Much like the United States, open stacks that patrons can access themselves are relatively common in South Africa. However, you'll be less likely to see the Library of Congress (LC) call numbers that are typically found in American university libraries. Instead, many South African libraries use Dewey Decimal Classification (DDC) call numbers to organize their books.

For example, the DDC call number for Archbishop Desmond Tutu's The Rainbow People of God is 261.70968.

Another system of call numbers used in many subject-area libraries in South Africa is the Universal Decimal Classification (UDC) System, which is similar to DDC. Depending on the scope of your research, you may also come across unique classification systems in archives and special collections.