The 800's
Looking at the class information for 800, we see the following summary of the section of the hundred divisions:
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SUMMARY |
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| 801-809
Standard subdivisions; rhetoric; collections; history, description,
critical
appraisal of more than two literatures 810 American literature in English 820 English and Old English (Anglo-Saxon) literatures 830 Literatures of Germanic (Teutonic) languages German literatures 840 Literatures of Romance languages French literature 850 Literatures of Italian, Sardinian, Dalmatian, Romanian, Rhaeto-Romaniclanguages Italian literature 860 Literatures of Spanish and Portuguese languages Spanish literature 870 Literatures of Italic languages Latin literature 880 Literatures of Hellenic languages Classic Greek literature 890 Literatures of other specific languages and language families |
<DDC 13th abridged ed., p. 587
Most of the divisions contained in the 800’s deal with the literature of specific countries or language groups. A weakness of the DDC design shows up in this 800’s class. A scan through the breakdowns of countries listed in the 810-880’s shows that they are all North American or European in origin. Looking at the last division, 890, it can be seen to stand for literature of other specific languages. Looking through the schedules in the section for 890 shows those other languages to be Celtic, Slavic, Indic, Semitic, Asian, African, North and South American Indian, Polynesian and Australian.
Dewey had a very ‘western’ view of the world, and for him the countries of Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and South Pacific were very minor players in modern society. Today, we realize that these areas of the world are necessary parts of the information base in our libraries. In the Dewey schedules, numbers related to these areas of the world often are longer, because these areas are combined together into a small section of the schedules and start with more lengthy notations to begin with. In addition to the literature class, this also holds true for the class of languages, 400, and for the history and geography class, 900.
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