ranganathan received an honors certificate from the school at the end of his stay.

WIFE: Sarada Ranganathan

Sarada Ranganathan Endowment trust for Library Science, founded by Ranganathan in honor of his wife.
The purpose of the endowment is to promote and publish research in library science.

CONTRIBUTION:

THE FIVE LAWS OF LIBRARY SCIENCE,
These were published in 1931.
The five laws are the following simple statements:
1) Books Are For Use,
2) Every Reader His Book,
3) Every Book Its Reader,
4) Save The Time Of The Reader,
5) A Library Is A Growing Organism

COLON CLASSIFICATION
Not until 1933 did Ranganathan publish his first major work on his new classification system ,The Colon Classification.

Its basic principles,however, require the analysis of a subject to determine its various
aspects, called facets, and the synthesis of a class number from the numbers assigned in published schedules to different facets.
Thus, Colon Classtilcation is known as an analytico -synthetic classification system.

Ranganathan was the first to fully explicate facet theory,and his work has had a major impact on modern classification schemes

CLASSIFIED CATALOGUE CODE
In 1934, just a year after The Colon Classification came out, Ranganathan published another important work, the Classified Catalogue Code.

Ranganathan maintained, however,that a catalog should consist of two components:-
One part should be classified by subject, reflecting the library's classification system, with class number entries.
The other should be a dictionary catalog, including author,title, series, and similar identifiers, as well as alphabetized subject entries.

The function of a catalog is to itemize works so they can be found by author, title, series, and so forth. It must also allow readers to review the selection of works on a given subject

CHAIN INDEXING
To determine subject entries for the dictionary catalog, Ranganathan devised an ingeniously Simple method called chain indexing.

This method simply uses each facet of a subject, together with its immediately preceding facets, as an index entry.
Thus, all important aspects of the subject, from the most general to the most specific, are automatically covered.
Chain indexing can be adapted to other classification systems as well.

PUBLICATIONS:
Although Ranganathan's works on classification and cataloging are his best recognized contributions, he published over 50 books and 1,000 papers on all aspects .

In 1935, he published the first edition of his influential book, LIBRARY ADMINISTRATION , in which he broke down library Work into approximately 1,000 component jobs
By precisely identifying many different library functions, he was able to simplify and streamline library routine.

He also wrote extensively on the physical layout and furnishings of libraries.

In addition, he founded and edited three periodicals:

The Indian Library Association Annals, Bulletin,and Granthalaya(the Hindi component of the journal);
The Annals of Library Science;
&
Library Science with a Slant to Documentation

CONTRIBUTIONS TO LIBRARY SCIENCE EDUCATION
Ranganathan worked tirelessly to professionalize library education in India.
One of his first achievements,in 1929, was to found a library school that was later incorporated into the University of Madras.
He also instituted a master of library science degree in 1948 and a doctoral program in 1950, both at the University of Delhi.
These were the first higher degree programs in library science offered in India, and probably in any of the Commonwealth countries.
Ranganathan greatly influenced the curricula and textbooks for such courses.

Ranganathan's crowning accomplishment in library education was to found the Documentation Research and Training Centre at Bangalore, under the auspices of the Indian Statistical Institute.
The center, is devoted solely to research and advanced training in documentation and information science.

Ever since his return from England, Ranganathan had hoped to establish a Western-style network of public libraries througho ut India.
His first step toward achieving this end was to form the Madras Library Association in 1928, to promote development of public libraries in the state of Madras.

He also drafted specific legislation to extend the public library system beyond the state of Madras into other areas of India.

In 1950, he published an influential work detailing plans for a system of national, state, university,public, and school libraries for the entire country.

COMMITMENT TO LIBRARY SCIENCE

Ranganathan's activity level throughout his lifetime reflects a total, selfless commitment to library science.

During his 20 years of service as librarian of the University of Madras,he took no leave.
He worked even on his wedding day, returning to the library shortly after the ceremony.

When he retired from the Madras University library, it was only to accept a series of appointments at other Indian universities and to step up his involvement in international activities.

He remained actively engaged in research until his death in 1972 at the age of 80.

Although Ranganathan is widely acknowledged as the father of library science in India,his activities extended well beyond his country's borders.

In addition to attending many international library and information science conferences, he traveled extensively on lecture tours to library science schools throughout the US and Europe.

He also participated in the activities of such international organizations as UNESCO, the International Federation of Library Associations, and the International Standards Organization.

He played a key role in setting policy for the United Nations Library and he devoted much effort to international Standardization of documentation

He also involved himself in every aspect of library work in India.
In the course of his career, he was a member or chairman of more than 25 committees which ad- dressed such issues as library administration, education of librarians,and library legislation.

CAREER

Ranganathan held several important offices in India during his long career.

He served as president of the Indian Library Association from 1944 to 1953 and
as president of the Madras Library Association from 1958 to 1967.
He also served as vice president of the Governing Council of the Indian Standards Institute from 1965 to 1972.

Although Ranganathan is widely acknowledged as the father of library science in India,his activities Extended well beyond his country's borders.
In addition to attending many international library and information science conferences, he traveled extensively on lecture tours to library science schools throughout the US and Europe.

He also participated in the activities of such international organizations as UNESCO, the International Federation of Library Associations, and the International Standards Organization.

He played a key role in setting policy for the United Nations Library and he devoted much effort to international Standardization of documentation.
He was particularly active in the International Federation for Documentation (FID).

He founded the FI committee on classification theory, served as vice president of the FID coun cil, and was elected an honorary member of FID.

He also became honorary chairman of the FID committee on classification research

HONOURS RECEIVED

Ranganathan's contributions were acknowledged 1964, he was named honorary president of the Second International Conference on Classification Research, Held in Elsinore, Denmark.

He also received a number of other high honors.

In 1935 and 1957, respectively,the Indian government bestowed on him the honorific title Rao Sahib and the public service award Padmashri.
In 1948, he received an honorary doctorate of literature from the University of Delhi.
In 1964, he received the same degree from the University of Pittsburgh.
In 1965, he was made a national research professor by the Indian government, and in 1970, he received the Margaret Mann Citation in Cataloging and Classification of the American Library Association(ALA). In 1965,
and in 1967, in honor of his seventy-first birthday, his colleagues published published two volumes of aestschrt dedicated to him.

After his death, the FID,in 1976, established the Ranganathan award in his memory. This certificate of merit is awarded biennially for a recent outstanding contribution in the field of classification,

LIFE STYLE

Besides his great capacity for work, Ranganathan was renowned for his abstemious life-style.

In spite of the good salary he earned, he adopted a Gandhi-like simplicity in diet and dress. He ate only lightly, shunned coffee and tea, and wore plain homespun garments.

He usually walked barefoot to the library and worked there barefoot, saying that the library was his home, and no one wears shoes in his own home.

As for his real home, it was sparsely furnished and lacked electricity, although he could have easily afforded these amenities.

The money he saved through years of frugal living, he gave away twice:-
In 1925 to endow a mathematics fellowship at Madras Christian College in honor of his mathematics professor, Edward B.Ross, and
In 1956 to endow the Sarada Ranganathan chair of library science at the University of Madras in honor of his wife.

This self-abnegation and devotion to work were grounded in a deep spirituality.

As T.R. Seshadri,an associate of Ranganathan, writes, "Ranganathan was born and brought up at a time when spirituality and religion still continued to be the mainsprings of Iife."

Some of his followers viewed him as a yogi.
He concentrated his whole body, mind, and soul on the discipline of library science, so they felt he had embraced it as a path to spiritual perfection.

Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan

Article Free Pass

Written byThe Editors of Encyclopædia Britannica

Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan, (born Aug. 9, 1892, Shiyali, Madras, India—died Sept. 27, 1972, Bangalore, Mysore), Indian librarian and educator who was considered the father of library science in India and whose contributions had worldwide influence.

Ranganathan was educated at the Hindu High School in Shiyali, at Madras Christian College (where he took B.A. and M.A. degrees in mathematics in 1913 and 1916), and at Teachers College, Saidapet. In 1917 he joined the faculty of Government College, Mangalore. He subsequently taught at Government College, Coimbatore, in 1920 and at Presidency College,University of Madras, in 1921–23. In 1924 he was appointed first librarian of the University of Madras, and in order to fit himself for the post he traveled to England to study at University College, London. He took up the job at Madras in earnest in 1925 and held it until 1944. From 1945 to 1947 he served as librarian and as professor of library science at Hindu University in Vārānasi (Banaras), and from 1947 to 1954 he taught at the University of Delhi. During 1954–57 he was engaged in research and writing in Zürich. He returned to India in the latter year and served as visiting professor at Vikram University, Ujjain, until 1959. In 1962 he founded and became head of the Documentation Research and Training Centre in Bangalore, with which he remained associated for the rest of his life, and in 1965 he was honoured by the Indian government with the title of national research professor in library science.

Ranganathan’s chief technical contributions to library science were in classification and indexing theory. His Colon Classification (1933) introduced a system that is widely used in research libraries around the world and that has affected the evolution of such older systems as the Dewey Decimal Classification. Later he devised the technique of “chain indexing” for deriving subject-index entries. Other works of his included Classified Catalogue Code (1934),Prolegomena to Library Classification (1937), Theory of the Library Catalogue (1938), Elements of Library Classification (1945), Classification and International Documentation (1948), Classification and Communication (1951), and Headings and Canons (1955). His Five Laws of Library Science (1931) was widely accepted as a definitive statement of the ideal of library service. He also drafted plans for a national and several state library systems, founded and edited several journals, and was active in numerous professional associations.

The Pioneers: S. R. Ranganathan

D. J. Foskett

Introduction: With the exception of Melvil Dewey, there is probably no librarian as widely known and universally admired as Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan, whose birth centennial falls in 1992. TWL is pleased to offer in his honor an appreciation of his pioneering accomplishments, written by a man who knew him and participated in the advancement of his ideas. —G.A.M.

Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan,

Courtesy of American Libraries

It is safe to say that no single individual has made quite such a wide-ranging contribution to the development of library and information services in his own country as S. R. Ranganathan. Internationally, he is probably best known for his revolutionary theories on bibliographical classification, and for his work with IFLA and FID; but in India, he brought a scientific approach to every facet of professional work.

He has recorded how he early began to search for normative principles, and how an intellectual struggle was resolved by an illuminating comment by Professor Edward J. Ross one evening-"You mean, 'Books are for use.'" From this principle, which Ranganathan named a Law of Library Science, he deduced the other four Laws, and these formed the guide to action which he pursued single-mindedly all his life, often at the sacrifice of family and other personal relationships.

From being a teacher of mathematics, he accepted the post of University Librarian at Madras, and immediately set about improving the service to the students and faculty. It was this urge to make the library more useful that prompted the invention of the Colon Classification and a similar codification of cataloguing practice inClassified Catalogue Code (1934). These two, with Five Laws of Library Science, began the series published by the Madras Library Association, but perhaps the next volume, Library Administration (1935), illustrates best his remarkable ability to analyse practice in the most minute detail in order to produce an instructional manual which could be a bench book for even the least educated assistant. Thus the first, and possibly the most fundamental contribution he made to Indian librarianship, was to publish basic texts for the education of future professionals.

After his travels abroad, he became intensely irritated by the apparent backwardness of his country's libraries, in particular by the lack of facilities for the poorer sections of the community, who had as much right to books and information as the richer. He soon realised that the surest way forward was to persuade the national and the states' governments to enforce action. To this end, he drafted model library legislation which, though by no means universally adopted or even welcomed, nevertheless succeeded in bringing the need for such action to the attention of a wide audience, including politicians. As a Brahmin and a former university teacher, he also had valuable contacts in high places.

His visit to England in 1948, the first in his regular series of international travels, brought him face to face with the emerging role of LIS in support of science and technology, particularly in industry, and he immediately appreciated the need for India also to advance its traditional techniques into the area of documentation and its facets, and organised a symposium on this need for an Indian response, published in 1963. He often found an illuminating phrase, like "spotting out microdocuments," an apt way to describe the action usually ponderously called selective dissemination of information. Again, he saw that a national model was required, and played an important role in establishing INSDOC, one of the pioneer national organisations devoted to the control of the growing flood of scientific and technical documents, in the interest of the nation as a whole.

Long after his official retirement, he continued to fill important posts, as university librarian, and as professor at the Documentation Research and Training Centre in Bangalore, where he founded and led a school which continues to this day to produce a stream of well trained and qualified professionals to serve in LIS across the country.

Ranganathan came to librarianship in a country struggling to break free from a colonial past, subsequently fraught with the problems of success and the pursuit of a democratic future. His aim, carried out with an iron determination which brooked no opposition, was to assert the absolute necessity of an advanced LIS for the future of India, and to bring into his profession the best of modern trends and methods seen in his wide travels-in VINITI in Moscow as well as in London or Pittsburgh. But he was insistent that mere borrowing is not the best way to put this information to use; cultural imperialism is no better than old colonialism. His way was a constant analysis and codification of the details of the best professional practice in a never-ending search for fundamental principles as a guide to action. Applied in an appropriate manner, such principles would ensure that Indian LIS would rank with the best in the world, and contribute in a unique and systematic way to its forward progress.

About the Author

D. J. Foskett retired in 1983 from the position of Director, Central Library Services, University of London. He had been Librarian of the University of London Institute of Education, and had also worked as a public librarian and special librarian. Mr. Foskett has been active in the Library Association (President, 1976), and was one of the founders of the Classification Research Group. His wide international experience includes numerous missions for Unesco and the British Council in most parts of the world. He has taught at the Universities of Michigan, Ghana, Ibadan, and Iceland, and at the Brazilian Institute of Bibliography and Documentation. The latest of his numerous books is Pathways to Communication (1984).

