The BISAC Subject Headings are a
method to classify books that is geared towards bookstores. It is mainly used by the Northern American booktrade, and online sellers like
Barnes & Noble
Barnes & Noble Booksellers is an American bookseller. It is a Fortune 1000 company and the bookseller with the largest number of retail outlets in the United States. As of July 7, 2020, the company operates 614 retail stores across all 50 U. ...
,
Amazon
Amazon most often refers to:
* Amazons, a tribe of female warriors in Greek mythology
* Amazon rainforest, a rainforest covering most of the Amazon basin
* Amazon River, in South America
* Amazon (company), an American multinational technology c ...
and
Baker & Taylor
Baker & Taylor, a distributor of books to public and academic libraries and schools, has been in business for over 190 years. It is based in Charlotte, North Carolina and currently owned by President & CEO Amandeep Kochar. Before being acquired ...
. The
Book Industry Study Group
The Book Industry Study Group, Inc. (BISG) is a U.S. trade association for policy, technical standards and research related to books and similar products. The mission of BISG is to simplify logistics for publishers, manufacturers, suppliers, whol ...
maintains the BISAC system.
In contrast to the
Dewey Decimal Classification
The Dewey Decimal Classification (DDC), colloquially known as the Dewey Decimal System, is a proprietary library classification system which allows new books to be added to a library in their appropriate location based on subject.
Section 4.1 ...
used by many libraries, it classifies all works by topics, and does not favor Western culture, history and religion as much as DDC.
All topics and sub-topics are ordered alphabetically, which also encompasses works of fiction. The BISAC's numbering scheme allows for a later introduction of new topics between already established ones.
Books can fall into several categories. In this case, BISG recommends that no more than three categories should be chosen for a single book, and the main category should be the one that best describes the book's contents.
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Examples
In the BISAC system, ''Biography and Autobiographies'' (BIO) comes before works of ''Fiction'' (FIC) and ''Religion'' (REL). Within ''Fiction'', FIC009020 (Fiction: Fantasy: Epic) is followed by Gaslamp fantasy
Gaslamp fantasy (also known as gaslight fantasy or gaslight romance) is a subgenre of both fantasy and historical fiction. Generally speaking, this particular realm of fantasy employs either a Victorian or Edwardian setting (i.e. a between th ...
novels (FIC009130, Fiction: Fantasy: Gaslamp) due to the alphabetic sorting.
As a drawback, it does not keep fictional works together if they were written by the same author. For example, Stefan Zweig
Stefan Zweig (; ; 28 November 1881 – 22 February 1942) was an Austrian novelist, playwright, journalist, and biographer. At the height of his literary career, in the 1920s and 1930s, he was one of the most widely translated and popular write ...
's novel that re-tells the Magellan expedition
The Magellan expedition, also known as the Magellan–Elcano expedition, was the first voyage around the world in recorded history. It was a 16th century Spanish expedition initially led by Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan to the Moluccas ...
would be filed under FIC014030 (Fiction: History: Historical: Renaissance). His ''Fear'', however, could be classified as FIC025000 (Fiction: Psychological). Some libraries, though, have decided to group one novelist's works under the same topic if the author has shown a clear preference for one.
Adoption by libraries
In order to address the shortcomings of the Dewey Decimal Classification, some libraries have changed to the BISAC classification. Some reasons given were BISAC being more intuitive, it was more usable by non-experts, and the books of similar topics being grouped together has allowed for better seating arrangements in libraries.[{{Cite web , url=https://www.kent.edu/ischool/news/so-long-dewey , title=So long, Dewey , date=2016-01-08 , access-date=2023-04-24 , last=Ellison , first=Latisha , publisher=]Kent State University
Kent State University (KSU) is a public research university in Kent, Ohio. The university also includes seven regional campuses in Northeast Ohio and additional facilities in the region and internationally. Regional campuses are located in As ...
The fact that readers can discover (or avoid) fictional works by genre has been cited as an advantage.
Weblinks
Complete BISAC Headings List
References
Library cataloging and classification