The classification (BC2):
History and description | Using the scheme | Schedules | Library users | Bibliography
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BLISS, Henry Evelyn. A bibliographic classification. Vols. 1-4. [BC1]. – New York : H. W. Wilson, 1950-1953.
MILLS, Jack and BROUGHTON, Vanda. Bliss bibliographic classification. 2nd ed. [BC2 ]. – London, Butterworth, 1977 onwards. (See below for details of published schedules).
The schedules are constantly updated and amendments to classes are published in the Bliss Classification Association's annual Bulletin.
Introduction and auxiliary schedules / Jack Mills and Vanda Broughton. – London : Butterworth, 1977.
Class A/AL : Philosophy and logic / Ken Bell and Jack Mills. – London : Bowker-Saur, 1991.
Class AM/AX : Mathematics, probability and statistics / Jack Mills and Vanda Broughton. – London : Bowker-Saur, 1993.
Class AY/B : Science in general & physics / Jack Mills and Vanda Broughton. – London : Bowker-Saur, 1997
Class H : Anthropology, human biology, health sciences (including medicine) / Jack Mills and Vanda Broughton. – London : Butterworth, 1981.
Class I : Psychology and psychiatry / Jack Mills and Vanda Broughton. – London : Butterworth, 1978.
Class J : Education / D. J. Foskett and J. Foskett. – London : Bowker-Saur, 1991.
Class K : Society / Jack Mills and Vanda Broughton. – London : Butterworth, 1984.
Class P : Religion, the occult, morals and ethics / Jack Mills and Vanda Broughton. – London : Butterworth, 1977.
Class Q : Social welfare & criminology / Jack Mills and Vanda Broughton. – London : Butterworth, 1977. – (Revised ed. by Chris Preddle. 1994).
Class R : Politics and public administration / Jack Mills and Vanda Broughton. – London : Butterworth, 1996.
Class S : Law / Jack Mills and Vanda Broughton. – London : Butterworth, 1996.
Class T : Economics & management of economic enterprises / Jack Mills and Vanda Broughton. – London : Butterworth, 1996.
Class W :The arts / Jack Mills and Colin Ball. – München : Saur, 2007.
CANONNE, A. The Bibliographic Classification of Henry Evelyn Bliss. Bibliotheque, Document, Livre, 1968-1969, Vol. 9-10, No. 1-2, 1-49. [In French]
EARL, A. J. Reclassification by Bliss. School Librarian, 1974, Vol. 22, No. 1, 18-22.
EAVES, D. et al. The university of Tasmania's reclassification programme: the first year. Australian Academic Research Libraries, 1974, Vol. 5, No. 3, 101-112.
FASAYANA, J. O. Ibadan adapts LC. International Library Review, 1977, Vol. 9, No. 3, 279-287.
The University of Ibadan (Nigeria) re-classification from Bliss to Library of Congress.
FREEMAN, C. B. Bliss's Bibliographic Classification. Education Libraries Bulletin, 1969, No. 35 (Summer), 20-28.
GARFIELD, E. The 'other' immortal : a memorable day with Henry E. Bliss. Wilson Library Bulletin, 1974, Vol. 49, No. 4, 288-292.
GLEYZE, Alain and BILLARD Marie Claude. The Documentary Centre for the Theatre and Cinematography of Lyons Inter-University Library. Bulletin des Bibliotheques de France, 1975, Vol. 20, No. 12, 559-565. [In French]
The Bliss Classsification is used for this collection.
GUNJAL, S. R. Henry Evelyn Bliss: his contribution to library classification. Herald of Library Science, 1969, Vol. 8, No. 4, 308-311.
HAYLOCK, J. R. In ignorance of Bliss. New Library World, 1976, Vol. 72, No. 917, 207, 209.
KUSHAL, A. Y. Contemporary state and development of the main foreign bibliographical classification systems. Bibliotekovedenie in Bibliografiya za Rubeshom, 1977, Vol. 63, 62-85. [In Russian]
LYVER, Des. Retrieval systems for audio-visual aids. Visual Education, 1977, December, 23-24.
MILLS, Jack. A new edition of Bliss. Catalogue & Index, 1970, No. 17, 8-9.
