Participants will focus attention on updating the "Paris Principles" of 1961, by commenting on the draft Statement of International Cataloguing Principles first developed at the 2003 Frankfurt IME ICC and updated in 2004/2005 by the participants of IME ICC2 in Buenos Aires and again in 2005 by the Middle Eastern participants, and most recently in 2006/2007 by the Asian participants.

This Statement incorporates terminology and concepts of the IFLA Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records (FRBR)The participants will also discuss cataloguing rules applied in sub-Saharan Africa and ways to reach closer harmonisation of rules in the following areas (possible focus topics):

  • Personal names
  • Corporate bodies
  • Seriality issues of when to make a new record
  • Multipart structures
  • Uniform titles and GMDs (general material designators).

Background papers are available here. Translations of these papers in French and Portuguese will be added where possible.

During June-August there will be pre-meeting discussions on the listserv (in English) to collect current thinking in sub-Saharan Africa on the focus topics for Working Groups and to identify other areas of interest for cataloguing principles.

At the meeting in August, the conference organisers will present further background on IFLA initiatives in cataloguing, including FRBR (IFLA's Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records), and the concept of a Virtual International Authority File (VIAF), as well as an overview of the draft Statement of International Cataloguing Principles. There will be time to respond to comments and issues from the pre-meeting listserv discussions. During breakaway sessions, each of the focus topics will be discussed by the respective Working Group and recommendations prepared for reaction during the final plenary session. The meeting will end with prioritised actions towards closer harmonisation and recommendations for changes to the draft Statement of International Cataloguing Principles.

The recommendations and action items from the meeting will be posted on the IME ICC5 Web site and the results will also be reported to IFLA during the Cataloguing Section's Open Programme on 22 August 2007. The meeting report will be published by K.G. Saur through IFLA in 2008. Progress on fulfilling the recommendations and action items also will be posted on the IFLA Cataloguing Section Web site available through IFLANET.

The participants will join the international community of cataloguing experts in future IFLA discussions related to cataloguing principles and cataloguing rules.