Indexing: Principles and Practice

This course relates to all kinds of material and covers general principles of indexing, the indexing process, specific points of practice, the relations between indexing and other ways of analysing and denoting content.

Course highlights:

The programme will cover:

What is indexing?
Principles of indexing, and the indexing process
Indexing as part of metadata creation
Controlled vocabularies for indexing
Indexing compared with other subject analysis methods
Indexing policies
Practicalities of indexing

Why you should attend:

Indexing is one of the best known of 'traditional' library/information activities. Its importance has not diminished in the digital age. On the contrary, indexing is of even more importance in digital environments, so that information can be efficiently found from sources such as the Internet, or intranets. Indexing is an important part of the broader process of metadata creation.

Many library/information workers are expected to index material, but not everyone is given sufficient training. This course covers general principles of indexing, and the indexing process, and also specific points of practice, in the indexing of all kinds of material, emphasising the value of controlled indexing languages.

The relations between indexing and other ways of analysing and denoting content (abstracting, summarising, classifying, categorising etc.) are emphasised. The course also deals with understanding, and creating, indexing policies, which govern the way in which indexing is carried out.

On completing the course, you will be able to:

understand the principles of indexing, and the indexing process
understand the relationship between indexing and metadata creation
understand the value of controlled languages for indexing
understand the relation between indexing and other forms of subject analysis
be able to index different forms of material effectively
be able to create an indexing policy