International Association of Libraries and Museums of the Performing ArtsSociété Internationale des Bibliothèques et des Musées des Arts du Spectacle |
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Actes du XIVe Congrès International des Bibliothèques et des Musées des Arts du SpectacleBeograd 15-20 septembre 1980. Beograd : 1982. ISSN 0361-7500
Sredoje LalicOrganising Documentary Materials According to the Systems of Subject or Formpp. 138-149 [Page 147 missing in original!!!]
Instead of an introduction: a word or two about Sterijino Pozorje Sterijino Pozorje was founded in Novi Sad in 1956 with the basic purpose of promoting the advancement of Yugoslav dramatic literature and stage productions based on Yugoslav texts. Sterijino Pozorje has been carrying out its purpose continuously by:
The institution of the Sterijino Pozorje Center for Theater Documentation and the basic aspects of its activityThe Center for Theater Documentation of Sterijino Pozorje began its activity in mid 1977, that is to say, more than twenty years after the founding of Sterijino Pozorje - the institution within whose framework the Center itself was instituted. Over the twenty years of existence of Sterijino Pozorje, that is to say, of the holding of the Yugoslav Theater Festival, the international symposiums of critics and theater professionals and Yugoslav and international exhibitions devoted to the theater and theater artists and of a series of other events a large and varied amount of documentary material came into being. Starting out its activities with a twenty years delay in comparison to the beginning of accumulation of documentary material, the Center for Theater Documentation found itself confronted by various problems of a professional nature. These arose from the variety of documentary material, both in content and in form, due to which it was difficult to find a simple and unique approach to its sorting, notation and processing. The documentary material which came into being and is still continuing to accumulate at Sterijino Pozorje consists of:
b) dramaturgical documentary material: - manuscripts of dramatic works (performed or not performed at the Yugoslav Theater Festival) - a collection of clippings (theater, literary and drama critiques in Yugoslavia, the repertoires and activities of theater festivals in Yugoslavia, biographies of theater artists, reviews of performances at the Yugoslav Theater Festival and the overall activity of Sterijino Pozorje), - negatives, photographs and slides taken at theater performances, exhibitions and assemblies, - tape recordings made of performances and various events, - 16 and 35 mm film tapes of performances (and from 1980 video-casettes also) , - theater posters of premiere performances, - theater programs and other short printed materials, - scenography and costume design sketches and final solutions, - various other types, in smaller quantity, of written, drawing, recorded or duplicated materials, including threedimensional objects (medallions, models and the like), c) library collections (Yugoslav and foreign books and periodicals on the theater and of Yugoslav dramatic literature) , d) bibliographies and bibliographical materials e) unpublished documents (both primary and secondary) providing statistical and other factual data on the activities of Sterijino Pozorje and the theater life in Yugoslavia. Dilemmas at the outsetConfronted by the fact of documentary material which had been collected and stored since 1956 but not sorted as well, following its institution the Center for Theater Documentation found itself in 1977 before its first and greatest dilemma of which methodology for sorting-and processing this documentary material it should apply. The problem of methodology posed itself as the alternatives of:
Arguments for and against organising documentary material according to the subject systemThe subject system for organising, sorting, processing and storing documentary material offers very attractive possibilities for creating, in a relatively simple manner and short time, of thematic and subject entities of various kinds of documents, which, from the standpoint of information and document use, bring documentational materials closer to potential users. For instance, this system makes it possible to find within one subject group (and as a physical collection) all the materials on, let us say, the performances of Goran Stefanovski's play Divo meso [Proud Flesh] (the text of the play, literary reviews, documents on the author, directing, scenographic and costume design materials, photographs, theater posters, tape recordings of various performances, theater reviews of various performances and the like). The documentary materials are, therefore, sorted independent of their material features and distributed into subject groups according to their content. Depending on the scope of subjects of the documentary materials, the documentarist establishes a number of subject groups so as to "cover" the entire material. For his own purposes and for those of the users it is sufficient, in such a case, to make an alphabetical index of these subject groups according to which the documentary material is sorted. Provided the interest of the user corresponds, in regard to content, with one or more of the subject groups, this system can, undoubtedly, meet the demand for certain data and documents. Those demands of the user, however, which originate from specific or "cross-reference" positions and do not coincide with the subject groups, can be met only by going through a number of subject groups of documents. The advantages of this system which appear in its relatively simple and quick practical application are subsequently lost due to the limitations and difficulties encountered later in the attempt to develop more ramified and "multifaceted" informing. The shortcomings of organising documentary materials according to subject, which become apparent in developing a more advanced information system, can, to a great extent, be overcome by creating information means adapted to this system of documentation. The joint feature of these information means would be the fact that one means would present information only on primary documents of the same material (formal) features. For instance, a catalog of theater posters whose cards would be ordered according to their authors or according to the authors of dramatic works or according to theater companies or the like which facilitates the process of gaining detailed information from this series of documents. The denotation of the subject group under which the poster is classified would, in such a case, function as its call number. One should not exclude, even in this system, the possibility of applying more complex information procedures, of a conventional or non-conventional nature. In this regard there are, in fact, limitless possibilities for applying traditional (classical) and mechanical (modern) indexing. Efforts in this direction are conditioned by the adequate processing of particular documentary units of which there are, as a rule, tens and hundreds in each subject group of documents. From this the conclusion impresses itself that with time, along with the introduction and advancement of more complex systems of information (capable of offering detailed data from various positions at one and the same time) the original organisation of documentary material according to subject becomes obsolete as the basis for complete and accurate informing. In the not so distant future, subject groups, that