A New Scheme for Library Classification

This proposed new classification scheme is based on two main elements: hierarchism and binary theory. Hence, it is called Universal Binary Classification (UBC). Some advantages of this classification are highlighted including subject heading development, construction of a thesaurus, and all terms with meaningful features arranged in tabular form that can help researchers, through a semantic process, to find what they need. This classification scheme is fully consistent with the classification of knowledge. The classification of knowledge is also based on hierarchism and binary principle. Finally, a survey on randomly selected books in McLennan Library of McGill University is presented to compare the codes of this new classification with the currently employed Library of Congress Classification (LCC) numbers in the discipline of Library and Information Sciences. [Article copies available for a fee from The Haworth Document Delivery Service: 1-800-HAWORTH. E-mail address: Website: © 2004 by The Haworth Press, Inc. All rights reserved.]