The main class C (religion) of the Swedish classification system, and its usability in todays Swedish society : a qualitative survey

The purpose of this thesis was to find out whether the main class C (religion) in the Swedish classification system Klassifikationssystem för svenska bibliotek is well adapted to classify materials published in or imported to Sweden, and handled by Swedish libraries today. The questions we put to ourselves were:1.How easy to understand, and how useful is the main class C religion today?2.What, in the main class C, is satisfactory?3.What, in the main class C, is inconsistent, anachronistic or incorrect?4.What, in the main class C, is in need of change or renewal?The method that was used was a number of interviews with librarians and cataloguers. We have interviewed eight librarians from six different libraries, of different types, but all with a relatively large collection of religious materials.Though all of our respondents have expressed a feeling that all the major religions deserve equal treatment in the classification system and a similar division of space, after some pondering on the subject, our respondents have agreed that a larger space for Christianity is warranted considering the composition of the current collections and publication. Our respondents have in some cases expressed that there is a lack of instructions as to how the subdivisions of the main class C (religion) is meant to be used. Several of our respondents have experienced difficulty in reasoning theoretically about classification. Our research shows that the main class C (religion), according to our respondents, is well adapted to classify materials published in or imported to Sweden, and handled by Swedish libraries today.Uppsatsnivå: