Women are not a subject : Subject indexing at Kvinnohistoriska samlingarna

The purpose of this paper is to examine the subject indexing in the bibliographic databaseKVINNSAM at Kvinnohistoriska samlingarna. the documentation and information centre·of Women's studies in Sweden.The focus of the study is the list of index terms produced at this centre. The paper tries to answer the following questions: a) How has the indexing developed? b) How can it be improved? c) Is there a need for feminist indexing? The method of the study is primarily observations and interviews. Texts and ideas by Birger Hj¢rland, D. C. Blair, Joan K. Marshall and others are used as a background. Women's studies in Sweden is described as a domain of its own. Women's studies often has difficulties in finding its literature because many systems for orga­nising and retrieving knowledge are sexist.The list of index terms is non-hierarchical and consists of about 2000 terms. These have been studied regarding form, scope notes, language, context, etc. The paper also suggests some improvements