Library of Congress:
Pinyin "Day One" for Subject Headings

CATALOGING POLICY AND SUPPORT OFFICE
SUMMARY OF DECISIONS, EDITORIAL MEETING NUMBER 26

(July 5, 2000)

Present from CPSO:
L. El-Hoshy, B. Bellinger, R. Goudreau, E. Rinn

CLASSIFICATION
Changes were made as indicated on the approved list.

SUBJECT HEADINGS
Pinyin *Day One* for Subject Headings

With this weekly list, the Library of Congress will begin to establish new subject headings containing Chinese language terms romanized according to the pinyin system. Existing subject headings that contain Chinese terms romanized according to Wade-Giles or other romanization schemes will be revised as a project on weekly lists between now and October, when pinyin will be adopted as the standard romanization scheme for Chinese terms in name headings and the bibliographic description of Chinese-language materials. An example of a new geographic subject heading with a pinyin-romanized name is Xiangshan Bay (China). Examples of subject headings revised on this list are Feng-shui to Feng shui; T)ien-an men (Beijing, China) to Tian)an Men (Beijing, China); and I Ho Yüan (Beijing, China) to Yi He Yuan (Beijing, China). Subject headings will not be revised to pinyin forms if they contain Chinese terms romanized according to Wade-Giles or other systems that are in widespread use in English. Examples of subject headings to be retained in their current forms are the dog breed Shih tzu; the martial art Kung fu; and the heading Cookery, Chinese*Cantonese style. The current heading T)ai chi ch)üan is being revised to the more commonly used English form Tai chi. As part of the Pinyin Conversion Project, authority records for revised headings are being identified with a *marker* in a MARC 21 control field. The 008/07 for Romanization scheme will be set to code *c* for *National library association standard* for headings revised to pinyin forms. In authority records for headings considered for change but left as is or revised to different forms, the 008/07 will be set to *n* for *not applicable.* The current default value for subject authority records is a fill character. More information on the Pinyin Conversion Project is posted to its Web site at http://lcweb.loc.gov/catdir/pinyin.