BK98CDSB.RVW   980705

"Canadian Sourcebook", Southam, 1997, 0-919-217-95-8 ISSN 1480-3038,
C$197.00
%A   Southam almanac@southam.ca
%C   1450 Don Mills Road, Don Mills, ON   M3B 2X7
%D   1997
%E   Barbara Law blaw@southam.ca
%G   0-919-217-95-8 ISSN 1480-3038
%I   Southam Information Products Limited
%O   C$197.00 +1-416-445-6641 fax: +1-416-442-2020 almanac@southam.ca
%P   ~1450 p.
%T   "(1998) Canadian Sourcebook, 33rd Edition"

This appears to be a kind of business oriented almanac type of
reference.  Sections in the book include the previous two years in
review, general information, geography, natural resources, people,
religion, education, "Sources of Information" (libraries and archives,
book publishers, periodicals, directories, and associations),
transportation, labour, law, banking and finance, business and trade,
consitution, federal government, provincial government,
intergovernmental agencies, and municipal governments.

On the one hand, I note that a number of the things I first saw in
this book were items that my wife had needed and had trouble finding
at some time in the past few years, such as the official words to the
national anthem and the proper form of address for the Lieutenant
Governor of British Columbia.

On the other hand, when I started looking further on my own behalf,
one of the colleges from which I hold a diploma, four of the trade
magazines that I have written for, the technical society responsible
for the instigation of this review series, a competitor to the Southam
owned newspaper on the North Shore, the two most active technical
societies locally, and one of the top telecommunications consultancies
in the country are missing.  In other words, the first nine, and a
majority of the next dozen items I went looking for, simply were not
there.  It took me a while to ensure that this was the case, since
there seems to be no reliable distinction between periodicals and
newsletters, and one particular one-man consultancy that I know of is
listed both as a magazine and as a society.  Given all the missing
items I'm not sure what I can give it for accuracy, but it seems to
rate about a "D" for completeness.  There is a definite "eastern"
(read "Ontario") bias: one magazine headquartered in Vancouver is not
listed, but a satellite publication based in Toronto is.  Members of
Parliament have their Ottawa telephone and fax numbers listed, but not
their consituency offices.

Lack of attention to detail seems to be a byword.  Under agriculture,
a single table format is slavishly adherred to even though it means
that the main table, citing total number of farms, is fractured and
disjointed.  That main table is very important since a number of
subsequent tables are meaningless without reference to it.  (Is there
any significance to the fact that the number of farms using computers
is roughly equal to the number of farms over a section in size? 
Perhaps not, but there is even less meaning to the fact that
Newfoundland has the least number of computer using farms unless you
also know that Newfoundland has the lowest number of farms of any
nature.)  At the moment, the fight over fisheries seems to hinge on
who has done how much to enhance salmon stocks: the material in the
book is limited to the number and tonnage of fish landed.

Of course there is a lot of interesting information.  If I am upset
with how my grandsons are doing in school, I now have the fax number
for the Wellington Board of Education.  It is amusing to see that
Vancouver is bigger than Montreal--if you count the regional district. 
For headquarters offices and marketing departments wanting quick, but
not necessarily serious, information on a variety of topics, this has
a use.  For media offices wanting instant contacts it might be better
than nothing if you are willing to dig.  For those doing important
research, it might be a starting point, but definitely should not be
used alone.

copyright Robert M. Slade, 1998   BK98CDSB.RVW   980705