Central Oregon
Community College
LIBRARY 127

LIBRARY ORGANIZATION
Remember...you are responsible for the text and the links!

The COCC Library--and most college and university libraries--is organized according to the Library of Congress Classification System. This system uses a combination of letters and numbers to create call numbers for each book;  those call numbers represent the subject of the book and serve as a kind of address, letting you know where to find the book on the shelf. 

Here's a little bit of background on the LC Classification system. 

It's important that you know how to look for books using the Library of Congress (LC) Classification system, and to do so, you have to earn how to read those call numbers effectively.

Note from Cat:  I remember I thought I knew how to use this system and then I was doing my senior research paper in college (on medieval Franciscan poetry of all things) and realized I really should have listened in those Library workshops...I was two floors underground in the College library, surrounded by musty books and didn't have the faintest idea how to find what I needed!  Don't be like me!  Pay attention to the structure of the call number system this week... next week you'll get acquainted with the online catalog that lets you search for books by keyword or subject then gives you the call numbers to find the books you need.

The combination of letters and numbers--the call numbers--also  group books by subject categories (also called "classes"). All books that have the same letters at the beginning of their call numbers should belong to the same subject area.  All books on art will have call numbers beginning with the letter N, for example.  Click here to find a listing of the general subject categories and their corresponding letters within the LC system.

The following call numbers are arranged in proper shelf order. Look at them closely to determine why:

Let's take a closer look at how LC call numbers are 'read' (this was also described in the first link on this page).

First line: A single letter comes first, followed alphabetically by a double letter. P comes before PA, which comes before PB, PE, PN, and so on.  The first row represents the broad topic of the book.

Second line: The letter(s) is followed by a WHOLE NUMBER, such as 217 and 1042 in the examples above. This number can range from 1 to 9,999 and is read in regular, whole number order.  The second line identifies the more specific topic of the book.

Third line: This line is always read as a decimal, whether a letter precedes it or not.  Compare numbers in the third line digit by digit in order to read them as decimals.  The third line, also called the "cutter number" identifies the author of the book.

Example:

In the example above, .R293 is smaller than .R444   .R444 comes before .R45 because it is a decimal.

The Library of Congress System will be the system you'll use at practically every college or university library you encounter on your academic travels. Imagine this: you look up a subject on a library's online book catalog (you'll learn how to do that in a few weeks). The online book catalog will list a number of book titles on your subject, and give you call numbers. You will have to be able to take those call numbers, and use them to find the books you need.

In addition, knowing the general categories, or classes,  for the Library of Congress system, will help you browse for books in any college library; for example, if you are looking for books on the general topic of art at the Reed College Library, you would be looking for the call number area beginning with the letter 'N'. 

Hey!  If you want to see the Library of Congress system IN INCREDIBLE DETAIL--GO HERE and click on each broad subject category!

So...how much do you know about the Library of Congress--our Nation's official library--located in Washington D.C.?   Go the official  Library of Congress webpage and find out!

The COCC Library and your local Public Library:

Your local public library is probably smaller than COCC's library, and most likely has a different organizational system-the Dewey Decimal system.  

Local public libraries are also different in the kind of books they contain in their collections, emphasizing general interest books and magazines, plus considerable amounts of fiction. The COCC library is low on fiction, but big on books and journals relating to the College's academic and professional/technical programs. At your local public library you might find a great book on fly-fishing, complete with pictures and diagrams; at the COCC library you'd find a current, scientific text on fish biology.

Your public library probably has a wide array of magazines and newspapers ranging from "Boy's Life"and "Sport's Illustrated" to the "Wall Street Journal". The COCC library does contain some popular magazines such as "Time" and "Newsweek" and "Runner's World" but most of our magazines and journals (the library word for this is 'periodicals'), again, are meant to relate to the College's programs. Browse through COCC's periodical collection and you'll find professional nursing journals, professional forestry journals, along with additional scholarly publications in the sciences, social sciences and humanities.

Of course, public libraries in large cities will have often have huge academic and professional book and journal collections in addition to expansive fiction and general interest collections. Take a look at the  Multnomah County Public Library System  in Portland, Oregon, and see the kinds of books they have in their collection. 

Now, take a look at the COCC Online Catalog and explore a bit (remember, we'll get into searching catalogs in detail next week!)