is to say, their titles as possible formulations of corresponding demands for information, will turn into an embryonic, quite small portion of an incomparably larger number of variously formulated demands for information which it will be possible to meet completely and accurately. This consideration of the features of organising documentary material according to subject should also include, though in broad terms, several others of a different nature. These stem from the fact that not even the smallest documentary unit belongs, by its content and formal features, to one single subject group exclusively. Most often there are instances of a single documentary unit which, due to its various content and formal features, could be justifiably included in a larger number of subject groups of different titles. This is in fact what is done, provided there are several copies of the same documentary unit - but to the detriment of storage space. If, however, it is a case of a unique item, it rests on the subjective opinion of the documentarist to determine which of its features will be the determining ones for assigning this documemtary unit to a corresponding subject group. The factors of economy in sorting and storing of documentary materials, and also the possibilities of standardising storage equipment, the application of physical and chemical protection and the possibilities for uniform documentational processing are also same of the weaker aspects of this system. The system of organising documentary material according to subject offers, at first glance, very attractive possibilities: even large collections of documentary materials can, in a relatively short period of time, be organised according to the principles of subject pertinence and thus quickly made available for scholarly and professional use. The limited popularity this system enjoys stems, for the most part, from those document users whose interests coincide with the formulated subject groups. Arguments for and against organising documentary material according to the form systemThe form system of organising documentary materials, as is evident in the practice of archives, museums, libraries and documentation centers, is founded on the principle of grouping the basic documentary units of the same formal and material features into separate groups - collections. Within these groups an order of basic documentary units is established according to the criterion of formal features (numerical denotation, chronological, alphabetical according to name, alphabetical according to name of geographical features, alphabetical according to author, combined denotation and so on). The establishing of groups of basic documentary units and the determination of their order according to formal features can rarely, at the first stage of sorting and processing, offer a subject view of the material. The sorting of the basic documentary units and their individual noting (inventory) creates physical series of documents of the same kind, and these can "emanate" information only if the demands (requests) of the users stem from that feature which served as a criterion for establishing the order of documents. Thus, for instance, if a collection of posters is organised (ordered) according to theater-houses - publishers, it would be easy and quick to answer a request for information to the effect of: "how many and which posters did this theater house publish?" as opposed to a question to the effect of "how many and which posters in the collection were published in 1961?", which would require much more time for their examination and singling out. From the instance cited, the conclusion can be easily drawn that the system of organising documentary material according to form, following the realisation of the first stage of sorting and noting of the basic documentary units, offers very modest possibilities for information. This is particularly true of such requests for information which require a synthesis of data and documents on a broader subject notion. So, for instance, the information demand about the play Proud Flesh by Goran Stefanovski on the Yugoslav stage would be left without a complete reply. What is, therefore, the advantage of the system of organisation according to subject (that relatively complex information requests can be answered fairly quickly, though not requests for more detailed information also) is a characteristic weakness of the system of organisation according to form (which can fairly quickly answer requests for more detailed information, but not those which require a synthesis of features or of various kinds of documents). Still, the system of organising documentary material according to form calls for the creation of an information system "for the long run" and for the application of more advanced information means and methods. The appropriate selection and evolving of information means, along with the application of traditional or contemporary techniques of document processing (and, of course, along with much knowledge and time devoted to the analysis of the content of the basic documentary units), can give rise to a complex information system which will be very flexible both in regard to the fields of interest of the users and in regard to the analytic and synthetic approach of users to subject notions, the formal features of documents or to the combined criteria for the dispersion of documents. The perspectives which the present age offers in the field of applying modern information methods and means particularly in the area of machine indexing, create an assurance that at least some of the previously insurmountable problems in the information memorizing and retrieval will be overcome by the application of modern technical means in the field of theater documentation as in others. The system of organising documentary material according to form can also be characterised as an open" information and documentation system, one in which new information sub-systems can be introduced, that is to say, as a very adaptable one in regard to user demands and compatible to larger branch or regional information systems. Along with this, the system of organisation according to form affords an incomparably more economic and safe storage and protection of documents, standardisation of equipment and technical requirements, an easier application of uniform methods of professional processing, and also more efficient methods and more modern technical means for the retrieval of necessary documents. [Page 147 missing in document!!! ]
The Center for Theater Documentation of Sterijino Pozorje has still not begun work on all the forms of processing the documentary materials it possesses and which it is continuing to collect along with collecting and sorting of "dry" data on the repertoires, performances of professional theater houses and theater festivals in Yugoslavia. The presentations on the theoretical and practical problems of sorting,
processing and use of documentary material on the theater which we have
had the occasion to hear at the 14th Congress of SIBMAS will be of great
value to us in our future work. All the more so, since the Center for Theater
Documentation of Sterijino Pozorje is virtually at the beginning of its
growth. What we have said of ourselves and of some of our problems and
dilemmas in the organising of our theater documentation and information
activities will provide you with an image of a rather small documentation
center still in the process of origination.
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