Top of Page | Table of Contents

Efforts Of Dr. S. R. Ranganathan For Public Library Legislation And Service- A Review

By Dr. Mohammad Azeem Siddiqui

Expert Author Dr. Mohammad Azeem Siddiqui

Dr. Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan was a visionary who realized the importance of library legislation for the promotion and development of library movement in India. He was a far-sighted person fully devoted to the cause of library and information science. He was fully aware regarding the role of libraries in the enhancement of education in any society. He understood the impact of educational advancement for the development of country and the effectiveness and utility of libraries to promote education.

In 1924, Dr. S. R. Ranganathan visited a number of public libraries during his stay in United Kingdom. These visits enabled him to study the system, functioning, funding and services of various libraries. As a consequence he was convinced that library legislation alone would provide a systematic, well-knit and efficient public library service. Since public libraries are informal agencies of education, therefore it is obligatory for a welfare state to provide, maintain and develop a network of public libraries to meet the needs of the masses. A public library being essential a peoples' institution is to be maintained out of public funds, which have to be collected most equitably. Only the government has got the power and authority to impose and collect taxes through legal sanction, hence library legislation is essential to collect the library cess. Thus it is apparent that it is imperative for the government to enact library legislation for the establishment and smooth functioning of a network of public libraries to cater to the educational needs of the general public.

Dr. S. R. Ranganathan was the first person in India who ever thought about the need for library legislation in 1925 after returning to India from England. He drafted a 'Model Library Act' and presented it for discussion at the First All Asia Educational Conference, which was held in Banaras on 27-30 December 1930. The participants of the conference were fully convinced with the advantages of draft legislation and the views of Dr. S. R. Ranganathan. This 'Model Library Act' was published by the Madras Library Association during the year 1936. He later on amended the draft Act twice- once in 1957 and again in 1972. This Model Library Act was introduced in the shape of Bill in the Madras Assembly in 1933, through Mr. Basher Ahmed Sayeed, the member of the Assembly an enthusiast of public library system.

Salient features of Dr. S. R. Ranganathan's Model Library Act are: -

Except the Kerala Public Libraries Act, 1989, all the Acts, which have passed in India during the years 1948 to 1990, have the influenced of Model Public Libraries Act drafted by Dr. S. R. Ranganathan.

Dr. S. R. Ranganathan made persistent efforts for getting the library Acts passed by various States in India and dreamt of having it a land of libraries. He prepared a number of Model Bills for various States. Following is a list of them: -

He also prepared a Model Union Library Bill in 1948 and redrafted it in 1957.

India got the first Public Library Act through the ceaseless efforts of Dr. S. R. Ranganathan. For the first time the Public Library Act was passed by the Madras Legislature in 1948. There is an interesting story behind the success of getting the Library Bill enacted in the third attempt in 1946 although the two attempts made earlier had failed. The first attempt was made by Janab Basher Ahmed Sayeed when he introduced the Bill in Madras Legislature in 1933 but it could not get through as the Madras Legislature was dissolved in 1935. A second attempt was made in 1938 but later on the World War-II began and the Bill could not be adopted. In 1946, Mr. Avinashalingam Chettiar, who was an old student of Dr. S. R. Ranganathan, became the Education Minister in Madras State. One day, Dr. S. R. Ranganathan took a copy of the Model Library Act and went to meet the Minister at his house after his usual morning walk. The Minister was surprised to see his "Guru" early in the morning and enquired about the purpose of his visit. Dr. S. R. Ranganathan replied that he came to demand his "Gurudakshina". When the Minister promised to offer the same, Dr. S. R. Ranganathan gave a copy of Model Act and expressed his wish to have it enacted into a law during his tenure as Minister. Mr. Avinashalingam Chettiar piloted the Bill and got it enacted in 1948.

*Mohammad Azeem Siddiqui, Research Scholar, D.L.I.S, Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar University (A Central University), Lucknow, Lucknow- 226025, E-mail: - azeem_mlisc@yahoo.com

** Dr. K. L. Mahawar, Reader & Head, D.L.I.S. Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar University (A Central University), Lucknow-226025, E-mail: -klmlis@indiatimes.com

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Dr._Mohammad_Azeem_Siddiqui

Susan Kelsch

407A Cataloging and Classification I, Summer II term

August 5, 2003

Ranganathan’s Colon Classification in 1500 Words or Less

A brief history of Colon Classification

Dr. Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan, who lived from 1892 until 1972, was a renowned thinker and innovator in the world of library and information science. He introduced one of his greatest contributions to the field, the Colon Classification scheme, in 1933. This was published in two slim volumes. One volume held the rules of using the scheme and the other held the schedules needed to use it. Ranganathan, a mathematician by education, first thought of the scheme while studying in London, soon after his appointment as the first official Librarian at the Madras University Library in 1924. He studied at the London School for Librarianship and was greatly influenced by W.C. Berwick Sayers, a professor there.

He was often frustrated by the limitations of library classification schemes that he studied, which included the Library of Congress scheme and Dewey Decimal Classification. He felt that the schemes contained flaws because they were developed in order to organize existing collections. He felt there was a need to create a scheme that would be able to reflect forthcoming titles with different subject matter than had been seen in the libraries and to expand to new areas of knowledge over time. His Colon Classification scheme was developed to fill this need. He claimed that he was partly inspired by the demonstration of a child’s toy set, called a Meccano set, at a Selfridge’s department store in London. The Meccano set was similar to an Erector Set, containing blocks, loops, string, and other items that could be used to build many different structures.

As Ranganathan traveled back to India after his studies, he worked on the scheme that would eventually become Colon Classification. He tested it on the ship’s library. He then tested it on the Madras University Library and determined that it was ready to be published. The name comes from the use of the colon as the character to differentiate the pieces of the Class Number, which is comparable to a Dewey number. Colon Classification includes an additional guide for creating what it calls a Book Number. The Class Number and Book Number work together to give individual volumes a place on the shelf. What I will focus on in this discussion is the Class Number, which outlines the subject or topic of the book.

The 2nd edition of the Colon Classification standard was published in 1939, after several years of use and testing by the public. Ranganathan referred to this as the Basic Version of the Colon Classification scheme. In 1952, Ranganathan published the 4th edition. This included a major new development, the introduction of the PMEST (Personality, Matter, Energy, Space, Time) categories. The basic idea of five categories was present in the earlier edition, but was not clearly defined. The presence of information in any of these five categories is indicated by different punctuation, making the term ‘colon classification’a slight misnomer. However the name remains.

Description of Colon Classification

Ranganathan based the Colon Classification scheme on the concept of facet analysis, an idea that was not new to library science. He believed that any concept could be built by using a term from a basic class to start the concept at a very broad level and then adding terms that corresponded to facets of that basic class in order to arrive at the very specific topic. This is how his fascination with the Meccano building set came to life in classification. A Class Number was made up of a Basic Class number (or sometimes more than one, as we’ll see later) and as many additional facets (what he called Isolates) that the cataloger needed to add. The Basic Class number is sometimes referred to as the Basic Subject or the Basic Facet.

Each of the five types of facets is associated with different punctuation. The punctuation indicates what type of facet would follow:

, (comma) = Personality

; (semi-colon) = Matter

: (colon) = Energy

. (period) = Space

‘ (apostrophe) = Time

Notes about this punctuation: Catalogers were allowed to omit the comma before the Personality element.

To be exact, the apostrophe did not appear until the sixth edition, published in 1960. Before then, a period was used for both Space and Time.

The letters and numbers used in each area were and are listed in official Colon Classification schedules. The number of Basic Classes is quite small. In 1933 the list consisted of 26 items, one for each letter of the alphabet. The number expanded to 46 in the 1960 edition.

The Personality, Energy, and Matter values vary according to subject. The Time and Space values are much more regular across all subject areas. Also, Ranganathan named in 1933 a small number of common subdivisions such as Bibliography, Maps and charts, Biography, History, Statistics, etc. which are used across all subject areas.

Example

So, for example, consider a book or report about ‘Circulation of periodicals in University Libraries in India up to the 1970s’. Using Colon Classification, this book/report would have this Class Number:

234;46:6.44’N7

This Class Number breaks down like this:

2 = Basic Class number 2, indicates the Basic Class Library Science.

34 = Personality. (Notice the lack of comma, as mentioned above.) In the Library Science Basic Class, Personality indicates types of libraries. 34 is the number for university libraries. In fact, 3 indicates any type of academic library, and 34 is a narrower term, so an additional digit is added to it. 33 indicates college libraries, 42 indicates industrial libraries, 48 indicates government department libraries, etc.

;46 = The semi-colon indicates a Matter value. In the realm of Library Science, Matter indicates the type of materials involved. 46 corresponds to periodicals.

:6 = The colon indicates an Energy value. In the realm of Library Science, Energy facets describe common actions such as cataloging (55), circulation (6), reference service (7), book selection (81). Please note that numbers in Colon Classification are in decimal order (not whole number order), so these four examples are listed in correct ascending order.

.44 = The period indicates a Space value. 44 is assigned to India. The scheme includes the number 1 to indicate World, as well as numbers to indicate specific states/provinces in some countries, such as 7376 for the state of Illinois.

‘N7 = The apostrophe indicates a Time value. The initial letter indicates a century (N=1900-1999), while the 7 indicates a decade. (Ranganathan was thinking far ahead: in his original schedules published in 1933, he had a table of values that went up to Z, which stands for the years 3000-3099 A.D.)

The five facets always are placed in this order. In some cases libraries have become accustomed to omitting some of the punctuation because it is “self-evident” that a new facet has begun. However I found this extremely confusing for someone who is new to the scheme.

About the five facets

Many catalogers and theorists have struggled with the distinction between Personality, Matter, Energy, Space, and Time.

Space and Time are the easiest of the five to understand. However, it is important to note that these are meant to be facets of some other concept—when they are the main focus of a work in themselves, then they are considered to be Personality elements of the work’s Class Number.

The Matter facet typically deals with some concrete object, typically inanimate. This includes basic elements/materials as well as finished products. This category also includes adjectives to describe inanimate objects.

Energy indicates action and interaction. This could be persons, objects, or any entity acting alone or with another. This could include conceptual or intellectual entities as well.

The Personality facet indicates the core point of the subject at hand. It is the most “elusive” of the five, as Ranganathan himself admitted in the 4th edition. In fact, he even admitted that if a concept could not easily fit into the other four categories then it is probably a Personality facet. I believe the Personality element requires the most intuition, as it is the cataloger’s gut feeling about what the most important element of the subject is. In many cases the Personality element is indicated by a Basic Class number only.

Ranganathan also allowed for the combination of two subjects from entirely different disciplines within a single Class Number. In this case, the cataloger added another Personality element onto the end of the initial (and most important) subject, along with the other relevant facets of the second subject. (This is the basic idea, although it is complicated by specific rules of order and number of facets allowed, etc.)

The future of Colon Classification

While Colon Classification, as well as many of Ranganathan’s ideas, continue to influence library and information science, the scheme is not widely used in libraries. It gained a foothold in India during Ranganathan’s life, but it never was the most commonly used scheme in India. Its critics claim that the scheme is better suited for classification of academic libraries than public or general-interest libraries. Colon Classification was also criticized because of major changes from one edition to the next. This not only added a burden of retrofitting to the libraries that used the scheme, but it also gave the international community the impression that Colon Classification was a work in progress rather than a fully functioning scheme. (Criticism about changes to the scheme particularly irritated Ranganathan. He pointed to his fifth law of library science, that a library is a growing organism. He extended this law to include classification of the library.) Most importantly, critics have long maintained that the Colon Classification notation and code numbers are simply too complex to gain acceptance from average library patrons.

Unfortunately, when Ranganathan died in 1972 he had not left an organization in place to continue work on the Colon Classification. All of the updates to the Colon Classification were personally managed by Ranganathan (with a little help from assistants on the development of schedules). So the code did not have the benefit of an overseeing organization to continue work on the code and develop support for its use. Ranganathan was working on the 7th edition of the Colon Classification system when he died. This was finally published in 1987.

Despite its bleak future as a modern, living standard for classification, Colon Classification continues to have great influence in the library world. And at least one article I read wondered: what would Ranganathan have done with classification of the Internet?

Bibliography

Articles

"Colon Classification." Encyclopædia Britannica. 2003. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. 27 Jul, 2003 http://search.eb.com/eb/article?eu=25223.
Glassel, Aimee. "Was Ranganathan a Yahoo!?"" Internet Scout. March 1998.
Satija, M.P. "The revision and future of Colon Classification." Knowledge Organization, Vol. 24, No. 1, 1997.
Singh, Sukhdev. "Potentialities, limitations and the future of the Colon Classification." Herald of Library Science, Vol. 38, No. 3-4, July-October 1999.

Books

Khanna, J.K. Colon Classification. New Delhi, India: Ess Ess Publications, 1986.
Kumar, P.S.G. Introduction to Colon Classification, Edition 7. Nagpur, India: Dattsons, 1987.
Parkhi, R.S. Decimal Classification and Colon Classification in Perspective. New York: Asia Publishing House, 1964.
Raju, A.A.N. Decimal Universal Decimal & Colon Classification. Delhi, India: Ajanta Publications, 1984.
Ranganathan, S.R. The Five Laws of Library Science. 2nd ed. Bangalore, India: Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science, 1988.
Ranganathan, S.R. Colon Classification. Madras, India: Madras Library Association, 1933.
Ranganathan, S.R. Volume IV The Colon Classification. New Brunswick, NJ: Graduate School of Library Service, Rutgers - the State University, 1965.
Taylor, Arlene G. Wynar's Introduction to Cataloging and Classification. 9th ed. Westport, CT: Libraries Unlimited, 2000.

Features | Previous | Next

Father of library movement

S.R. RANGANATHAN _ Pragmatic Philosopher of Information Science _ A Personal Biography: Ranganathan Yogeshwar; Bhavans Book University, Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, Kulapati Munshi Marg, Mumbai- 400007. Rs. 250.
IN THIS book - a personal biography - the author, the only son of Dr. S.R. Ranganathan, father of library and information science movement of India and an independent industrial consultant, analyses all facets of his personal as well as professional life.
The impact of Ranganathan's works and life on balanced social progress in today's context in India and elsewhere was well assessed by late C. Subramaniam, World President of the Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan.
The foreword was written by Mr. Douglas J. Foskett, who was one of Ranganathan's close collaborators and a founding member of the Classification Research Group (CRG), U.K. The introduction was written by another eminent person in the profession and a student of SRR, who is none other than Abdul Rahman Kamaruddin, an international advisor on information systems and services. One of his articles (1960s) gave the message "Library science, when fully developed, may become the pilot of the dynamics of the universe of knowledge{hellip} propelling it in the right direction to result in a greater efflorescence of human happiness.'' This is the essence of SRR's life as depicted in the book.
His entire life was fully dedicated to the cause of library science education and library movement. He visualised libraries as resources for perpetual self-education, knowledge and information.
This is true today in the context of distant learning education system. He was one of the few librarians who fostered and developed the libraries of India - public, academic, scientific and research libraries.
Library legislation is yet another milestone in his contribution to library movement of India, besides his efforts in development of theories, principles, etc., to make it as one of the sciences of universe of knowledge. He has also made his impact on western librarianship, which has added considerably to his image.
He inspired all library professionals to become a part of his life itself. His personal life was so much interwoven with his professional life.
This book is more than a biography. It is a rich insight into a variety of experiences and is an intellectual treat to its readers. It portrays how a revolutionary stalwart virtually created a new discipline, heralded a library movement in India and influenced nearly three generations of library and information professionals worldwide. Therefore, it should be of considerable interest to all those concerned with libraries, information science and information systems, in the words of Abdul Rahman Kamaruddin.
The author has presented the life of SRR, personal as well as professional in his own style, but followed SRR's style of presentation.
The presentation is systematic and is arranged in 33 headings. Of them, 24 have subheadings logically arranged. A broad chronology of significant events covering the eight decades of Ranganathan's life-time is shown under the sub-heading "Milestones'' under heading "Prologue'' which gives his whole life-history. There are 88 illustrations in the book. All are unique in their own merits with respect to his personal and professional life.
This personal biography is a meaningful document for the young generation who desire to become a library and information professional.
Also a thought-provoking material for the library world, this book is an indispensable resource for any one interested in the roots, milestones and developments of library and information science, not only in India but also abroad.
R. VENGAN.

India's First IT Guru

India's First IT Guru S.R. RangathananI consider N.V. Satyanarayana, Managing Director of Informatics, as the father of electronic library science in India.
And it was Satyanarayana who first told me about S.R. Ranganathan, the father of library sciences in India.
I then took interest in the life and works of Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan, and I find Ranganathan to be a great inspirational personality. Yet, not many within India have heard his name.
But everybody has heard of his principles: "Every man his book" said he, and "Every book its reader".

S. R. Ranganathan (1892- 1972)

IMO, Ranganathan was way ahead of his time. He was India's first IT guru. A mathematician by education (B.A. and M.A. in Mathematics), he thought deeply about information organization and classifications. He proposed what is today known as the "Colon Classification System", which is fundamentally different and IMO, fundamentally superior than the more established classification systems (Library of Congress or Dewey Decimal System). For programmers of today, colon classification is analogous to the object-oriented model, where ability to change and adapt is built in.
Ranganathan was subject to many a hardships in the hands of government and administration, and was repeatedly denied opportunities due to his caste. He finally had to resign his job at the Madras University. But his ideas were recognized by many scholars in Europe and in USA who saw the merits of a future-proof content classification system. Ranganathan died in 1972 in Bangalore.
Ranganathan's multi-faceted classification ideas have found wide-ranging applications in modern computer science -- from naming of reusable software components to categorizing web content. That's why I am calling him India's first IT guru.
See Also:

http://unllib.unl.edu/LPP/

Library Philosophy and Practice 2011

ISSN 1522-0222

Relevance of Ranganathan's Laws of Library Science in Library Marketing

Dr. R.K. Bhatt
Associate Professor & Head,
Department Of Library And Information Science
University Of Delhi,
Delhi – 110007, India

Introduction

Libraries and information centers arean indispensable part of any academic or research institution in India. Information transfer and dissemination of information have long been recognized as essential elements for research and development activities. Libraries and information centers put lot of effort and energy into designing information services and products and distributingthem to satisfy their users. Despite their best efforts, users sometimes feel that they are not being adequately and appropriately served. The best way to overcome this problem is by designing and developing an appropriate marketing strategy for LIS products and services.

Marketing

The Chartered Institute of Marketing, UK ("Marketing," n.d.), defines marketing as the management process which is responsible for identifying, anticipating, and satisfying customer requirements profitably. Kotler (1985) says that marketing is "an act of analysis, planning, implementation, and control of carefully-formulated programmes designed to bring about voluntary exchanges of values with target markets for the purpose of achieving organizational objectives." These two definitions draw our attention to the following:

marketing is a managerial process involving analysis, planning, implementation and control
marketing is concerned with carefully formulated programmes – not random actions – designed to achieve desired responses
marketing seeks to bring about voluntary exchange
marketing selects target markets and does not seek to be all things to all people
marketing is directly correlated to the achievement of organizational objectives
marketing places emphasis on the target market's (consumer's) needs and desire rather than on the producer's preferences.

Since customers are given the top priority, service providers should remember that customers are the most important people to be served in library and information centers. They are not dependent on the library; rather, the library depends on them. They are part of the library. They are the people who bring their wants and needs and we are there to meet their needs. Marketing is a management process that includes: marketing plan, marketing research, market segmentation, marketing mix (Graves and Wulff, 1990). In creating a marketing plan, a library must concentrate on mission analysis, resource analysis, strategic planning and monitoring, and evaluation of the tasks performed. Market research is done to assess market information needs by stating research objectives, developing a research strategy, knowing target market characteristics, etc. Market segmentation is defined as a group of customers with similar or related characteristics who have common needs and wants. Market segmentation is usually divided into:

Demographic Segmentation
Socio-Economic Segmentation
Geographic Segmentation

Marketing mix includes products (such as books, periodicals, literal programmes, bibliographies, annual reports, statistical surveys, and compilations and services such as electronic resources); price (in the form of credit, discount, cash, etc.); Place (including coverage, distribution channels, inventory, locations, and transport), and Promotion (which is done through advertising, personal selling, and public relations).

Ranganathan's Five Laws of Library Science

During his eighty-year lifespan, Dr. S.R. Ranganathan made contributed many new ideas to library and information science. He wrote 60 books and about 2,000 research articles in his life. Really, Dr. Ranganathan was a multifaceted personality. He devoted his life to the cause of development of library science in India. Dr. Ranganathan enunciated various laws, principles, canons, theories, etc., in LIS. His theories are based on scientific principles. They are accepted universally and are relevant even today. We can say that his ideas are like a lighthouse for libraries, and LIS students and teachers. His ideas are still exciting and, even today when computers and other developments in the field of telecommunication have changed the whole scenario of LIS. Even now, when libraries and information centres face the problem of underused information resources as well as the challenges of implementing Information Communication Technology (ICT), Dr. Ranganathan's philosophy is relevant and accepted as a way to overcome both these problems. The answer comes in the application of his Five Laws of Library Science.

Ranganathan's Five Laws of Library Science

1. Books are for use

2. Every reader his/her book

3. Every book its reader

4. Save the time of the reader

5. The library is a growing organism

The father of library science in India propounded the five laws of library science in 1931. The first law is that books are for use. It is imperative to ensure library patrons use the materials we select and purchase for them. Libraries are not just about storing books, they are about people having access to books. This is something Ranganathan made clear in his own discussion of the first law (Ranganathan 1988). His talks and writings emphasize the preservation of information and knowledge to be as important as access to information and knowledge. Undoubtedly, both preservation and access are important, and the availability of digital technologies that Dr. Ranganathan could only have dreamt of have a vital role to play in preservation and access. Librarianship is now blessed to have the opportunity of making knowledge available through digitization, but digitization can best be justified by focusing on the priorities laid down in the first law. The first law is also forward-thinking in its emphasis on the library's location. Increasingly we are seeing libraries sited, or even relocated, in more accessible locations in order to increase custom.There is debate among library professionals on the issue of merging of public libraries with other services, such as sports centres, or moving the library to main thoroughfares rather than outlying parts of the community. The implication of first law of library science in marketing library is the emphasis on the optimum use of resources, facilities, and services.Convenient location, effective signage, and longer opening hours; helping hands for using resources and services are all important.

The second law, "every reader his or her book," means that we all have diverse interests and that there is a book out there to satisfy each of us. The core need is to fight for the right of users to information of all kinds, the consistent battle against censorship and inequality of access that has governed civilisation since its inception. Our duty is to help users find the information they require and ensure any blocks in the way are not blocks we have created. Barring access to knowledge is totally against the philosophy of Dr. Ranganathan's law. In fact, the second law provides roots to the freedom to access information and knowledge in the forms of writings of all kinds, and to be informed on topics that others may wish to suppress. The second law reminds us to be impartial in our dealings with users. The implication of the second law in marketing the library is to meet user needs satisfactorily by collecting and interpreting information, understanding the needs of users, and matching the needs with its resources. The library should develop its collection keeping in mind the present and future requirements of its users. The library collection should be a mix of old and rare material as well as of the latest material reflecting advances in various fields.

The third law: every book its reader (Ranganathan, 1988) advocates easy access to materials, and one way to do so is by putting people together with what they require. Putting books into the hands of people who do not necessarily know what they need is also at the heart of the third law. We could interpret reader development as being part of the third law, since we promote books to users that may not be known to them and that may offer opportunities for enrichment that other titles do not. Historically, reference work has been identified within the third law, and this continues to be the case in the virtual library. Virtual reference services continue to grow in popularity in both academic and public libraries. Libraries and information centres are launching virtual enquiry services through their websites. They are accepting models created for this purpose by world-renowned libraries, especially university libraries. These are exciting developments, focused on expanding services to where and when users may need them. They allow librarians to continue to use their skills in tracking down quality information for users and will become a staple feature of library services. The implication of the third law in marketing the library is performing activities that take library products and services to the users: publicizing the value and benefits, promotional campaigns, adovacy, public relations, personal communication, etc. The library should use promotional tools to publicize its resources, facilities, and services. It should direct its efforts to attracting new users to the library and reach out to its existing users by providing library services at their doorstep. It should give its users tje personal touch and develop a feeling of belonging in the library.

The fourth law is "save the time of the reader" (Ranganathan, 1988). Time is important to every person. Time management is a key to success in life. Libraries must have the objective of saving the time of the reader. The entire journey of librarianship is about devising, designing, and developing methods, systems of organization and dissemination of information to provide the best service to their readers in the most efficient, accurate, and effective manner and thus saving the reader's time. For example, we create catalogues, bibliographies, indexes, and abstracts to save the time of readers. Saving the time of the reader also relates to how we actually organise information. Acceptance and adoption of ICT has used to save thousands of hours of the reader's time when compared to manual systems. Noruzi very rightly opines that considering the time of the user as a vital notion, and that all five laws of library science are transferable and applicable to the Web. Increasingly, saving the time of the user becomes navigating with them through the Web and creating high-quality and accurate guides to information in this challenging domain. The implication of the fourth law in marketing library is its focus on the user benefits and preferences. Consolidation and repackaging information into an appropriate form, making information available when it is needed, ensuring the quality of services and offerings, are tasks that take user benefits and preferences into account.The main objective of the library should be that the user who enters in a library for a specific purpose should not leave emptyhanded. At the same time, it must also be ensure that the users' valuable time is not wasted in searching for material.

The fifth law, that the library is a growing organism (Ranganathan, 1988) states that libraries will continue to grow in the future. Perhaps we can look at digital information and conclude that the growth is not as pressing from the point of view of physical space, although this remains something that libraries struggle with. Even in the digital world, the analogue continues to be important. Book publishing remains healthy, and indeed a much less expensive endeavor than it was in 1931. Libraries will continue to struggle with space problems. This is reflected in the statistics of information generation and the acquisition of information resources of libraries of any type. Even the presence of e-resources does not stop the acquisition of new print material, and the pace at which they grow has not changed. Lancaster's dream of a paperless society is not likely to come true in the near future. The sacrifices librarians have to make between space for books shelves and space for computer terminals to deliver this ever- expanding need will continue to be an issue. One can also see the library as a growing organism in terms of staff and skills. As the library grows in services, the skills necessary to deliver these new services will also grow. Perhaps we could argue that both libraries and the profession of librarianship are growing organisms. The fifth law's implication for marketing is adapting the library to future user needs, including mobilizing resources, dealing with uncertainty about future user needs, new services, new customer groups, new environment, etc. The library should also transform its services to keep up with other changes in the world. The library must not lag behind in adapting to new technologies. The library staff must be technology-literate.

In order to make use of these laws more effective, libraries and information centres must adopt marketing tools. Important promotion tools include:

1. Communication

Rowley (1998) divides communication channels into personal and non-personal. Personal communication channels are those in which two or more people communicate, and word of mouth is the primary means of communication, although other media such as e-mail are significant. Non-personal communication channels include TV, radio, posters, newspapers, etc.

2. Atmospherics

This term is coined by Philip Kotler (1975) who defines atmospherics as "the designing of buying and consuming environments in a manner calculated to produce specific cognitive and/or emotional effects on the target market." In other words, the working environment, library ambience, appearance of employees, the physical setting, lighting, work environment, noise levels, etc. These must be healthy and suitable to make a positive impact on users. Atmospheric considerations are often neglected in may libraries and information centers. It is not always a matter of extra cost but simply a matter of thoughtfully designing space in the library, placing of relevant guides to use, etc. This may help in attracting and maintaining users.

