502  Dissertation Note (R)

Definition

A note that gives the designation of an academic dissertation or thesis and the institution to which it was presented. Use field 502 also to include the degree for which the author was a candidate, name of the granting institution or faculty, the year it was granted, and the dissertation identifier. Dissertation information may be encoded as a note in subfield ǂa or parsed into specific subfields.

Use field 500 for other notes indicating the relationship between the item being cataloged and the author's dissertation or thesis (e.g., Originally presented as ...). Use field 500 also for notes concerning abstracts, abridgements, or revision of theses, as well as honors papers, term papers, etc., which are not submitted as part of requirements for an academic degree. See section 3.3.6, "Theses and Dissertations," for more information.

For information on punctuation, see the Punctuation section below.

Guidelines

You may use field 502 with either a single subfield ǂa or multiple subfields ǂb, ǂc, ǂd, and/or ǂg. Subfield ǂo can be used with either option. Prefer use of field 502 with multiple subfields to provide the level of detail specified by RDA instructions. Do not use subfield ǂg to record academic units, advisors, or field of study. Instead, add captioned notes in field 500. The field of study should be included in the subfield ǂb only if it is an integral part of the degree name, otherwise record it in field 500. If needed, access points with relator terms may be provided for personal names and corporate bodies associated with the degree.

Regardless of the choice of subfield practice (single ǂa or multiple), follow these guidelines.

• LCRI 1.0C specifies that an abbreviation consisting of more than a single letter is treated as a word separated by a space from preceding or succeeding words or initials, e.g., "Ph. D." not "Ph.D." For consistency between pre-RDA and RDA records, follow abbreviation practice under LCRI 1.0C along with LC-PCC PS 7.9.1.3.

If using multiple subfields, follow these guidelines in addition to those above.

• The thesis designation is omitted; it should not be input in subfields ǂb or ǂg
• Punctuation separating elements is omitted (no parentheses around the type of degree, no dash separating the type of degree and institution, and no comma separating the institution and date)

Single subfield ǂa

Multiple subfields with optional note fields

1st Indicator

Undefined. The 1st indicator position is undefined and contains a blank.

	Undefined

2nd Indicator

Undefined. The 2nd indicator position is undefined and contains a blank.

	Undefined

Subfields

Note: If a record contains subfield ǂa, it cannot contain subfields ǂb, ǂc, ǂd, and/or ǂg.

Punctuation

For records containing punctuation, follow these instructions:

• Include incidental and ISBD punctuation needed within any subfields, e.g., commas, periods (following abbreviations or initials), etc.
• For fields with subfield ǂa, follow the term Thesis by the degree in parentheses, the name of the granting institution preceded by two hyphens, and the year the degree was granted preceded by a comma-space
  
• For fields with subfields ǂb, ǂc, ǂd, and/or ǂg, omit punctuation preceding each subfield unless the preceding subfield ends with an ellipsis, exclamation point, hyphen, period (following an abbreviation or initial), question mark, closing bracket, or closing parenthesis
• Optionally, add a terminal period at the end of the field unless the last subfield ends with an ellipsis or period (following an abbreviation or initial)

For records containing minimal or no punctuation, include incidental and ISBD punctuation needed within any subfields. Otherwise, omit the punctuation outlined above.

For more information on punctuation, including OCLC policy, see section 2.8, Punctuation.

Indexing

For indexing and searching information, see Searching WorldCat Indexes, field 502.

MARC 21

For more information, including content designator history, see MARC 21 Format for Bibliographic Data, field 502.