ABSTRACT
The Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules received a thorough revision in 1978, and was reissued with minor revisions in 1988 and 1998. In this chapter, the authors examine document access in the context of catalogues and bibliographies. The tension between the direct and collocative functions remains as strong as ever, and an understanding of these functions is fundamental to the appreciation of the role of catalogues and of the author approach generally. Card catalogues in the UK traditionally only provided title access points for a small proportion of their stock. For the great majority of items, the main entry consists of a single personal author, which in a catalogue entry is followed immediately by the title - which follows the authors normal everyday practice of citing a work by its author and title. Main entry under a personal author or corporate body has to be justified on criteria of responsibility for the existence of the work; otherwise main entry is under title.