3. Advertising

Advertising is important for promoting library services. A library can advertise its products and services in newspapers, scholarly journals, magazines, newsletters, radio, television, Web, etc. Advertisements help in image-building. They can be in a short message, or staff can write longer articles on new and existing library services. Librarians can appear on local radio and TV, highlighting the new role the libraries plays in the present era (Jaafar, 1998). There are a variety of ways of advertising online. Traditional print advertisements include brochures, pamphlets, newspaper advertisements, etc.

4. Brochure

The design and presentation of brochures and leaflets should be aesthetic and attractive to users. The language should be simple and should hold the interest of the user.

5. Leaflets

Leaflets include guides to the library and its special collections, Web guides, Reading list on IT, and so on. Other brochures can be kept in the library at a location which is placed so that anyone who enters the library is attracted to that corner.

6. Posters

Posters offer good visual communication. They can draw attention when displayed at prominent locations and provide brief information about an event, service, etc. Old and defaced posters should be replaced on a regular basis.

7. Newsletters

The library can convey information about new acquisitions, new services, events and activities, fee changes, etc. Information regarding library can be included to conveys a message to readers about the alertness of the library in updating and communicating small but important pieces of information. In fact, they are an excellent marketing tool because they list all the activities of a library. With ICT facilities in the library, an e-newsletter can be produced. The text of the newsletter can also be included on the library website.

8. Extension activities

Activities such as book displays, lectures, quiz, debates, seminars, competitions, exhibitions, etc., can have a positive impact on the image of the library and can motivate people to come to the library and promote the use of its products and services.

9. Library Tour

Library tour for new and existing members can be used to promote the library services. While on a library tour, users can be prompted to ask questions and find out more about new activities, products, and services.

10. Library Month/Day

Organizing national library day/month can be an effective way to promote the library. A library can create awareness of its importance in society.

11. Promoting in Electronic Environment

Libraries, especially in large cities like Delhi, and Bombay use ICT tools in designing, developing, and disseminating services to satisfy their users. They also use ICT to promote their products and services. ICT-based channels include library websites and email.

12. Websites

Libraries websites can be accessed by users at any time.The websites contain details about the library, including the collection, subscriptions, service policy, terms and conditions, etc. It may also have graphics and multimedia advertising that can have an impact on visitors. The library webite should be contiuously updated to avoid an adverse effect the image of the library. The website can also be interactive so users can communicate with staff. For this purpose, a directory of staff members should be posted on the website (Mahajan and Chakravarty, 2007).

13. Electronic Mail/Mailshots

According to Natarajan (2002), e-mail is the most universal application on the Internet and it can be used for direct communication with potential users. There are many benefits to using email as a promotional tool. Mailshots are an effective medium that create personalized services, with information about library activities and events, membership renewal (Singh and Krishan Kumar, 2005).

14. Bulletin Board

This is an offshoot of email and is a many-to-many email system. It is medium for messages of interest to a community of online users (Moorthy and Karisiddappa, 2000). This service can be used by libraries for disseminating information to online users.

15. Newsgroups

Libraries can use newsgroups or discussion groups to build awareness among its clientele. According to Moorthy and Karisiddappa, (2000) a message (an article) is posted to the entire newsgroup. Other interested persons can reply/comment on the message. The topic can range widely, but each group is confined to one subject.

16. E-commerce

A library can also sell its products online through online charging and credit facilities. E-commerce has redefined the way business is conducted. Well-known bookstores around the world are offering their holdings over the Internet. For example, Blackwell maintains a database of more than 1.5 lakh active titles (Moorthy and Karisiddappa, 2000). Benefits of e-commerce include:

A very large customer base and that reaches many different countries.
Maintaining a website is relatively cheap, and results in reduced prices, more competition, current information, quick access and sales
Caters to the customers' wide and varied interests, saving travel time

17. Blogs

Blogs are continuously-updated websites, created by individuals or organizations. They are generally free. A library can use blogs to promote its products and services by making it appealing and informative (Mahajan and Chakravarty, 2007). Special alerts about new resources special services can be included in the blog entries. To get feedback, comments and suggestions can be invited from visitors.

References

Chartered Institute of Marketing (UK) (n.d.). "Marketing." CIM Resource Glossary, Available.http://www.cim.co.uk/resources/glossary/home.aspx

Graves, Diana J., and Yvonne L. Wulff (1990), "The economics behind resource sharing: implications for collection development and the future of libraries", in Advances in Library Resource Sharing, Makler, London, pp. 52-3.

Jaafar, Shahar Benum (1998), "Marketing information technology (IT) products and services through libraries: Malaysian experiences", Proceedings of sixty fourth IFLA general conference, 16-21 August, Amsterdam, available at: http://www.ifla.org/IV/ifla64/126-86e.htm (accessed 14 July 2008).

Kotler, Philip (1975), Marketing for non-profit organizations, Prentice Hall, New Jersey.

Kotler, Philip (1985), Marketing for non-profit organizations,2nd ed., Prentice-Hall of India, New Delhi.

Mahajan, Preeti and Chakravarty, Rupak (2007), "How to promote library services: academic libraries in India," in Mullins, Jame L. (Ed.), Library Management and Marketing in a Multicultural World, Proceedings of the 2006 IFLA Management & Marketing Section, 16-17 August, Walter de Gruyter, Berlin, pp. 138-55, available at: http://www.reference-global.com/doi/abs/10.1515/9783598440267.3. 138 (accessed 15 April 2010).

Moorthy, A Lakshmana and Karisiddappa, C. R. (2000), "Internet for Libraries", in Ashok Babu, T. et al. (Eds.), Vision of the future library and information systems, Viva Publications, New Delhi, pp. 67-81, available at: http://drtc.isibang. ac.in:8080/jspui/bitstream/1849/354/1/SSMfect.pdf (accessed 15 April 2010).

Natarajan, M. (2002), "E-Mail as a marketing tool for information products and services", DESIDOC Bulletin of Information Technology, Vol. 22 No. 3, pp. 27-34.

Ranganathan, S. R. (1988), Five laws of library science, 2nd ed., Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science, Bangalore.

Rowley, Jennifer (1998), "Promotion and marketing communications in the information marketplace", Library Review, Vol. 47 No. 8, pp. 383-7, available at: http://www.emeraldinsight.com/Insight/ViewPDF.jsp?Filename=html/Outpur/Pub lishe3d/EmeraldFullTextArticle/pdf/03580470802.pdf (accessed 12 September 2008).

Singh, S. P. and Krishan Kumar (2005), Special libraries in electronic environment, Bookwell, Delhi.

Application of Ranganathan's Laws to the Web

Alireza Noruzi
Department of Information Science, University of Paul Cezanne, Marseille, France

Received November 5, 2004; Accepted December 3, 2004

Abstract

This paper analyzes the Web and raises a significant question: "Does the Web save the time of the users?" This question is analyzed in the context of Five Laws of the Web. What do these laws mean? The laws are meant to be elemental, to convey a deep understanding and capture the essential meaning of the World Wide Web. These laws may seem simplistic, but in fact they express a simple, crystal-clear vision of what the Web ought to be. Moreover, we intend to echo the simplicity of Ranganathan's Five Laws of Library Science which inspired them.

Keywords

World Wide Web, Ranganathan's laws, Five Laws of Library Science

Introduction

The World Wide Web is an Internet system that distributes graphical, hyperlinked information, based on the hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP). The Web is the global hypertext system providing access to documents written in a script called Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) that allows its contents to be interlinked, locally and remotely. The Web was designed in 1989 by Tim Berners-Lee at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) in Geneva (Noruzi, 2004).

We live in exciting times. The Web, whose history spans a mere dozen years, will surely figure amongst the most influential and important technologies of this new century. The information revolution not only supplies the technological horsepower that drives the Web, but fuels an unprecedented demand for storing, organizing, disseminating, and accessing information. If information is the currency of the knowledge-based economy, the Web will be the bank where it is invested. It is a very powerful added value of the Web that users can access resources online electronically, that for whatever reason are not in the traditional paper-based collections. The Web provides materials and makes them online accessible, so they can be used. This is the real difference between the Web and libraries. Therefore, webmasters build web collections not for vanity but for use.

The Web is interested in its cybercitizens (users) using its resources for all sorts of reasons: education, creative recreation, social justice, democratic freedoms, improvement of the economy and business, support for literacy, life long learning, cultural enrichment, etc. The outcome of this use is the betterment of the individual and the community in which we live -the social, cultural, economic and environmental well being of our world. So the Web must recognize and meet the information needs of the users, and provide broad-based services.

The Five Laws of Library Science

Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan (1892-1972) was considered the father of Library Science in India. He developed what has been widely accepted as the definitive statement of ideal library service. His Five Laws of Library Science (1931) is a classic of library science literature, as fresh today as it was in 1931. These brief statements remain as valid -in substance if not in expression- today as when they were promulgated, concisely representing the ideal service and organizational philosophy of most libraries today:

Books are for use.
Every reader his or her book.
Every book its reader.
Save the time of the reader.
The Library is a growing organism.

Although these statements might seem self-evident today, they certainly were not to librarians in the early part of the 20th century. The democratic library tradition we currently enjoy had arisen in America and England only in the latter part of the nineteenth century (Sayers, 1957). For Ranganathan and his followers, the five laws were a first step toward putting library work on a scientific basis, providing general principles from which all library practices could be deduced (Garfield, 1984).

In 1992, James R. Rettig posited a Sixth Law, an extension of Ranganathan's laws. He conceived that Sixth Law "Every reader his freedom" as applicable only to the type of service (i.e., instruction or provision of information).

New information and communication technologies suggest that the scope of Ranganathan's laws may appropriately be extended to the Web. Nowadays the same five laws are discussed and reused in many different contexts. Since 1992, the 100th anniversary of Ranganathan's birth, several modern scholars of library science have attempted to update his five laws, or they reworded them for other purposes.

'Book, reader, and library' are the basic elements of Ranganathan's laws. Even if we replace these keywords with other elements, Ranganathan's laws still work very well. Based on Ranganathan's laws, several researchers have presented different principles and laws. For instance, "Five new laws of librarianship" by Michael Gorman (1995); "Principles of distance education" by Sanjaya Mishra (1998); "Five laws of the software library" by Mentor Cana (2003); "Five laws of children's librarianship" by Virginia A. Walter (2004); "Five laws of web connectivity" by Lennart Björneborn (2004); and "Five laws of diversity/affirmative action" by Tracie D. Hall (2004).

Gorman's laws are the most famous. He has reinterpreted Ranganathan's laws in the context of today's library and its likely future. Michael Gorman has given us his five new laws of librarianship:

Libraries serve humanity.
Respect all forms by which knowledge is communicated.
Use technology intelligently to enhance service.
Protect free access to knowledge; and
Honor the past and create the future (Crawford & Gorman, 1995).

Gorman (1998a,b) believes that S.R. Ranganathan invented the term 'Library Science' and beautifully demonstrates how his laws are applicable to the future issues and challenges that librarians will face. Gorman's laws are not a revision of Ranganathan's laws, but another completely separate set, from the point of view of a librarian practicing in a technological society (Middleton, 1999).

Furthermore, based on Ranganathan's laws, Jim Thompson (1992) in protesting against a library services, revised Ranganathan's laws to the following statements:

Books are for profit.
Every reader his bill.
Every copy its bill.
Take the cash of the reader.
The library is a groaning organism.

Whether one looks to Ranganathan's original Five Laws of Library Science or to any one of the many new interpretations of them, one central idea is immediately clear: Libraries and the Web exist to serve people's information needs.

The Five Laws of the Web

The Five Laws of the Web are inspired by the "Five Laws of Library Science" which were the seed of all of Ranganathan's practice. These laws form the foundation for the Web by defining its minimum requirements. While the laws seem simple on first reading, think about some of the conversations on the Web and how neatly these laws summarize much of what the Web community believes. Although they are simply stated, the laws are nevertheless deep and flexible. These laws are:

Web resources are for use.
Every user his or her web resource.
Every web resource its user.
Save the time of the user.
The Web is a growing organism.

The Web consists of contributions from anyone who wishes to contribute, and the quality of information or the value of knowledge is opaque, due to the lack of any kind of peer reviewing. Moreover, the Web is an unstructured and highly complex conglomerate of all types of information carriers produced by all kinds of people and searched by all kinds of users (Björneborn & Ingwersen, 2001).

This new revised version of Ranganathan's laws gives us the grounding for librarians' profession just as the 193l original did. The Web exists to help users achieve success through serving user information needs in support of the world community. Information needs are met through web pages and documents appropriate to web users. In fact, the Five Laws of the Web are really the foundations for any web user-friendly information system. What they require is universal access as a right of cybercitizenship in the information age. Like most laws, they look simple until you think about them. We explain each law here:

1. Web resources are for use

The Web was designed to meet the human need to share information resources, knowledge, and experience. Webmasters want people to interact with their web sites and pages, click on them, read them, print them if they need to, and have fun. So web sites are not statues or temples users admire from a distance. This law implies that the Web is for using and learning and information is there to be used. This law is very important because information serves no purpose if it is not utilized and at least available for people to attempt to learn. The role of the Web is to serve the individual, community and service, and to maximize social utility in the communication process.

The dominant ethic of the Web is service to society in general. The question "how will this change improve the service that the Web gives better? " is a very effective analytical tool. Another aspect of this law is its emphasis on a mission of use both by the individual seeker of truth and for the wider goals and aspirations of society. So "information is for use and should not be hidden or altered from people" (Middleton, 1999).

The Web is central to freedom, intellectual, social, and political. A truly free society without the Web freely available to all is an oxymoron. A society that censored the Web is a society open to tyranny. For this reason, the Web must contain and preserve all records of all societies, communities and languages and make these records available to all. We should put the emphasis on free access to information. Old web pages should be protected by Internet Archive (www.archive.org) and national libraries for future users. The Web of the future must be one that retains not only the best of the past but also a sense of the history of the Web and of scholarly communication.

