Readings 10/30

Literacy in American Lives by Deborah Brandt

Literacy is so widespread today that it is often taken for granted. For many people it is tough to imagine being illiterate and all the difficulties that would be involved in it. Brandt traces literacy through the last century through personal interviews with eighty people. All their experiences differ, but they are common in their shared experience with literacy. Some situations involve the shift from an agrarian society to an industrial society in which literacy would take a much more prominent role. People tailored their own reading and writing skills to their particular needs, such as the prisoner who learned to read and then learned legal jargon, and finally wrote an appeal that eventually got him his freedom. The U.S. culture today certainly discriminates against the illiterate. There is no parity between those who can read and those who can’t. If you can read you are not something special, but if you can’t you are forced to the lowest edges of society.

Readings 10/23

The Mission: Consensus and Contradiction by Molz and Dain

A central theme that comes to light in this chapter is one that concerns values. It is the debate about “demand versus quality.” Should librarians select books based on the scholarly value of them or by how popular they are? Different strategies were used throughout the history of libraries. Dewey incisively noted that library materials were not useful if they sat dormant on the shelf. Nonetheless the Baltimore County library system keenly realized that the public, through tax dollars was paying for the library, and therefore it should have some say in the materials purchased. It is clear that to understand this question as well as other tough questions one needs to understand the values of libraries, and what their purpose is. There are values of maintaining an informed citizenry, and providing education so as to strengthen the country. Also at play are values of entertainment and leisure. And as Fletcher stated on page 12-13, the library should contain lower kinds of books so as to facilitate a graduation to better materials. A balance of both scholarly and entertaining materials should be found for the most effective libraries.

Human Values in a Technological Age by Michael Gorman

One thing that struck me in this address was when Gorman talked about people nowadays. About how people have no repose and how perhaps people of my generation may have not developed a rich interior life, due to being “bombarded with information and stimulation.” I don’t think this is true for me. It is true I sometimes feel overwhelmed by all the information out there that I find interesting and would like to learn about but simply do not have the time. But my interior life I still believe is fairly rich. In a society such as ours sometimes it is necessary to simply be alone for a while with your thoughts. Shut your door, turn of your cell phone and do some reflective reading, writing, or simply thinking about your life. I do not find it terribly hard to have an interior life if I make a bit of effort.

Discourse and Censorship by Steven R. Harris

It is Harris’ contention that libraries and the Library Bill of Rights, in fact overlook much of the censorship that goes on in the world today. One main example he gives is that of the large media conglomerations. Huge publishing houses and groups have a stranglehold on what people read. These groups have the power to print a multitude of books rather inexpensively and libraries perpetuate their censorship by buying only their materials. Harris calls us to take a good look at these conglomerates and their effects. Also Harris perceptively notices that libraries are a bit pretentious. We think that libraries are key in a democratic society, yet only 20 percent of people use libraries. In comment to this it is also true that only around 50 percent of people vote, and these are both areas in which this country could improve. Probably my favorite quote is his final sentence. “We should stop congratulating ourselves on how important we are to democracy and start behaving as though democracy really matters.” This has a ring of truth. Americans need to become more informed and more involved in their respective governments.

Why Thomas Jefferson Would Love Napster by Siva Vaidhyanathan

When our country was being founded great thinkers abounded. They debated heartily about copyright law, the formation of the new government and about important issues that would affect the following generations. We still have these issues today, but where have all the great thinkers gone? This is what makes me angry. Instead of Jefferson and Hamilton, we have Bush and Rumsfeld. Instead of conscientious and reflective leaders, we have ignorant and greedy dolts at the helm. I wish politics was different. I wish it was about issues and not about huge campaign budgets, lies, scandals, and superficialty.

