Profile Guide Step 3.2
The second phase of MARS 2.0 Authority Control is Authority Matching. While Authority Cleanup improves authority controlled headings using custom MARS 2.0 correction tables, authority matching compares each authority controlled heading in your bibliographic records against authority record headings from any of a number of national and other authority files. Authority files available in MARS 2.0 Authority Control processing are:
National Authority Files
- NAF -LC Name Authority File
- SAF -LC Subject Authority File
- LCG -LC Genre Authority File
- ACF -LC Children’s Authority File
- MeSH -National Library of Medicine MeSH Authority File
- NLC -Library and Archives Canada Canadiana Authority File
- NLC -Library and Archives Canada Canadian Subject Headings Authority File
- AAT -The Art & Architecture Thesaurus
- GSAFD -Guidelines on Subject Access to Individual Works of Fiction, Drama, etc.
Other Authority Files
- Your local Authority File
- MARS 2.0 Auxiliary File
Goals of Authority Matching
Authority matching uses the headings in authority records to update or correct the bibliographic headings so they conform to current standards. Authority matching is also the basis for providing full authority records for your local system. The goals of authority matching are to:
- Identify invalid headings and change them to valid forms based on cross-references found in authority records (convert to the established form of heading)
- Identify headings that have incorrect spacing, punctuation, indicators or subfield codes, and change to the correct form based on matches found on authority records in the NAF/SAF
- Identify invalid higher levels of a heading and change them to their valid forms, based on cross-references found in authority records (for example, convert the name portion of a name/title heading to the established form of heading), and then compare the updated heading against the authority records
- Identify matched MARC authority records that are to be selected and distributed to the library
- Identify headings requiring manual review, if the Library requests manual review by the MARS 2.0 staff
