Biog:  Biography

Record Type

BIB

Bytes

BKS: 008/34; 006/17

Definition

A code that indicates whether or not an item contains biographical material, and if so, what the biographical characteristics are.

Guidelines

The following types of material are biographical:

• Straightforward accounts of the life of a person (character, thought, and activities).
• Accounts of limited periods or aspects of the life of a person (e.g., Goethe as a government official). Collections of materials that serve as a source of or substitute for an account of a life. These include: (1) collections of correspondence unless they clearly relate to a particular subject or to an event not in the life of the writer (2) journals and diaries and (3) memoirs or reminiscences. Collective biographies.
• Literary criticism if more than half of the work is biographical.
• A work about a ruler and his or her reign if the ruler's life is given considerable attention.
• A work about a doctrine or movement if the work is largely biographical.

The following are not biographical:

• Documents relating to a person's life (birth, marriage and death certificates, commissions, diplomas, etc.). Obituaries, funeral orations, eulogies.
• Collections of portraits unless accompanied by substantial biographical description.
• Interviews and conversations.
• Bio-bibliographies.
• Genealogies.
• A vita within a work does not qualify the work as biographical. However, a biographical work may have a vita.

Codes

Indexing

For indexing and searching information, see Searching WorldCat Indexes, 008/34.

MARC 21

For more information, including content designator history, see MARC 21 Format for Bibliographic Data, 008/34 (Books).