MILLS, Jack. The Bibliographical Classification. In: MALTBY, Arthur, editor. Classification in the 1970s: a discussion of development and prospects for the major schemes. London, Bingley, 1972. pp. 25-52.
RANGANATHAN, S. R. Bliss Centenary Address. (Delivered in Bangalore 16th December 1970). Library Herald, 1971, Vol. 12, No. 4, 219-227.
RODRIGUEZ, Robert Classification and subject indication: highlights of the Anglo-American debate, 1850-1950. Libri, 1981, Vol. 31, No. 4, 323-340.
SHOYINKA, Patrick. Adoption of the Library of Congress at the University of Ibadan: decisions and practices. Nigerian Librarian, 1975, Vol. 11, No. 1/2, 65-85.
An account of the changeover from Bliss to Library of Congress.
AITCHISON, Jean. Integration of thesauri in the social sciences. International Classification, 1981, vol. 8, no. 2, 75-85.
A paper presented at the CONTA Conference, Bielfeld, 24-27 May 1981.
AITCHISON, Jean. A classification as a source for thesaurus: the Bibliographic Classification of H. E. Bliss as a source of thesaurus terms and structure. Journal of Documentation, 1986, Vol. 42, No. 30, 160-181.
A discussion of the problems, benefits and future prospects of Bliss-based thesaurus construction. Two examples are discussed - the DHSS-DATA thesaurus and the ECOT (Educational Courses and Occupations Thesaurus).
BALDAZZI, Anna. Scienze dell'educazione e classificazioni bibliografiche. Frascati : Centro Europeo dell`Educazione, 1989. [In Italian]
BEGHTOL, Clare. Knowledge domains: multidisciplinary and bibliographic classification systems. Knowledge Organization, 1998, vol. 25, no. 1/2, 1-12.
Argues that the structural principle of classification ssytems which were originally predicated in the academic disciplines are no longer adequate in multidisciplinary knowledge production. Considers the potential of a single notation for multidisciplinary description in four general classifications, including BC2. The author notes that BC2 appears to offer more complete treatment of multidisciplinary works than other systems.
BEST, Kenneth W. The Supreme Court Library. Law librarian, 1979, vol. 10, No. 1, 13-16.
The use of Bliss.
BREWIN, Paul. Use of STATUS for housekeeping at the DHSS. Vine, 1985, No. 58(March), 3-9.
The STATUS programme used Bliss in the compilation of a thesaurus of terms.
BROUGHTON, Vanda. The new Bliss Classification. Catalogue and Index, 1974, No. 33(Spring), 6.
BROUGHTON, Vanda. Notational expressivity; the case for and against the representation of internal subject structure in notational coding. Knowledge Organization, 1999, vol. 26, no. 3, 140-148.
The ways in which notation can be used to express the content of documents to which it relates are various. The author examines the methods of displaying these many structure and questions the practicality in a documentary context. Reference is made specifically to recent revision of the chemistry class of BC2 (Class C).
BROUGHTON, Vanda and LANE, Heather. Classification schemes revisited: applications to Web indexing and searching. In: THOMAS, A. R. and SHEARER, J. R., eds. Internet searching and indexing: the subject approach. – New York : Haworth Information Press, 2000. – p. 143-155. (Also published in: Journal of Internet Cataloguing, 2000, vol. 2, no. 3/4, 143-155).
Discusses how a fully faceted classification scheme, notably BC2, offers many advantages over traditional enumerative schemes for classifying online, particularly internet, resources.
BURY, Susan. Comparison of classification schemes for libraries. Library Sciences with a Slant to Documentation, 1980, vol. 17, No. 3, 73-82.
BURY, Susan. National Library of Medicine Classification compared with Bliss Class H. Health Libraries Review, 1984, vol. 1, No. 4, 179-190.
CLACK, Doris H. Year's work in subject analysis: 1979. Library Resources & Technical Services, 1979, vol. 24, No. 3, 235-246.
COATES, E. J. Classification in information retrieval: the 20 years following Dorking. Journal of Documentation, 1978, vol. 34, No. 4, 288-298.
CURWEN, Anthony G. Book review: Dewey Decimal Classification and relative index. By Melvin Dewey. Edition 21, edited by J. S. Mitchell et al. – Albany, NY : Forest Press, 1996. 4 vols. Journal of Librarianship and Information Science, 1997, vol. 29, no. 3, 169-171.
