Case studies in cataloging: theoretical and practical considerations

The practice of cataloging underwent vast changes when the computer was introduced and opened the field of what we now call information technology now essential in the practice of the professional librarian, involving highly specialized pragmatics, languages, syntax and interpretative rules. The purpose of this research is to explain why case studies in the field of cataloging have been used merely descriptively, while failing to draw out general principles. These studies, moreover, have been used for instrumental ends, having been designed from explicatory and fragmentary models. As such, this paper argues for case study praxis as a support for the theory of Evidence Based Librarianship. By adopting the case study methodology, cataloguers will enjoy powerful decision making parameters that happily conjoin real-world practice with theory.