Evaluation of encyclopaedias, Humanities

Assignment Help:

Evaluation of Encyclopaedias

A good and useful collection of general and special encyclopaedias form the backbone for the reference work in any library. The strong collection of general and special encyclopaedias in English and other languages ensure efficient reference service in a library. In this section, we will discuss various check points which can help in the selection and assessing the value of encyclopaedias before the acquisition for the library.

It is a very expensive venture to produce an authoritative set of encyclopaedia as it involves overall planning, engaging subject experts to write articles, competent indexers to provide layout artists, exhaustive index, and photographers for providing apt illustrations, accurate printing, efficient editorial and proof reading, adequate advertising through reviews in journals catalogues and announcement leaflets to booksellers, distributors, librarians etc. All these cannot be done cheaply. Reputed publishers recognise this fact by their experience in the field of publishing encyclopaedias and incur considerable expenditure to produce an authoritative work so as to earn the profit in turn. The prices of the authoritative sets of encyclopaedia are quite high, as the publishers have to meet with the expenses of high cost of production. Therefore the librarians have to make careful selection of the encyclopaedia and judicious expenditure depending upon the avail-ability of funds and space. Again, the librarian has also to consider the needs of the reader. They must be used intelligently to obtain the maximum benefit. It is not possible to make a perfect and complete encyclopaedia, as it is difficult to include all the existing information: Hence, the librarian should assess their value and find out their merits and demerits before acquiring them.

The main checkpoints for evaluating and analysing encyclopaedias are :

a) Authority

b) Scope and purpose

c) Treatment

d) Arrangement

e) Format

f) Revision

g) Limitation

h) Special features


Related Discussions:- Evaluation of encyclopaedias

Ageing and health, What is Ageing and Health- ? Please provide me report o...

What is Ageing and Health- ? Please provide me report on Ageing and Health . It is about 2000 words count report on topic Ageing and Health . Ageing and Health- Ageing, irre

Thesauri and subject headings list, Thesauri and Subject Headings List   ...

Thesauri and Subject Headings List   Both thesauri and subject headings lists are vocabulary control devices, but they are used in different situations. The essential character

What is mass media?, Mass Media Mass media here means communication th...

Mass Media Mass media here means communication through a number of physical transmission modes such as print, visual, audio, audio-visual and electronic forms to a general mas

Tang cosmopolitanism, Tang Cosmopolitanism and Poetry Wang Wei (699-...

Tang Cosmopolitanism and Poetry Wang Wei (699-759) Inspired by Zen Buddhism.also a painter. Synthesized two mediums of painting and writing. "Deer Enclosure" - Beautiful att

Non conventional indexing model - citation indexing, NON CONVENTIONAL INDEX...

NON CONVENTIONAL INDEXING MODEL - CITATION INDEXING Another unique indexing model was developed by Eugene Garfield in early 1960's. The model is non conventional in the sense

Ecology as a science, How was the development of ecology as a science affec...

How was the development of ecology as a science affected by global exploration

Applied ethics phl101, select one of the four views examined by hursthouse ...

select one of the four views examined by hursthouse on the moral status of the human foetus and critically examine one of the arguments either for or against that view

Bibliography, BIBLIOGRAPHY The bibliography is the chief class or form...

BIBLIOGRAPHY The bibliography is the chief class or form of reference and information access tools. It is a systematically produced descriptive list of records. The term bibl

Human Relations in Organization, Ask qI am need answers to my work I am fai...

Ask qI am need answers to my work I am failing and need to do a lot of catching up with my work also I need it to worded correctly

Vocabulary control - objectives, Objectives   There are basically two o...

Objectives   There are basically two objectives for having a controlled vocabulary:  a)  to promote the consistent representation  of the subject  matter  of documents by in

Write Your Message!

Captcha
Free Assignment Quote

Assured A++ Grade

Get guaranteed satisfaction & time on delivery in every assignment order you paid with us! We ensure premium quality solution document along with free turntin report!

All rights reserved! Copyrights ©2019-2020 ExpertsMind IT Educational Pvt Ltd