The Web must acquire materials and make them accessible so they can be used. The Web needs to be accessible to users. A webmaster who has faith in this law is happy only when the users read and use his web pages. As some webmasters are currently closing their files by password-protected systems, and others charging fees and introducing fines, law one admonishes: Web resources are for use.

What we are producing and delivering via the Web and how well we are doing that, are the tangible results of the Web. So what is best practice now and what does this indicate for the future of the Web?

Just as Newton's first law of motion ("A body at rest remains at rest unless acted upon by an outside force") is a statement of the obvious, the first law of the Web also puts forth an obvious and elemental principle. But even so, it is a law that is often violated in the practice and use of the Web. Medieval and monastic libraries, as an extreme example, were chained books to the shelves. The books literally were attached to the shelves with brass chains and could only be used in a single location. Obviously, this was done primarily for preservation of the books rather than to facilitate their use. On the other hand, it might be argued that this method of controlling access helped prevent theft and thereby facilitated use!

But you don't have to go all the way back to medieval times to find ways by which librarians can obstruct the use of library materials. Limiting access to books and information resources has prevailed through time, and exists even today. Maintaining special web collections with limited access; storing materials off-site; restricting access to web resources based on memberships, fees, or even by selecting materials that are contracted in such a way as to limit use to particular classes of users (such as when a public library, or a library that is open to the public, eliminates print resources in favor of an electronic version of the material that is only accessible to certain users with passwords) are all modern equivalents of chaining books to the shelves (Leiter, 2003). And all bring into question whether the Web is adhering to the first law: Web resources are for use.

Another aspect of this first law is that either the Web is about service or it is about nothing. In order to deliver and reap the rewards of services, the Web must identify the benefits that society can reasonably expect and then devise means of delivering those benefits. Service always has a purpose and of course, price, and the Web has a purpose. If web resources are for use, what happens to unused resources?

The Web relies on user-orientation to justify and develop the Web operations. Suominen (2002) called this 'userism'. At the outset, let us distinguish between good and valuable user-orientation on the one hand, and naive, biased and ideological userism on the other hand. One can speak of the latter when users' interests are assumed, self-evidently, as the only possible rationale for the Web operations, to the extent that no other rationales are even considered. This can be illustrated by a simple example. There is something particularly convincing in the claim that

The Web exists for users. Therefore, the interests of users must be the basis of the Web operations;
The Web exists for researchers and writers, so the interests of researchers and writers should be central in the Web policies;
The Web exists for society, and it should serve the interests of society.

It can be argued that these three assertions are not mutually exclusive, for surely the interests of society are those of the cybercitizens, so claims 1 and 2 are included in claim 3.

Furthermore, one might assume that these three different categories are collective that individual interests reduce to collective interests by way of the collective culture contributing to the creation of individuals, 'culture speaks in us' (Suominen, 2002).

This law dictates the development of systems that accommodate the use of web resources. For instance, updating and regular indexing of web site resources facilitates the use of site resources and the Web in general.

2. Every user his or her web resource

This law has many important implications for the Web. This law reveals the fundamental need for balance between making web resources and the basic right of all users to have access to the web resources they need anywhere in the world. This makes diffusion and dissemination very important; each web resource should call to mind a potential user.

A web site must formulate access policies that ensure that the collection it is building and maintaining is appropriate and adequate to fulfill the expectations of its community of users. In other words, the collection must be appropriate to the web site's mission. A web site must contain resources appropriate to the needs of all its users. Any web site that limits access in any way must ensure that this restriction does not prevent adequate access to the collection by the users that web site was created to serve. Access policies also have implications for search engines.

However, there is an even more practical aspect to this law. Webmasters must know their users well if they are to provide them with the materials they need for their research or that they wish to read. A responsibility, therefore, of any webmaster is to instruct and guide users in the process of search for web documents they need for enjoyment, education or research. Clearly, it is the business of webmasters to know the user, to know the web resources, to actively help in the finding and retrieving by every user of his or her web resource, and to help search engines in the process of indexing web sites. Webmasters need to ask themselves:

Who might want to access information resources?
Who will or won't have access?
What are the issues surrounding access to printing, passwords, etc. ?

Webmasters must acknowledge that users of web sites, themselves included, use and value different means of communications in the pursuit of knowledge, information and entertainment. Web sites must value all means of preserving and communicating the records and achievements of the human mind and heart. This second law dictates that the Web serves all users, regardless of social class, sex, age, ethnic group, religion, or any other factor. Every cybercitizen has a right to information. Webmasters and search engine designers should do their best to meet cybercitizens' needs.

3. Every web resource its user

When a web user searches the Web, or gains access to the Web's services, there are certain web resources that will meet his or her needs. It is webmasters' job to ensure that the connection between the user and the web resources is made and that connection is as practical, easy and speedy as possible. Appropriate arrangement of documents in a web site is also an important means of achieving this objective of the third law.

If a web resource is secretly published by a web site, but its diffusion and dissemination otherwise kept secret, the web resource may not be readily discovered and retrieved until the user has reached a crisis in his or her research. At such a time, a frustrated user may seek out a webmaster or someone else with knowledge of the needed web resource's existence, or may simply stumble upon it by serendipity. While either scenario may represent a happy ending for the user, they are not the preferred model of web service. And in the worst case, the web resource may remain invisible indefinitely.

How can a webmaster find a user for every web resource? There are many ways in which a web site can actively work to connect its resources to its users:

Distribution of new web resources via mailing lists, listservs and discussion groups;
Making new web resource list on the home page of the site, etc.;
Submitting resources to popular search engines and directories, which is the most common way of indexing the new resources of a web site.

The use of a structured, well-organized and more categorized site map/index is a necessity, as it ensures uniformity of treatment of various web resources on similar topics. It should be simple, and easy to use. This is something most webmasters probably feel that they already do, but their site maps are not always clear and easy to use. Also important is a correct link to web resource, as mislinking and misindexing a resource can make it all but invisible to the user and, for all practical purposes, lost. To help users to find resources that are topically related, web site designers should use navigational links.

The point here is that webmasters should add content with specific user needs in mind, and they should make sure that users can find the content they need easily. They should make certain that their content is something their users have identified as a need, and at the same time make sure they do not clutter up their web site with content no one seems to care about (Steckel, 2002). Webmasters need to continue adding unique content to their web sites, because the high quality content is everything.

This third law is the most sensible, and it is consistently broken by most webmasters and web writers on most subjects. This law stipulates that a web resource exists for every user, and that resource should be well described and indexed in the search engines' indexes, displayed in an attractive manner on the site, and made readily available to users. This law leads naturally to such practices as open access rather than closed files, a coherent site arrangement, an adequate site map, and a search engine for each site. "It should be easy for users to search for information from any page on a site. Every page should include a search box or at least a link to a search page" (Google, 2003).

4. Save the time of the user

This law presents the biggest challenge to the Web administrators, webmasters and search engine designers. Webmasters should always bear in mind that the time of users is very important and precious. A web site must always formulate policies with the information needs of its users in mind. Web site collection must be designed and arranged in an inviting, obvious, and clear way so as not to waste the time of users as they search for web resources they need.

This law has both a front-end component (make sure people quickly find what they are looking for) and a back-end component (make sure our data is structured in a way that information can be retrieved quickly). It is also imperative that we understand what goals our users are trying to achieve on our site (Steckel, 2002).

Webmasters have helped save the time of the user by creating a user friendly web site. When a site has been finished, uploaded and tested with users, their experiences will be worth reading. Perhaps then, the question is that "is the web site user-friendly?" A webmaster should think about users and how to attract them, develop for them, cater to them, if s/he wants to satisfy the Web community. We need to remember that the webmasters' job is to help web users research effectively and efficiently, to update web sites, and to make them easy to navigate. So user friendliness and usefulness are important.

Perhaps this law is not so self-evident as the others. None the less, it has been responsible for many reforms in web site administration. A web site must examine every aspect of its policies, rules, and systems with the one simple criterion that saving the time of the user is vital to the web site's mission.

There are other ways to satisfy this law. A well-planned and executed site map saves the time of the user. Saving the time of the user means providing efficient, thorough access to web resources. It means satisfied web users. This is the prime measure of the web site's success; disappointed or frustrated users mean that web site has failed in its duty and its responsibility. This law might be restated as: Serve the user well.

In order to save the time of the user, web sites need to effectively and efficiently design systems that will enable the users to find what they are looking for quickly and accurately, as well as to explore the vast amount of collection of information available that could potentially be useful. This fourth law emphasizes efficient service to the users, which implies a well design and easy-to-understand map/index to the site.

5. The Web is a growing organism

The Web reflects the changes in our world and will continue to grow as we move along in life and contribute to its riches. It is indeed a growing organism. We need to plan and build with the expectation that the Web and its users will grow and change over time. Similarly we need to keep our own skill levels moving forward (Steckel, 2002).

The Web presents an interesting dilemma for librarians. For while only about 50,000 books are published each year in the United States, the World Wide Web contains an ever-growing and changing pool of about 320 million web pages. When a book is published, it has been assessed by editors and publishers, and hopefully has some value. Moreover, when a web page is published, it has simply been uploaded to a server somewhere. There are no guidelines for the Web. Anyone can publish--and does. Librarians can play an important role in weeding through the dross and establishing annotated lists of links that patrons can feel confident about using. The boundless resources found on the Web benefit from a librarian's expertise in such areas as indexing and cataloguing, as well as search techniques; there will be an increased demand for these types of skills as users demand more value from the searches that they conduct (Syracuse University, 2004).

Today, the Google index of the Web contains over 8 billion web pages (Google, 2004) and the Web is growing at a rapid rate, providing a huge source of information for users and a huge potential client base for businesses who have a web presence (Thelwall, 2000). The Internet Archive is building a digital library of web sites and other cultural artifacts in digital form. Like a paper library, it provides free access to researchers, historians, scholars, and the general public. Its information collection contains 30 billion web pages. Its wayback machine, which currently contains over 100 terabytes of data and is growing at a rate of 12 terabytes per month, is the largest known database in the world, containing multiple copies of the entire publicly available Web (Internet Archive, 2004). For better or for worse, the Web plays an important role in all countries and societies.

The fifth law tells us about the last vital characteristic of the Web and stresses the need for a constant adjustment of our outlook in dealing with it. The Web grows and changes and will do so always. Change and growth go together, and require flexibility in the management of the Web collection, in the use of cyberspace, in the retention and deployment of users, and in the nature of web programs. The Web collection increases and changes, information technologies change and people will change. So this fifth law recognizes that growth will undoubtedly occur and must be planned for systematically.

Discussion

The Five Laws of the Web help to identify the Web as a powerful inspiration for technological, educational and social change. The user is rightly the center of attention in this process. So, it is only through understanding user needs and characteristics that webmasters and search engine designers can build tools to help users meet their information needs. Saving the user's time by providing convenient access mechanisms is a principal concern of the Web. Furthermore, some writers and webmasters like to share their information and knowledge with others through web pages. This is because the Web is for use, and can provide a dynamic source of information for all kinds of users.

The growth of userism in recent Web thinking can be understood partly in relation to the prevailing neo-liberalistic view of society. When human beings are reduced to customers, consumers or users, society can be reduced to a market. A critique of userism is thus topical (Suominen, 2002).

Conclusion

What should we learn from these Five Laws of the Web? It is our hope that the reader has gained two things from this essay: first, a new appreciation for the work of the great Indian librarian; second, a renewed perspective on and appreciation of our work as information professionals and librarians. We started this paper with a question "What do these laws mean?". The first four of these reflect the way of thinking that we call userism. According to these laws, the Web's raison d'être lies in its relationship with users and use.

These laws are as applicable to the current practice of the Web as they will be to the Web of tomorrow. These laws are not only applicable to the Web in general but characterize the establishment, enhancement, and evaluation of online databases and digital library services as well. These five laws concisely represent the ideal service and organizational philosophy of the Web. Therefore, we can evaluate web sites by applying the Five Laws of the Web.

We end the paper with other questions for future readers. What will the next great age of the Web be? Is the Web as civilizing force or a cause of exclusion? Is it a bastion of intellectual freedom? Is it a vital force for social and cultural cohesion? Whatever it is now, it will assume to the essential roles libraries have had throughout the ages.

Acknowledgements

The author wishes to thank Mrs. Marjorie Sweetko for her helpful comments.

