assignFAST: An Autosuggest based tool for FAST Subject Assignment

<p><em>Subject assignment is really a three-phase task. The first phase is intellectual—reviewing the material and determining its topic. The second phase is more mechanical, identifying the correct subject heading(s). The final phase is retyping or cutting and pasting the heading(s) into the cataloging interface along with any diacritics, and potentially correcting formatting and subfield coding. If authority control is available in the interface, some of these tasks may be automated or partially automated.</em></p> <p><em>A cataloger with a reasonable knowledge of </em><a href="http://www.oclc.org/research/activities/fast.html"><em>FAST</em></a><a href="#_edn1">[i]</a>,<a href="#_edn2">[ii]</a><em> or even </em><a href="http://www.loc.gov/catdir/cpso/lcc.html"><em>LCSH</em></a><a href="#_edn3">[iii]</a><em> can quickly get to the proper heading, but usually needs to confirm the final details—was it plural? Am I thinking of an alternate form? Is it inverted? Etc. This often requires consulting the full authority file interface. assignFAST is a Web service that consolidates the entire second phase of the manual process of subject assignment for FAST subjects into a single step based on autosuggest technology.</em></p> <div><br /> <hr size="1" /><div><p><a href="#_ednref1">[i]</a> Chan, Lois Mai and Edward T. O'Neill. <em>FAST: Faceted Application of Subject Terminology, Prnciples and Applications</em> Libraries Unlimited, Santa Barbara, 2010.<br /> <a href="http://lu.com/showbook.cfm?isbn=9781591587224">http://lu.com/showbook.cfm?isbn=9781591587224</a>.</p></div> <div><p><a href="#_ednref2">[ii]</a> OCLC Research Activities associated with FAST are summarized at <a href="http://www.oclc.org/research/activities/fast/default.htm">http://www.oclc.org/research/activities/fast/</a></p></div> <div><p><a href="#_ednref3">[iii]</a> Chan, Lois M. <em>Library of Congress Subject Headings : Principles and Application: Principles and Application</em>. Westport, Conn: Libraries Unlimited, 2005.</p></div></div>

Priority hierarchies in subject assignment in English: case of conflation

The theoretical model of Functional (Discourse) Grammar initially developed by Simón C. Dik (1997a/b) stresses the relevance of implicational hierarchies in grammatical operations and claims that these hierarchies, although they present individual properties associated with intrinsic, functional and hierarchical constraints, may interact with each other to the extent that some of them could be grouped and reformulated as a single hierarchy gathering properties of different nature. In this paper, we will explore these cases of conflation within the domain of the grammatical operation of Subject assignment in one particular language, viz. English, and will suggest new cases of overlap between some of these priority features which might be appropriate in a descriptive approach to Subject selection in the English language.

SECOND LANGUAGE ACQUISITION RESEARCH IN THE LABORATORY

This paper discusses some possibilities and limitations of laboratory research methods for testing theories of second language acquisition. The paper includes a review of 20 experimental lab studies. The review focuses on the motivation for conducting lab studies, the use of artificial or semiartificial language structures, and various design features (including pre- and posttesting, number of subjects, random subject assignment, between- and within-subjects comparisons, treatment materials and procedures). The paper calls for lab studies addressing issues central to SLA theory (“learning” vs. “acquisition”) and ends with some methodological recommendations, concerning the length of experimental treatments, the use of grammaticality judgment tasks, the measurement of reaction times, and the use of retrospective interviews.