O controlo de autoridade por assunto em Ciência da Informação: estudo de caso de uma biblioteca de ensino superior

Abstract

This work was developed in the scope of authority control (AC), a process that allows consistency in access points, in order to provide the retrieval of coherent information in catalogues of libraries. The AC by subject in the area of Social Sciences and Humanities (SSH) requires knowledge of the information professional in the area, considering that this area has a variety of terminology and constant updating in its vocabulary. It is worth mentioning that in Information Science (IS) it is no different, vocabulary heterogeneity is present in this domain, and for information professionals it becomes a challenge to maintain control of authority by subject. From this, a case study was developed in the context of the library of the Faculty of Letters of the University of Porto (FLUP) and aims to answer the following question: How is the control of authority by subject developed in the field of Information Science within the scope of FLUP library? To clarify the aforementioned question, this research has the general objective: To analyse the development of AC by subject in the field of IS in the online catalogue of the FLUP library. Therefore, this is an investigation of an exploratory nature, developed from a qualitative approach, in order to seek evidence capable of enabling an understanding of the development of AC by subject in the context of the FLUP library. Data collection will take place through document analysis and semi-structured interview. The sample results revealed that the AC by subject in IS in the FLUP library develops in an inconsistent way, as it was possible to perceive the presence of some terms that were in disagreement with the norms practiced, in addition to terms that are not included in the authority base and terms that did not have association or equivalence relationships. This work resulted in the elaboration of a proposal of principles for AC by subject, and also a List of terms in Information Science registered in the Aleph authorities base.