References

Berners-Lee, T. (1989, September 24). Information management: a proposal. CERN, March 1989, May 1990. Retrieved September 2, 2004, from http://www.w3.org/History/1989/proposal.html
Björneborn, L. (2004). Small-world link structures across an academic web space: a library and information science approach. Ph.D. Thesis. Royal School of Library and Information Science, Copenhagen, Denmark. p. 245-246.
Björneborn, L., & Ingwersen, P. (2001). Perspectives of webometrics. Scientometrics , 50 (1), 65-82.
Cana, M. (2003, July 5). Open source and Ranganathan's five laws of library science. Retrieved October 22, 2004, from http://www.kmentor.com/socio-tech-info/archives/000079.html
Crawford, W., & Gorman, M. (1995). Future libraries: dreams, madness & reality. Chicago and London, American Library Association.
Garfield, E. (1984). A tribute to S.R. Ranganathan, the father of Indian Library Science. Part 1. Life and Works. Current Contents, 6, February 6, 5-12.
Google (2003). 10 Tips for enterprise search: a best practices tip sheet. Retrieved October 15, 2004, from http://www.google.com/appliance/pdf/google_10_tips.pdf
Google (2004, November 15). Google's index nearly doubles. Retrieved November 15, 2004, from http://www.google.com/googleblog/
Gorman, M. (1995). Five new laws of librarianship. American Libraries, 26 (8), 784-785.
Gorman, M. (1998a). Our singular strengths: mediations for librarians. Chicago, IL: American Library Association.
Gorman, M. (1998b). The five laws of library science: then & now. School Library Journal, 44 (7), 20-23.
Hall, T.D. (2004). Making the starting line-up: best practices for placing diversity at the center of your library. 2004 National Diversity in Libraries Conference" Diversity in Libraries Making It Real". May, 4-5, Atlanta, Georgia. Retrieved October 15, 2004, from http://www.librarydiversity.org/MakingtheStartingLine.pdf
Internet Archive (2004). Web Archive. Retrieved October 15, 2004, from http://www.bibalex.org/english/initiatives/internetarchive/web.htm and http://www.archive.org/web/web.php
Leiter, R.A. (2003). Reflections on Ranganathan's five laws of library science. Law Library Journal, 95 (3), 411-418.
Middleton, T. (1999, October 14). The five laws of librarianship. Retrieved October 15, 2004, from http://www2.hawaii.edu/~trishami/610a.html
Mishra, S. (1998, October 12). Principles of distance education. Retrieved October 15, 2004, from http://hub.col.org/1998/cc98/0051.html
Noruzi, A. (2004). Introduction to Webology. Webology, 1(1). Article 1. Retrieved October 5, 2004, from http://www.webology.org/2004/v1n1/a1.html
Ranganathan, S.R. (1931). The five laws of library science. Madras: Madras Library Association.
Rettig, J.R. (1992). Self-determining information seekers. RQ, 32 (2), winter, 158-63. Retrieved October 11, 2004, from http://archive.ala.org/rusa/forums/rettig.pdf
Sayers, W.C.B. (1957). Introduction to the first edition, (Ranganathan, S.R.) The five laws of library science. London: Blunt and Sons Ltd., p. 13-17.
Steckel, M. (2002). Ranganathan for information architects. Boxes and Arrows, 7 October. Retrieved October 20, 2004, from http://www.boxesandarrows.com/archives/ranganathan_for_ias.php
Suominen, V. (2002). User interests as the rationale of library operations: a critique. Public Library Quarterly, 35 (2). Retrieved October 15, 2004, from http://www.splq.info/issues/vol35_2/07.htm
Syracuse University, School of Information Studies (2004). Librarians in the 21st century: libraries and the Internet. Retrieved October 19, 2004, from http://iststudents.syr.edu/~project21cent/
Thompson, J. (1992). The five laws of library science. Newsletter on Serials Pricing Issues, 47, September 13. Retrieved October 12, 2004, from http://www.lib.unc.edu/prices/1992/PRIC47.HTML#47.3
Thelwall, M. (2000). Who is using the .co.uk domain? Professional and media adoption of the Web. International Journal of Information Management, 20 (6), 441-453.
Walter, V.A. (2001). Children and libraries: getting it right. Chicago: American Library Association.

Bibliographic information of this paper for citing:

Noruzi, A. (2004). "Application of Ranganathan's Laws to the Web." Webology, 1(2), Article 8. Available at: http://www.webology.org/2004/v1n2/a8.html

to Works by and on him

Books

Prepared by : Dr. M Krishnamurthy
Indian Statistical Institute Library, Bangalore
and
Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science, Bangalore

SRELS Journal

Monologue on Dewey

Memorabilia - Quotations

Five Laws of Library Science

S.R.Ranganathan : The Man & His Mission - Video

Colon classification

by S R Ranganathan

An outline with examples

Notation and examples are taken selectively from: Colon classification. Basic classification : 6th edition / S R Ranganathan -- Sarada Ranganathan endowment for library science : Bangalore : 1960. SRELS has been asked permission of reproducing. A short explanation of CC is given at the end of Eugene Garfield's Tribute to S R Ranganathan [PDF file].

fundamental categories

, personality
; matter-property
: energy
. space
' time

time isolates

...
'M 1800 to 1899
'N 1900 to 1999
'N5 1950's
'P 2000 to 2099
...

`z` Generalia

[material] , [kind] , ...

`1` Universe of knowledge

`2` Library science

[library] ; [material] : [problem]

2;45:6 circulation of newspapers

234:81 book selection in university library

234;45:81 newspaper selection in university library

index

B Mathematics
C Physics
D Engineering
E Chemistry
F Technology
G Biology
H Geology
I Botany
J Agriculture
K Zoology
L Medicine
M Useful arts
Δ Mysticism
N Fine arts
O Literature
P Linguistics
Q Religion
R Philosophy
S Psychology
T Education
U Geography
V History
W Polytical sc.
X Economics
Y Sociology
Z Law

`3` Book science

`4` Journalism

`B` Mathematics

B1 Arithmetic
     B11 Lower arithmetic
     B12 Concept of numbers
     B13 Theory of numbers [number] , [theory] : [method]
B2 Algebra
     B21 Elementary algebra
     B23 Algebraic equations [equation] : [problem]
     B25 Higher algebra [form] , [degree] : [transformation]
B3 Analysis
     B33 Differential equation [equation] , [degree] , [order] : [problem]
     B37 Real variable [variable] : [problem]
     B38 Complex variable [variable] : [problem]
     B39 Special functions
B4 Other methods
B6 Geometry [space] : [method]
B7 Mechanics [matter] : [problem]
B8 Physico-mathematics
B9 Astronomy [body] : [problem]

B13:5K Fermat's last theorem

B23:1 numerical solution of algebraic equations

B331,1,2:1 numerical solution of ordinary linear differential second order equations

B62:3 differential plane geometry

B952:72 orbits of comets

`C` Physics

C1 Fundamentals
C2 Properties of matter [state] : [problem]
C3 Sound [wave lenght] : [problem]
C4 Heat [state] : [problem]
C5 Light, radiation [wave lenght] : [problem]
C6 Electricity [electricity] : [problem]
C7 Magnetism [magnetism] : [problem]
C8 Cosmic hypotheses

C25:53 compressibility of liquid

C3:11;5 velocity of sound in water

C53:3 X-ray spectra

`D` Engineering

[work] , [part] ; [material] : [problem]

D27,3:4 designing of surplus weir for tank

D41531,5 narrow gauge railway curves

D5153,8:5 specification for the brake of railway carriage

`E` Chemistry

[substance] , [combination] : [problem]

:1 General
:2 Physical chemistry
:3 Analytical chemistry
:33 Qualitative
:34 Quantitative
:35 Volumetric
:4 Synthesis
:5 Extraction
:8 Manipulation

E1 Inorganic substance
E10 Group 0
E11 Group 1
E110 Hydrogen
E1109 Lithium
E111 Sodium
...
E2 Hydroxyl, basic oxyde
E3 Acid, acidic oxyde
E4 Salt
E5 Organic substance
...

E111:14 atomic weight of sodium

E194:3 analysis of alloy

E1940k13:34 estimating the presence of copper in an alloy

E3616:4 synthesis of sulphuric acid

E41871:4 synthesis of gold chloride

E9G,92:3 biochemical analysis of alkaloids

`F` Technology

[substance] : [problem and process]

F:6 industrial electro-chemistry

F551:2 hydrogenation of coal

`G` Biology

[organ and special grouping] : [problem]

G11:2 microscopical anatomy

G:13.44 plants and animals of India for everybody

G:(C):(B) mathematical biophysics

`H` Geology

[substance] : [problem]

H1 Mineralogy
H2 Petrology
H3 Structural geology
H4 Dynamic geology
H5 Stratigraphy
H6 Palaeontology
H7 Economic geology
H8 Cosmic hypotheses

H191:16 genesis of diamond

H4115.53 volcanos of France

H7.438 mineral resources of Burma

H7113:16.8 origins of the copper deposits of Australia

`HX` Mining

[substance] , [work] : problem

`I` Botany

[natural group] , [organ] : [problem] ¹

I22:12.42 Japanese algae

I5,15:3 physiology of leaves

I5,16:2 morphology of flowers

`J` Agriculture

[plant] , [utility/part] , [organ] : [problem] , [nature of soil/substance/cause/material] : [operation]

:1 Soil
:2 Manure
:3 Propagation
:4 Disease
:5 Development
:6 Breeding
:7 Harvesting
:91 Nomenclature
:92 Morphology
:93 Physiology
:95 Ecology

,1 Sap
,2 Bulb
,3 Root
,4 Stem
,5 Leaf
,6 Flower
,7 Fruit
,8 Seed
,97 Whole plant

J1 Horticulture
J2 Feed
J3 Food
J4 Stimulant
J5 Oil
J6 Drug
J7 Fabric
J8 Dye, tan

`K` Zoology

[same formula as I Botany]

`KZ` Animal husbandry

[same formula as J Agriculture]

KZ311 cow farming

KZ351 fowl farming

KZ351:4 disease of poultry

KZ351:421:5 prevention of tuberculosis in poultry

`L` Medicine

[organ] : [problem] , [cause] : [handling]

L:4 diseases

L:4:3 diagnosis of disease

L9F:4 gynaecology

LC,9F:4 gynaecology according to Siddha system

`LZ` Pharmacognosy

LZ3 Pharmacology [substance] : [action] , [organ]
LZ5 Pharmacopoeia [nation] , [kind]

`M` Useful arts

M7 Textiles [material] : [work]

M71:2 cotton spinning

M73:7 silk weaving

`Δ` Spiritual experience and mysticism ²

[religion] , [entity] : [problem]

Δ:8 occultism

Δ,16:5 vision of disembodied souls

Δ(E118) occult chemistry of gold

`N` Fine arts

NA Architecture [style] , [utility] , [part] : [technique]
ND Sculpture [style] , [figure] ; [material] : [technique]
NN Engraving
NQ Painting [style] , [figure] ; [material] : [technique]
NR Music [style] , [music] ; [instrument] : [technique]

ND44,C8(Q4) Buddhist iconography

NQ44,3;3:6 Indian distemper fresco painting of landscape

`O` Literature

[language] , [form] , [author] , [work]

English is taken as the favoured language

O,1:g poetic criticism

O-,1:g(S:55) love in English poetry

O-,2J64,51 Hamlet

O-,2J64,51:g criticism of Hamlet

O-,2J64,51:g(S) pshychology of Hamlet

O121,1G65:g criticism of Dante

`P` Linguistics

[language] , [variant-stage] , [element] : [problem]

:1 Phonology
:2 Morphology
:3 Syntax
:4 Meaning

,1 Phoneme
,2 Syllable
,3 Word
,4 Phrase
,5 Clause
,6 Sentence

,9B Slang
,9D Dialect
,9J Jargon

P111 English
P113 German
P122 French
P15 Sanskrit
P31 Tamil
P33 Kanarese

P111,9D56175 Yorkshire dialect

P111,9D56175,1:1 pronunciation in Yorkshire dialect

P111,J,9D56175 modern Yorkshire dialect

P111,J3:1k modern English pronouncing dictionary

P152:4k Hindi dictionary

`Q` Religion

[religion] : [problem]

:1 Mythology etc.
:2 Scripture
:3 Theology
:4 Religious practice
:5 Preaching etc.
:6 Religious institution
:7 Religious sect
:8 Heresy and persecution

Q1 Vedic Hinduism
Q2 Post-Vedic Hinduism
Q3 Jainism
Q4 Buddhism
Q5 Judaism
Q6 Christianity
Q7 Muhammadanism [Islam]

Q3:336 rebirth according to Jainism

Q4:33 Buddha

Q6:445 Christian worship

Q7:26 Muslim traditions

`R` Philosophy

R1 Logic
R2 Epistemology
R3 Metaphysics [view] , [subject]
R4 Ethics [topic] , [controlling principle]
R5 Aesthetics
R6 Favoured system 1: e.g. Indian philosophy [system] , [canonical/basic text]

R14 symbolic logic

R3,(Q) philosophy of religion

R4,(Q6) Christian ethics

R65,5 Brahma-sutra

`S` Psychology

[entity] : [problem]

S15:524 anger of children

S55:524 anger of women

SM9,55:524 psycho-analysis of anger of women

`T` Education

[educand] : [problem] , [subject] , [method]

T:3,1 audio-visual method

T:3(B2) method of teaching algebra

T:3(B2),1 audio-visual method of teaching algebra

T15:3(B2),1 audio-visual method of teaching algebra in elementary schools

TN3.44'N5 basic schools in India in 1950's ³

`U` Geography

[geography]

U2855.42'N5 rainfall in Japan brought upto 1950's ³

U30r287 bioclimatics

U5.44'N5 historical geography of India brought upto 1950's ³

`V` History

[community] , [part] : [problem]

y7 biography (common isolate)

V1N4,2'N5 The executive of the United Nations brought upto 1950's ³

V3:19.5'N5 Britain's European policy brought upto 1950's ³

V3:2:(Z)'N5 British constitutional law brought upto 1950's ³

V53,1y7L69 Life of Napoleon

`W` Political science

[type of state] , [part] : [problem]

W:5 civic rights and duties

W:58(Q) freedom of conscience

W4,1:(R) philosophy of kingship

W41:591 allegiance in an absolute monarchy

W691:58(Q) freedom of conscience in communistic state

`X` Economics

[business] : [problem]

X:53.440r56'N5 the influence of British tariff on Indian tariff brought upto 1950's ³

X:9 personnel management

X:936 profit sharing

`Y` Sociology

[group] : [problem] : [secondary problem]

Y:433:6.73'N5 treatment of unemployment in U.S.A. brought upto 1950's ³

Y31:7:7 rural development

Y72-78:424'N5 the moral degeneration of the Australian primitives brought upto 1950's ³

`Z` Law

[community] , [law 1] , [law 2]

Z53 French law

Z(Q2) Hindu law

Z1,C265 prize law

notes

1: The original edition has problem as another personality instead of an energy, which seems to be a typo

