Marginalized knowledge? : A critical approach towards the representation of gender studies in classification systems and subject heading lists’

The main focus of this master’s thesis concerns the relation between subject representation, power and gender. Classification systems and subject heading lists are products of their cultural and social context and some subjects and disciplines are given a greater value than others. Our aim in this thesis is twofold; to discuss and critically analyse the prevailing gender norms that are expressed trough classification systems and subject heading lists and to examine how they manage to represent gender studies as a multidisciplinary subject in theory as well as in practice. We are also discussing the particular problems with the representation of multidisciplinary subjects in general. The analysis is grounded in the field of gender studies, where feminist, masculinity and queer theory are included, and the area of critical classification theory. The classification systems and subject heading list that are discussed here are DDC, SAB, SAO, LCSH and KVINNSAM. In the case of DDC and SAB, the analysis concerns the hierarchal structure and principal arrangement of subjects. The focus in the analysis of SAO, LSCH and KVINNSAM is on the assigned subject headings and the lists’ possibilities to adequately represent gender studies. The result of this study shows that both the systems and the subject heading list have considerable problems with integrating and fully representing gender studies as a multidisciplinary subject. It also shows that the available vocabularies for describing gender and feminist literature are very limited. The practise in indexing and classifying multidisciplinary subjects in general are neither sufficient nor consistent.Uppsatsnivå: