If a library shelves all entries under one title (new titles with old
titles) in alphabetical order, how is the re-shelver to know what the old
title is so that he can re-shelve?  Do you have to label every current
issue with the old title?  And if someone uses an index (which uses the
title of the same year as the index) and goes to the shelves to pull the
issue, isn't he confused because the index lists ABCD Journal, and the
title is shelved as Journal of ABCD?  As many title changes as we get
each year, our shelves would be full of shelf dummies if we used this
method.  And shelf-space is bought at a very high price.

I can see advantages to this method only when patrons simply "scan" the
shelves, looking for articles haphazardly.  In an academic or research
setting, do patrons use this method of finding articles?  I don't know,
but I would think true researchers would use some form of an index.
Although we don't classify our periodicals (and I certainly don't want
to, with over 4000 records, 1500+ current), that really makes more sense
than grouping all titles alphabetically under the first/oldest title, no
matter what the current one is.

Thanks.

Debbie Harrell
Ingram Library, State University of West Georgia
phone: 770-836-6498
fax: 770-836-6626
<dharrell@WESTGA.EDU>