2: Greek delta symbol

3: The original edition has .N5 instead of 'N5

Colon classification : an outline with examples = (ISKO Italia. Documenti) / S R Ranganathan ; Claudio Gnoli : editor -- <http://www.iskoi.org/doc/colon.htm> : 2005.03 - 2006.11 -

Memories of the 1957 Dorking Conference

Eugene Garfield

   In the Spring of 1957, I temporarily shared an office in Washington, DC, at Thomas Circle with my new partner Harry Brager. He wisely recommended changing the title of "Management's Documation Preview" to Current Contents®.1
    A few weeks later, I received an unexpected invitation to discuss CC® and citation indexing (based on my papers in Science2 and the Journal of the Patent Office Society 3) at an International Conference on Classification for Information Retrieval to be held in Dorking, England. The conference was only a few weeks off and I was nearly broke. Using TWA's installment plan, I bought a round-trip $489 ticket.
    Dorking was my first personal encounter with British information scientists. I would meet J. D. Bernal in connection with the science of science movement, but not until the following year in Washington.
    It is quite possible that Jesse Shera, editor of American Documentation had suggested I be invited. Other participants included Robert Fairthorne, D. J. Foskett, Eric J. Coates, Cyril Cleverdon, Brian C. Vickery, D. J. Campbell, N. T. Ball, Jack Wells, Barbara Kyle, John Mills, and last, but not least,
S. R. Ranganathan.4 I spoke at length with Ranganathan and others about my earlier meeting with Henry Evelyn Bliss in 1954.5  The Bliss classification was better known in the U.K. then in the U.S. thanks to Jack Mills.
    FID publication #7146 commemorated the 40th anniversary of Dorking. Unfortunately, I was unaware of this 1997 meeting, so I missed the opportunity to catch up with old friends many of whom I had not seen for years. In that reminiscence of the Dorking conference, Robert Fairthorne mentioned my "surprise" at the British members "disagreeing without being disagreeable,"6a unlike the rancor frequently encountered at the early meetings of the American Documentation Institute. On the other hand, Cyril Cleverdon recalled the evening when "Gene Garfield defended his proposals for a citation index against a group of very skeptical and outspoken critics,"6b including Cyril himself!7 Jean Aitchison recalled me as " a young man vigorously marketing his ideas of journal contents lists, at an extra evening session."6c   Indeed, 1957 was the year that the Life Sciences edition of Current Contents was introduced to the pharmaceutical industry.

    The 1957 Proceedings volume, Page 98, contains a concise account of citation indexes covered in the evening session on May 14th.8
    On the second day, I realized that if I attended Wednesday's session, I would not see London. So I took an early morning train to Victoria Station. During the next 15 hours, I visited everything from the Tower of London to Parliament and the British Museum Library. I arrived at Victoria Station about midnight and was shocked to learn that it was closed. The only transportation to Dorking was a taxi. When I chaired the morning session the next day, the audience gasped when I said that I had taxied from London. I didn't mention that it used most of my remaining cash.
    This remarkable meeting eventually led to my joining the UK Institute of Information Scientists, which in 1966 gave me an Honorary Fellowship. Through IIS, I made the friendship of researchers like John Martyn, Alan Gilchrist, Charles Oppenheim, and others too numerous to mention. Somewhat later, I met Tony Cawkell, who became ISI's man in London and then Director of Research.

References:

1. Garfield, E. "Current Contents -- Ninth Anniversary," Current Contents (February 21, 1967). Reprinted in Essays of an Information Scientist, Volume 1. Philadelphia: ISI Press, pgs. 12-13 (1977).

2. Garfield E. ”Citation Indexes for Science: A New Dimension in Documentation through Association of Ideas," Science 122(3159):108-11, 1955.) Reprinted in Essays of an Information Scientist, Volume 6. Philadelphia: ISI Press, pgs. 468-471 (1984).

3. Garfield, E. "Breaking the Subject Index Barrier -- A Citation Index for Chemical Patents," Journal of the Patent Office Society 39(8):583-595 (August 1957). Reprinted in Essays of an Information Scientist, Volume 6. Philadelphia: ISI Press, pgs. 472-484 (1984).

4a. Garfield, E. "A Tribute to S.R. Ranganathan, the Father of Indian Library Science. Part 1. Life and Works," Current Contents No. 6, pgs. 5-12 (February 6, 1984). Reprinted in Essays of an Information Scientist, Volume 7. Philadelphia: ISI Press, pgs. pgs. 37-44 (1985).

4b. Garfield, E. " A Tribute to S.R. Ranganathan, the Father Library Science. Part 2. Contribution to Indian and International Library Science," Current Contents No. 7, pgs. 3-7 (February 13, 1984). Reprinted in Essays of an Information Scientist, Volume 7. Philadelphia: ISI Press, pgs. 45-49 (1985).

5. Garfield, E. "The 'Other' Immortal: A Memorable Day with Henry E. Bliss," Current Contents No. 15, pgs. 7-8 (April 14, 1975). Essays of an Information Scientist, Volume 7. Philadelphia: ISI Press, pgs. pgs. 37-44 (1985).

6. Gilchrist, Alan, ed. FID Publication 714: From Classification to 'Knowledge Organization': Dorking Revisited or 'Past is Prelude,'" The Hague: FID General Secretariat (1997) 186 pgs.

6a. ibid, v

6b. ibid, vi

6c. ibid, vii

7a. Cleverdon, C. "Citation Indexing," Nature 203(4944):446 (1964).

7b. Cleverdon, C. "Science Citation Index, An International Interdisciplinary Index to the Literature of Science," Revue Internationale de la Documentacion 31(4):161 (1964).

8. Garfield, E. in "Summary of Discussions," Proceedings of the International Study Conference on Classification for Information Retrieval. London: ASLIB; New York: Pergamon, pg. 98 (1957).

Dr. SRR DISCIPLES: A View Point

[Readers may recall the signed Editorial entitled:Whither Ranganathan ? by Dr A Lahiri, which appeared in Apr-Sept 1995 issue of Information Today & Tomorrow. A view point expressed (bylined Shri C V Subba Rao) under the column Dr SRR Disciples' in RRC Newsletter No 10, 1997, on the said editorial, is reproduced for the benefit of readers - Editor.]

Life is so varied. It follows a path of its own, nor is in any ones control. It cannot be retraced and retracked. A great man lives, a boor lives, but different lives. There is greatness in power, wisdom, science, technology, performance, spirituality or any sought sphere. The common run, of which societies are made, is 90% or more. They observe, absorb the influence to the extent possible, strive for a life-path a little higher or nobler, undeclared and unannounced. The satisfaction is internal.

Great people, Like lotuses, grow out of mud, and rise above water, display fragrance and colour and dance in the wind to the delight of the surroundings. The period of growth is as turbulent as that of any other flower. Nobility, beauty, fragrance, and a queenly height with enviable delicacy, leave a mark of distinction. In the Human world the way life is lead, knowledge contributed, expounded and left to influence posterity, combined with social, academic and national honours bestowed, differentiate the great from the ordinary.

Every Great man has not produced another Great man next to him. A century in a subject and a country as vast as India, produces one or none. But they change the ruling laws of life, spread a new vigorous logic, create a new path of which they are exponents and guides, and to a greate extent live it out. During their life time they are admired, criticised but remain unconquered through decades of battles. But are they fully understood and followed?

Neither Shankara, Ramanuja nor Madhava have produced a second. Disciples there are, partial representations of the Great, but have a mark of their own. After Sir CV Raman, how many Nobel laureates are produced? Even in its lack of affluence, can physics be termed to have bad times in India! After Rabindranath, Bengal so admired and worshipped, that stars are not even noticed. (Kavi' in Bengal refers to Rabindranath). A cultural ethos develops, like a dust storm, to be the dimmed hallow of the great. At times obstructing normal vision.

But to live close to great men is a rich experience. Those who shared intimacy are very distinguished group. They admired and absorbed to the extent possible, and express the way they understood and experienced. They have not been as much honoured, not in wisdom and thought as distinguished, nor created ripples of aura around. Perhaps, nature in Time, does not allow too much turbulence, and allows decades to get attuned to change. Greatness is a peak followed by troughs for decades, till perhaps in a century another arise. Change, transformation, peace, is a broad spiral-circle of time in human affairs.

To the routine 90% of the Society, the disciples of the great are different. They experienced the aura, struggled to absorb the mighty force, propagated as they understood, and explained what it is. The central point is the great man, the discovery, its practice and explanation. To look for a second centre or another great person's emergence is futile, within the realm of time.

But the disciples are better than ordinary men. They were blessed to be around Greatness, and so became causes of change. These who did not live with the Great, naturally envy the disciples. Their moral or human depravity had caused religions to fall foul and decay. Science or technology or subject saw a slope downward till an ascent and a peak arises.

To be with Dr SR Ranganathan is an unforgettable experience. To be taught by him, to work with him is a privilege very exceptional. Many disciples did contribute to the growth of theories and theoretical frameworks, but Dr SRR was the Director with many actors. He built institutions, established theoretical frameworks for classification and cataloguing, indexing and created an academic subject called Library and Information Science, recognised by all Indian Universities from graduation to PhD. Library Acts he initiated in three states of India during his life time. (Tamilnadu, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka). Now more than ten States have Library legislation. The academic equation he has created for the library profession in universities and colleges. He interacted with the greats of his time, and was not pushover to greatness. His greatness is not in dispute, but the atmosphere after his demise.

Dr SRR liked very much to have Research Circles— at Delhi and Bangalore. After 1992 being his disciples in our humble way, to encourage `Research' in LIS sphere, we did start Ranganathan Research Circle' at Delhi in 1993, which meets every month, (on a second Saturday), and publish RRC Newsletter to let India know what RRC is doing at Delhi. From 1994 RRC is celebrating Annual Day in January, and August 12 as Dr SRR's birthday. The profession at Delhi is participating and response is encouraging. RRC avoids a show-culture and prefers a deep digging commitment for research. RRC has some influence based on its activities. Government servant fretting along in a chamber, with lot of power and negligible influence could envy. RRC is no disservice to Dr SRR, nor its growth into Ranganathan Research Institute at Delhi, as and when it happens.

DRTC started by Dr SRR under the Indian Statistical Institule, exists since 1962 and is noted as a pioneer research institute. Enough number of foreigners in USA, UK, Europe, besides Indians are working on Dr SRR's ideas. Their full flowering should be left to the future. Computer limited brains are not able to understand philosophy of information science beyond the machine, technology is machine oriented, how can it go above it, unless science comes to rescue!

Professor PN Kaula, a close life long associate of DRSRR, has instituted a `Kaula Foundation' which awards `Kaula-Ranganathan Gold Medal' For pioneering researchers internationally and in India every year. Money earned is kept apart, a Trust is created and LIS research is honoured every year. Does the effort serve or disserve Dr SRR and what he aimed at or lived for?

Professor Ganesh Bhattacharyya is a distinguished professional, having national and international reputation. His authority on the subject has won appreciation of American universities. His forte is cataloguing and he followed closely and participated in the development of POPSY. He developed his own version of it. For fun or his deep attachment to indexing, he might have called his daughters -'POPSY' and -'PRECIS'. Does it harm anybody else? Is it an affront against any? A scientific preference that envelops the family also, makes a complete scientist than 10 AM to 5 PM researchers of Govt of India, without any achievement even if a total career of 40 years is scanned. A complete satisfied life of Dr SRR disciples causes envy, is a matter of deep satisfaction. Influence and happiness comes through dedication, total devotion, and 24-hour-a-day commitment which is called `research'. Government service and bureaucracy had drifted far away from it, but envy such deep satisfaction.

Any body who retires in a high position, does not ipso facto become eminent. Their contributions in writing in the subject, in institution building, personal behaviour are important considerations. Sychofancy, subservience, courtiership, political manoeuvring which may succeed to gain high positions, are not born out of exemplary character or science or subject expertise. Cleverness is different from honesty and character. Bureaucracy, divorced from subject knowledge, is entertained by fine English and humour, that makes its rounds, which is entertainment, but not great life. It is wasted power of an aimless life, life-time sold cheap for lucre and other diversions. Great power profits but does not attract, nor create nay permanent values. Rather, the devilish shadows haunt!

Dr SRR believed in intellect and intuition. Analysis of subject elements into `Facets' and `Fundamental Categories' and free combination of them to arrive at subject thought. Indexing follows subject content and retrieves by word access, whose combinations go by a systematic sequence. Till 60's the ideas held the international realm.

Then came the computers with phenomenal speed of search, storage in memory and print out sought detail. The computers did not accommodate classification schemes, catalogue codes or indexing systems. Computer culture spread in industries and technologies. Alphabetical storage and retrieval, is the total process. Computers negated the progress of classification schemes catalogue codes and indexing systems, and argue like children on the problems of information retrievel, noise factors, dawnpour of information, etc. A new vocabulary does not change the idea behind a problem. In the next fifty years, when computers became typewriters with memory and communication tools, then classification theory, cataloguing codes, indexing systems, subject formations would come as new invention! An understanding librarian calmly views how machines have become masters and will make them function as tools of information analysis and research. Indian librarians are patient enough to allow the computer technology in combination with communication, printing and reprography, to settle down to be a social tool of international communication culture, to take over the leadership again. DDC & LC indexing systems are insufficient to grapple with knowledge analysis. They are backward systems. Computer men cannot understand it. The databases will be redone serveral times over because of intellectual limitation of computer sceintists. In short, their only contribution is to make free library service to become information for sale and a price tag, to inaugurate a new era of information colonialism that is worse than a `Nuclear Winter'.

Ranganathan is not lost, nor Gandhiji. There is a lull in time that intervened. But ideas and knowledge will triumph over techniques and machines. Human culture is taken forward by ideas and knowledge, and techniques and machines, are methods and tools needed but subservient.