Considers some of the features of this edition. Includes a comparison of DDC Public Administration class (350) with BC2 Class R (Politics and Public Administration).
CURWEN, Anthony G. Revision of classification schemes: policies and practices. Journal of Librarianship, 1978, vol. 10, No. 1, 19-38.
This article, written shortly after the publication of the first four volumes of BC2, reflects the euphoria and optimism in the Bliss community at the time. It is, of course, long out of date in many respects. Nevertheless, I hope it still has value as an historical article for the BCA archive on the one hand, and on the other as a discussion – still largely valid, I think – of general problems facing the revisers of all schemes. – A.G.C., 2012-02-03.
DAHLBERG, Ingetraut. The Broad System of Ordering (ORD) as a basis for an integrated social science thesauri? International Classification, 1980, vol. 7, No. 2, 66-72.
DANESI, Daniele. Il ritorno di Bliss [The return of Bliss]. Associazione Italiana Biblioteche Bollettino d'Informazioni, 1981, vol. 21, No. 1, 31-44. [In Italian]
DAVIES, J. Eric. Mechanical engineering information organisation, part II. Systematic classification schemes. IATUL (International Association of Technological University Libraries) Proceedings, 1976, vol. 8, pp. 11-28. DE GROLIER, Eric. [Classification one year after Dewey]. Tudomanyas es Muszaki Tajekoztatas, 1977, vol. 24, No. 12, 527-534. [In Hungarian]
ELLIS, David and VASCONCELOS, Ana. Ranganathan and the Net: using facet analysis to search and organise the World Wide Web. Aslib Proceedings, 1999, vol. 51, no. 1, 3-10.
Documents the continuing relevance of facet analysis as a technique for searching and organising World Wide Web based materials. Authors argue that the underlying philosophy of facet analysis is better suited to the disparate nature of WWW resources and searchers than the assumptions of contemporary information retrieval research. Mentions BC2 as a "pure example" of a faceted classification scheme.
FOSKETT, D. J. Classifications and information languages: thoughts on revising a bibliographical classification scheme. International Forum on Information and Documentation, 1989, vol. 14, No. 1, 3-7.
FOSKETT, D. J. Concerning general and special classifications. International Classification, 1991, vol. 18, No. 2, 87-91.
GILCHRIST, Alan Blissful spiders. Forty years of information retrieval. Managing Information, 1996, vol. 5, no. 3.
Report of a forthcoming international conference (May 1997) entitled 'Knowledge Organisation for Information Retrieval'. The author looks back at the first Dorking classification conference on information retrieval [attended by one of BC2's editors, Jack Mills] which took place in 1957 and forward to the issues of classification and information retrieval in the late 20th century.
GORMAN, Michael. Let us now praise. American Librarian, 1980, vol. 11, No. 4, 201-203.
An article reviewing the work of six great classificationists.
HJØRLAND, Birger. Information retrieval in psychology: implications of a case study. Behavioural and Social Sciences Librarian, 1988, vol. 6, No. 3/4, 39-64.
HJØRLAND, Birger and ALBRECHTSON, Hanne. An analyis of some trends in classification research. Knowledge Organization, 1999, vol. 26, no. 3, 131-139.
Looks at three prevailing themes in knowledge organisation. Discusses the history and origins of bibliographic classification from the perspective of pragmatist philosophy and social studies of science. The authors refer specifically to the use of disciplines as structuring principle for knowledge organisation in BC2.
MACLEOD, Roderick A. Reclassification at Chancellor College Library: background and 1984 project. MALA Bulletin, 1984, vol. 4, no. 1, 60-63.
The re-classification of Malawi University Libraries from Bliss and Dewey to Library of Congress.
MALTBY, Arthur and GILL, Lindy.The case for Bliss: modern classification practice and principles in the context of the Bliss Bibliographic Classification. London, Bingley, 1979.
MARUYAMA, Shojiro. Faceted indexing languages in an information society: with special reference to the Bliss Classification. Biblos - Tokyo, 1989, vol. 39, No. 3, 1-13.
