The Acquisitions and Bibliographic Access Directorate provides acquisitions and bibliographic access services to the Library of Congress and leadership in bibliographic access collaborations and standards for the library and information service communities, nationally and internationally, and training and instructional design for the Library Services service unit of the Library of Congress.
Office of the Director
In addition to providing administrative and technical support for the directorate, the Office of the Director oversees digital initiatives and the Acquisitions Fiscal, Overseas and Support Division, responsibilities of which include mail functions and the Duplicate Materials Exchange and Surplus Books Programs, as well as Overseas Operations.
Beacher Wiggins, Director
Phone: (202) 707-5325
[email protected]
Angela Kinney, Deputy Director
Acquisitions Mission: To acquire materials for the Library's collections in the most timely and cost effective manner and make them accessible. Acquisitions acquires materials for the Library of Congress in all formats -- books, periodicals, maps, music, prints, photographs, recorded sound, videos, digital, etc. -- and in all subjects, except technical agriculture and clinical medicine, from all over the world.
Bibliographic Access Mission: To provide innovative and effective bibliographic access to library materials and leadership to the library and information communities. The Acquisitions and Bibliographic Access Divisions are responsible for the descriptive cataloging (physical attributes of the creative work, assignment of intellectual responsibility for the creation of the content, and the forms of names by which those responsible are to be represented in the catalog) of books, microforms, and computer files; and the subject analysis, Library of Congress classification, shelflisting (to provide unique call numbers), and Dewey Decimal classification of books, special formats, and some serials. The divisions provide leadership in cataloging policy for the national and international library communities and the secretariat for the Program for Cooperative Cataloging, an international consortium which promotes the creation of shared cataloging which meets international standards.
The Acquisitions and Bibliographic Access Directorate includes the following divisions and offices.
Acquisitions Fiscal, Overseas and Support Division
The Acquisitions Fiscal, Overseas, and Support Division administers the expenditure of funds and provides centralized accounting for the acquisitions budget as well as financial services for the overseas offices and their Cooperative Acquisitions Programs.
Chief, Vivek Nadkarni
Visit the Overseas Offices home page
African, Latin American and Western European Division
The African, Latin American and Western European Division acquires (via purchase and non-purchase), processes and catalogs materials from all sub-Saharan African, Iberian, Latin American, South American (including the Rio Overseas Office), and Caribbean countries, and from France, Belgium, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, and Italy and processes and/or catalogs some materials from the Rio and Nairobi Offices; also ECIPs that require expertise in the languages, history, religion or culture of Africa, Latin America and the Western European countries covered by the division.
Acting Chief, Héctor Morey
Asian and Middle Eastern Division
The Asian and Middle Eastern Division acquires (via purchase and non-purchase), processes and catalogs materials from Asia and the Middle East and processes and/or catalogs materials from the Cairo, Jakarta, Islamabad and New Delhi Overseas Offices; also ECIPs that require expertise in the languages, history, religion or culture of Asia and the Middle East, including Judaica.
Chief, Jessalyn Zoom
Germanic and Slavic Division
The Germanic and Slavic Division acquires (via purchase and non-purchase), processes and catalogs materials from Scandinavian, Baltic and Germanic countries, Russia, and East Central and Southeast Europe; also ECIPs that require expertise in the languages, history, religion or culture of the countries covered by the division.
Chief, Christine Korytnyk Dulaney
Network Development and MARC Standards Division
The Network Development and MARC Standards Office is a center for library and information network standards and planning in the Library of Congress. Established in 1976 to provide focus for networking activities in the Library of Congress, the office was expanded in 1984 to include MARC standards responsibilities. The Office is involved in many facets of network development including: standards that are basic to efficient, long-term interchange with other systems such as those for Bibliographic Framework Initiative (BIBFRAME) and Machine-Readable Cataloging (MARC), as well as SRU and Z39.50 information retrieval protocols; planning, which involves detailed models and specifications with other institutions and with internal Library of Congress units; and coordinating and testing implementation that takes the standards development and planning to fulfillment through the completion of operational networking systems.
Chief, Sally McCallum
Visit the Standards home page
Policy, Training and Cooperative Programs Division
The Policy, Training and Cooperative Programs Division trains and coordinates internal and external training; cooperative cataloging programs, including serving as the Secretariat for the Program for Cooperative Cataloging (PCC); the National Union Catalog of Manuscript Collections (NUCMC); and oversight of the PCC fund. The Division provides cataloging and acquisitions policy library wide; product support and development functions for bibliographic products and tools; processing of subject and classification proposals; LC database record maintenance and error/conflict resolution; and documentation and website maintenance.
Chief, Judith Cannan
Information about the work of PTCP can be found throughout the ABA site
U.S./Anglo Division
The U.S./Anglo Division acquires (via purchase and non-purchase), processes and catalogs materials from the United States, Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and Oceania; catalogs rare materials; accessions and disposes of multiple copies of government documents; and coordinates major gifts to the Library, as well as the acquisition of special collections.
Chief, Theron (Ted) Westervelt
U.S. Programs, Law, and Literature Division
The U.S. Programs, Law, and Literature Division catalogs Copyright and CIP materials and materials coming in through the ISSN application process; provides CIP, CYAC (Children's and Young Adults' Cataloging), Dewey Decimal Classification, and ISSN infrastructure support; and catalogs law materials.
Questions about copyright registration should be directed to the Copyright Office, http://www.copyright.gov
Chief, Caroline E. Saccucci
U.S. Arts, Sciences, and Humanities Division
The U.S. Arts, Sciences, and Humanities Division catalogs Copyright and CIP materials and manages the selection process for U.S. imprints coming through these workflows.
Questions about copyright registration should be directed to the Copyright Office, http://www.copyright.gov
Chief, Vera Clyburn
Other Library of Congress divisions involved in cataloging and acquisitions activities:
- Geography and Map Division Acquisitions
- Geography and Map Division Cataloging
- Prints and Photographs Cataloging and Digitizing Toolbox
Previous Organizational Divisions and Offices
As a result of reorganizations that took effect on October 1, 2008, and June 2, 2013, the ABA Directorate is organized in the above named divisions and offices. The ABA Directorate formerly included the following divisions and offices.
- Anglo-American Acquisitions Division
- European & Latin American Acquisitions Division
- Serial Record Division
- Arts and Sciences Cataloging Division
- History and Literature Cataloging Division
- Regional and Cooperative Cataloging Division
- Social Sciences Cataloging Division
- Cataloging Distribution Service (portions now part of Policy, Training, and Cooperative Programs Division; other functions part of Business Enterprises Division, Library Enterprises Directorate)
- Cataloging in Publication Division (now CIP Program, part of U.S. Programs, Law, and Literature Division)
- Decimal Classification Division (now Dewey Program, part of U.S. Programs, Law, and Literature Division)
- Cataloging Policy and Support Office (now Policy, Training, and Cooperative Programs Division)
- Policy and Standards Division (now Policy, Training, and Cooperative Programs Division)
- Special Materials Cataloging Division (Music Teams now with Music Division outside of ABA, others in U.S./Anglo Division and Policy, Training, and Cooperative Programs Division)
- US General Division
- US & Publisher Liaison Division