- CV Subba Rao

than's Prolegomena to Library Classification

Submitted by wtd on 27 March 2009 - 10:56pm

These are some definitions and principles taken from S.R. Ranganathan's Prolegomena to Library Classification (2e) (1957). The terminology isn't easy to crack without some examples, but just keep in mind that he's talking about how classification schemes like the Dewey and Library of Congress systems work. They organize knowledge (in books and other things) by deciding what the book is about and then giving it a call number and putting it in order with other books. How that aboutness is decided, to what level of detail, and how the call numbers are made, is what he's discussing. He's setting out the basic rules he thinks all classification schemes should use. (He thought of them while working on his own system, Colon Classification.) Dividing "Mammals" with "Cats" and "Dogs" makes a lot more sense than dividing "Whiskered Animals" into "Ones that Meow" and "Ones that Bark," for example--but why exactly? Should cats come before dogs--why or why not? The definitions below are all verbatim from the book, and anything I added is in square brackets.

Definitions

1212: Characteristic

A Characteristic is any attribute of any complex of attributes with reference to which the likeness or unlikeness of entities can be determined and at least two of them are unlike. [E.g. height is a characteristic of boys, but not possession of a face, which is an attribute shared equally by all boys.]

1221: Class

A Class is a ranked group. [If a set of things is divided into groups based on characteristics or attributes, and those groups are ranked, then each ranked group is a class. Q (Science) in LC is a class, as is Philosophy and Psychology (100s) in Dewey.]

1222: Array

An Array is the sequence of the classes of a universe, derived from it on the basis of a single characteristic and arranged among themselves according to their ranks. [Ranked groups making classes form an array of the first order. The ten main classes in Dewey form an array, as are the letters in LC.]

118: Chain of Classes

A set of classes such as 3, 32, 322, 3221, having lineal kinship, so to speak, is a Chain of Classes. Class 3 is the First Link of the Chain, class 3221 is the Last Link. [Another example: Universe of Knowledge -> Social Sciences -> Economics -> Labour -> Labouring classes -> Duration of work.]

General Canons

Canons for Characteristics

131: Canon of Differentiation

Each characteristic used should differentiate, that is, it should give rise to at least two classes.

132: Canon of Concomitance

No two characteristics should be concomitant.

133: Canon of Relevance

Each characteristic should be relevant to the purpose of the classification.

134: Canon of Ascertainability

Each characteristic should be definitely ascertainable.

135: Canon of Permanence

Each characteristic should continue to be both ascertainable and unchanged, so long as there is no change in the purpose of the classification.

136: Canon of Relevant Sequence

The characteristics of the scheme are to be used in a sequence relevant to the purpose of the classification.

137: Canon of Consistency

The sequence of applying the chosen characteristics should be consistently adhered to.

Canons for Array

141: Canon of Exhaustiveness

The classes in any array of classes should be totally exhaustive of their common immediate universe.

142: Canon of Exclusiveness

The classes in an array of classes should be mutually exclusive.

143: Canon of Helpful Sequence

The sequence of the classes in any array should be helpful. It should be according to some convenient principle, and not arbitrary, wherever insistence on one principle does not violate other more important requirements.

144: Canon of Consistent Sequence

Whenever similar classes occur in different arrays, their sequences should be parallel in all such arrays, wherever insistence on such a parallel does not run counter to other more important requirements. (See Principles for Helpfulness in Array below.)

Canons for Chain

151: Canon of Decreasing Extension

While moving down a chain from its first link to its last link, the intension of the classes should increase, and the extension of the classes should decrease.

152: Canon of Modulation

A chain of classes should comprise one class of each and every order that lies between the orders of the first link and the last link of the chain.

Canons for Filiatory Sequence

161: Canon for Subordinate Clauses

All the subordinate classes of a class, in whatever chain they may occur, should immediately follow it, without being separated from it or among themselves by any other class.

162: Canon for Co-ordinate Classes

Among the classes in an array, no class with less affinity should come between two classes with greater affinity.

Canons for Terminology

171: Canon of Currency

Each of the terms used to denote the classes in a scheme of classification must be the one currently accepted by those specialising in the universe to which the scheme is applicable.

172: Canon of Reticence

The terms used to denote the classes in a scheme of classification should not be critical.

173: Canon of Enumeration

The denotation of each term in a scheme of classification should be decided in the light of the classes enumerated in the various chains (lower links) having the class denoted by the term as their common first link.

174: Canon of Context

The denotation of each term in a scheme of classification should be decided in the light of the different classes of lower order (upper links) belonging to the same primary chain as the class denoted by the term.

Canons for Notation

1881: Canon of Relativity

The length of a class number in a scheme of classification should be proportional to the order of the intension of the class it represents.

1882: Canon of Expressiveness

A class number should be expressive of the relevant characteristics of the class represented by it.

1883: Canon of Mixed Notation

The notation of a scheme of classification should be mixed.

Special Canons for Knowledge Classification

221: Canon of Hospitality in Array

The construction of a class number should admit of an infinite number of new co-ordinate class numbers being added to an array without disturbing the existing class numbers in any way.

231: Canon of Hospitality in Chain

The construction of a new class number should admit of an infinity of new class numbers being added at the end of its chain without disturbing any of the existing class numbers in any way.

241: General Canon of Mnemonics

The digit or digits used to represent a specified concept in a class number should be the same in all class numbers having the concept represented in them, provided that insistence on such consistent representation does not violate more important requirements.

252: Canon of Verbal Mnemonics

Verbal mnemonics should be rejected, without any hesitation, if a sequence more helpful to readers or more filiatory than alphabetical sequence exists. Verbal mnemonics by alphabetical device should be preferred if the alphabetical sequence is as helpful as any other sequence. The word forming the basis of verbal mnemonics should be that of international nomenclature whenever it has been set up.

261: Canon of Scheduled Mnemonics

A scheme of classification should include a preliminary set of schedules of divisions based on characteristics likely to recur in a array of some order or other of all or many classes, or refer any recurrent array of divisions to the one schedule of them giving in connection with an appropriate class.

271: Canon of Seminal Mnemonics

A scheme of classification should use one and the same digit to denote seminally equivalent concepts in whatever array of whatever class they may appear.

Special Canons for Book Classification

621: Canon of Classics

A Scheme of Book Classification should have a device to bring together all the editions, translations, and adaptations of a classic, and next to them all the editions, etc., of the different commentaries on it, the editions, etc., of a particular commentary all coming together, and next to each commentary all the editions, etc., of the commentaries on itself in a similar manner (commentaries of the second order), and so on.

631: Canon of Local Variation

The notational system of a scheme of book classification should provide for variations due to special interests.

662: Canon of Book Number

A scheme of book classification should be provided with a scheme of book numbers to individualise the documents having the same class of knowledge as their ultimate class.

678: Canon of Collection Number

A Scheme of Book Classification may be provided with a Schedule of Collection Numbers to individualise the various collections of special documents to be formed on the basis of the peculiarities of their gross bodies, or their rarity, or service exigency to facilitate use by readers. The collection numbers based on physical peculiarity may be of use in bibliographies also.

6852: Canon of Distinctiveness

In a Scheme of Library Classification, the class number, the book number, and the collection number, together forming the call number, should be written quite distinct from one another.

Principles

General

3581: Principle of Increasing Concreteness

If two classes are such that one can be said to be more abstract and less concrete than the other, the former should precede the latter.

3582: Principle of Increasing Artificiality

If two classes are such that one can be said to be nearer to the "thing-in-itself" or naturalness and farther from artificiality than the other, the former should precede the other.

For Facet Formula

3583: Principle of Inversion

In an analytico-synthetic classification, the implementation of the Principle of Increasing Concreteness requires that the facets in the facet formula of a basic class should be in the decreasing sequence of concreteness. If the scheme has rounds of facets, the facets in each round should be in the decreasing sequence of concreteness.

For Helpfulness in Array

1431: Principle of Increasing Quantity

If the characteristic used admits of quantitative measurement, the sequence of the classes may be in the ascending sequence of the measure in which the classes share the characteristic.

1432: Principle of Later-in-Time

If the classes in an array have originated in different times, they may be arranged in a parallel progressive time-sequence.

1433: Principle of Later-in-Evolution

If the characteristic is of an evolutionary nature, the sequence of the classes may be parallel to the course of evolution.

1434: Principle of Spatial Continuity

If the classes of an array occur contiguously in space, they may be arranged in a parallel spatial sequence.

1435: Principle of Increasing Complexity

If the classes in an array show different degrees of complexity, they are arranged in the sequence of increasing complexity.

1436: Principle of Canonical Sequence

If the classes are traditionally referred to in a specific sequence, although no underlying principle is discoverable, it will be convenient to confirm to this traditional sequence.

1437: Principle of Favoured Category

The classes in an array may be arranged in the sequence of the decreasing quantity of published documents on them.

1438: Principle of Alphabetical Sequence

When no other sequence of the classes in an array is more helpful, they are arranged alphabetically by their names current in international usage.

Dr. S. R. Ranganathan

All the libraries, book sellers and library software companies owe a part to Dr. S. R. Ranganathan for his contribution to the field of library movement in India. This page is dedicated to Dr. SRR.

Dr. S. R. Ranganathan is admired to be the father of Library Science movement in India. His five laws of library science are ever green.

Books are for use

Every book it's reader

Every reader his book

Save the time of the reader

A library is a growing organism

We at Easylib pay our homage to Dr. S. R. Ranganathan by trying to implement the features in Easylib that help you implement his laws successfully at your library.

Here is biography of Dr. S. R. Ranganathan for your reading.

SHIYALI RAMAMRITA RANGANATHAN

Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan was born on August 9, 1892 at Shiyali, Madras, India and died on September 27, 1972. He was considered to be the father of library science in India and his work has had a profound influence worldwide. Ranganathan is considered by some as the greatest librarian of the twentieth century and to have contributed to the many connections between libraries throughout the world.
Ranganathan began his career as a mathematician and became a librarian in 1924, at the University of Madras. Ranganathan attended the University College of London from 1924 to 1925 in order to prepare for his work at the University of Madras. During his time in London, Ranganathan visited and studied public libraries, as well as college libraries, across Great Britain. The observations and studies Ranganathan made during his stay in Great Britain helped him to focus on subjects such as cataloging, c lassification and reference services. He appreciated the potential libraries had for helping societies to grow and flourish and this awareness helped Ranganathan in his lifelong promotion of libraries and library services.
Ranganathan focused his research on library services when he returned to India and developed his Five Laws of Library Science which helped changed the role of public and private libraries, as well as those in colleges and universities throughout the world. Ranganathan saw libraries as places of service and librarians as both scholars and teachers. Ranganathan was aware of the need for India and other countries to have literate populations and this must have been a significant influence in his life long focus on library services.
In addition to his work on library services, Ranganathan made considerable contributions to library understanding and use through his development of the Colon Classification system and the techniques of chain indexing for subject-index entries. Both of these techniques have had significant influence and impact on library systems throughout the world and continue to have impact as libraries grow and change in the modern electronic environment.
Bibliography
Kuronen, Timo, and Paivi Pekkarinen. "Ranganathan Revisited: A Review Article". Journal of Librarianship and Information Science 31 (1) (March 1999): 45-48.
Atherton, Pauline A. Putting Knowledge to Work: An American View of Ranganathans Five Laws of Library Science. Bombay, India: Vikas Publishing House PYT LTD, 1973.
The New Encyclopaedia Britannica, 15th ed., s.v. "Ranganathan, Shiyali Ramamrita".
Created December 3, 1999
Authored by Margaret Pruiett. Contact at (mpruiett@utk.edu)

www.csmalavd.blogspot.in

Saturday, December 21, 2013

RANGANATHAN, S.R.

RANGANATHAN, S.R.----

Classification and Communication

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Documentation and its Facets: Being a symposium of seventy papers by thirty-two authors

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The Five Laws of Library Science

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New education and school library: Experience of half a century

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S. R. Ranganathan

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Early life and education[edit]

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Later career[edit]

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Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan

.........http://www.slideshare.net/anilmlis/ranganathan-biography-1830888

...........Ranganathan Biography

Document Transcript

.....Ranganathan, Shiyali Ramamrita (1892-1972)

..............................................................

DR. S .R .RANGANATHAN

FATHER OF INDIAN LIBRARY SCIENCE

Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan

Efforts Of Dr. S. R. Ranganathan For Public Library Legislation And Service- A Review

Susan Kelsch

407A Cataloging and Classification I, Summer II term

August 5, 2003

Ranganathan’s Colon Classification in 1500 Words or Less

A brief history of Colon Classification

Description of Colon Classification

Example

234;46:6.44’N7

About the five facets

The future of Colon Classification

Bibliography

Father of library movement

http://unllib.unl.edu/LPP/

Library Philosophy and Practice 2011

Relevance of Ranganathan's Laws of Library Science in Library Marketing

Introduction

Marketing

Ranganathan's Five Laws of Library Science

References

Application of Ranganathan's Laws to the Web

Abstract

Keywords

Introduction

The Five Laws of Library Science

The Five Laws of the Web

1. Web resources are for use

2. Every user his or her web resource

3. Every web resource its user

4. Save the time of the user

`z` Generalia

`1` Universe of knowledge

`2` Library science

`3` Book science

`4` Journalism

`B` Mathematics

`C` Physics

`D` Engineering

`E` Chemistry

`F` Technology

`G` Biology

`H` Geology

`HX` Mining

`I` Botany

`J` Agriculture

`K` Zoology

`KZ` Animal husbandry

`L` Medicine

`LZ` Pharmacognosy

`M` Useful arts

`Δ` Spiritual experience and mysticism ²

`N` Fine arts

`O` Literature

`P` Linguistics

`Q` Religion

`R` Philosophy

`S` Psychology

`T` Education

`U` Geography

`V` History

`W` Political science

`X` Economics

`Y` Sociology

`Z` Law