MCILWAINE, Ia C. The future of classification systems. Classification schemes: consultation with users and cooperation between editors. Cataloguing and Classification Quarterly, 1997, vol. 24, no. 1/2, 81-95.
Outlines developments in the improvement of communication between those responsible for editing the general schemes of classification and their users. Reviews a number of classification schemes, including BC2.
MCILWAINE, Ia C. and WILLIAMSON, N. J. International trends in subject analysis research. Knowledge Organization, 1999, vol. 26, no. 1, 23-29.
Describes a survey of subject analysis research over a ten-year period. Strengths and weaknesses in approaches taken to subject analysis are discussed and suggestions for improvements are made. Bliss Class H Health Sciences is referred to as the framework used for a major restructuring of Class 61 Medical Sciences in UDC.
MILLS, Jack. A comment on the article by R. A. UKOH 'Library classification and change: the example of Bliss'. (Libri, 1976, Vol. 25, 168). Libri, 1976, vol. 26, No. 2, 156-157.
MILLS, Jack. Bliss Bibliographic Classification [Entries in Harrod's Librarians Glossary].
Briefly outlines the history and application of BC2
MILLS, Jack. The new Bliss Classification. Catalogue and Index, 1976, no. 40, 3-6.
NEILSON, Colin. Organisation of a knowledge base for social science information: Bliss Class K and category based retrieval. ASSIGnation: Aslib Social Sciences Information Group Newsletter, 1989, vol. 6, No. 4, 18-19.
NOCETTI, Milton A. Agricultural soil sciences in universal classification systems: a comparative analysis. Revista (AIBDA), 1980, vol. 1 no. 1, 17-32. [In Spanish]. (La Asociacion Interamericana de Bibliotecarios y Documentalistas Agricolas).
PAYNE, Roy. Ignorance and Bliss. New Library World, 1978, vol. 78, No. 920, 27-28.
A rejoinder to `In ignorance of Bliss' by J. R. Haylock (New Library World, 1976, 77(917), 207, 209).
POWER, Gerry. New Bliss Class Q. Assignation, 1995, vol. 13, no. 1, 46-47.
Review of the new edition of Class Q (Social Welfare and Criminology) revised by Chris Preddle (NCH Action for Children librarian). Review points to the huge developments in terminology and the greatly expanded schedules as a major tool for librarians in the social welfare field.
RAJAN, T. N. Dewey's relative index - a precursor to Thesaurofacet. Annals of Library Science & Documentation, 1976, vol. 23, No. 4, 270-274.
The influence of the relative index on U.D.C., Bliss and the Thesaurofacet of the English Electric Company.
RAMSDEN, Michael J. A new life for Bliss. Australian Academic & Research Libraries, 1978, Vol. 9, No. 4, 210-218.
RIGGS, Fred W..Class K Society.(Review). International Classification, 1987, Vol. 14, No. 1.
STODDARD, Hilda. Reclassification by Bliss. Catalogue & Index, 1979, no. 55, 4-5.
THOMAS, Alan R. The Bliss Bibliographic Classification in the North American compulsory curriculum. Bliss Classification Bulletin, 1977, vol. 6, No. 2, 7-9.
THOMAS, Alan R. Bliss Bibliographic Classification 2nd edition: principal features and applications. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly, 1992, vol. 15, no. 4, 3-17.
THOMAS, Alan R. Bliss regained. The second edition of the Bliss Bibliographic Classification. Wilson Library Bulletin, 1993, March, 56-57.
A look at the progress of BC2 and the potential of its contribution.
TUORMAA, Jussi. Resurrection from the graveyard of information. Kirjastolehti, 1980, vol. 73, No. 10, 451-455. [In Finnish]
UKOH, R. A. Library classification and change: the example of Bliss. Libri, 1975, vol. 25, No. 3, 168-173.
VITI, Elisabetta. Class T “Economics” in Bliss Bibliografic Classification . JLIS.it : Italian journal of library and information science. Vol. 1, n. 2 (Dicembre/December 2010), p. 331-356. DOI: 10.4401/jlis.it-34. http://leo.cilea.it/index.php/jlis/article/view/34. In Italian, with English abstract.
WIMMER, F. The Universal Decimal Classification as a tool for a collective subject approach in a limited library system. DK-Mitteilungen, 1986, v No. 5, 15-18.