Readings 10/16

The Ugly Side of Librarianship by Klaus Musmann

It is interesting to see how libraries catered to immigrants and not blacks for many years. It is easy enough to imagine though. Libraries, our seeming champions of freedom and progressive pioneers simply followed what the rest of the country was doing at the time. Even our cherished libraries were not above segregation, oppression, and general inequality. It was surprising to learn though that legislation explicitly prohibited teaching blacks to learn how to read. I knew this was the practice during slavery. But it surprised me that it continued so long. I guess I had never thought about that aspect of oppression before. The ability to read and write brings great power.

OOH 06-07 and Information Technology and the De-Skilling of Librarians by Roma Harris

The OOH paints a somewhat happy picture for librarians to be: the creation of new job openings due to a large amount of retirees, and a great number of more jobs opening in the private sector. Then Harris comes along as a very “Negative Ned.” It may be because the article was published in 1992 that the outlook looks so bleak (and perhaps the reason there are so many editing errors), but many of Harris’ claims probably hold some truth. Women in librarianship are be being “de-skilled” and replaced by paraprofessionals who do the regular orthodox work of librarians. And men are the ones who are in power and will get the best new jobs when the profession slowly morphs into a more information centered job. This is another instance of discrimination. As a male I started to get nervous about some of the things Harris was saying but then she mentioned that males probably will not be as affected by these changes. I was relieved, but this does not solve the problem for my female counterparts. I think though that Harris, trying to predict the future, may have underestimated the power of service in the profession. Instruction and counseling appears to still be a very large part of librarianship and growing.

Librarians and Party Girls by Marie and Gary Radford

I read some reviews on Amazon about this movie and then requested it be ordered at the library I work at. It sounds like quite a humorous and entertaining motion picture. I propose we have a showing of it as an event for SLIS. It would probably an excellent learning experience. But I believe that Mary, the main character, goes from a person who’s life is in disarray to a person who becomes organized. This reminds me of Scrolling Forward and man’s need for organization. She goes from someone who is in jail to a person who is a professional. This parallels our quest to bring chaos into order. It is clear from my experience interacting with female librarians that they are not the stereotypical frumpy, hair in a bun girls. As in everything there is a center area and balance between the two. Irregardless, the stereotype still exists in popular culture.

10/9 Readings

Scrolling Forward by David M. Levy

Levy impresses me with this book. He makes an entire chapter out of a deli receipt, and it is actually interesting reading. He goes into great detail about the history behind different documents, the invention of paper, the invention of script, all sorts of human innovations, leaving little to be desired. But what I enjoyed more was how he examined documents from a philosophical viewpoint. He compares documents to creation. We as humans make documents in our own image. We take earth (tree fragments) and breath into them life, our voice, as Levy points out. In this way we are analogous to God. We have our own power to create objects in our own image that can talk to, inform, delight and appall others. This truly is fascinating if one looks at it from Levy’s perspective.

Another excellent point that Levy discusses, concerns personalities of people. On the one hand there are Melvil Deweys: people who are constantly rushing about against time and death. They are efficient and great organizers but are obsessive compulsive in their pursuit of trying to maintain order and become successful. On the other hand there are Walt Whitmans: people who take things more slowly and insouciantly. This way of thinking celebrates life as well as death and values contemplation and taking things as they come. Recognizing the beauty in all things especially in the mundane is the central tenet of these people. This is often hard though, especially in our current situation. Everyone rushes around to work, to class, to the gym, to pick up their kids, to the mall. In our society it is very hard to slow down and not get caught up in the swift current. This is where libraries come in. They are places where one can just be, without being hassled to buy something, without having a deadline on the Johnson account. Time if you let it, moves a bit more slowly in the library.

Readings for 10/2

Hegemony’s Handmaid? By Christine Pawley

Pawley sees libraries as adding to class distinctions. It is her view that we must be vigilant and realize exactly what we are doing and in what direction we are going. Whether it be implicitly going along with corporations and already empowered classes to increase the prestige of our profession, or to be champions of parity between the classes. She doesn’t paint a very optimistic picture of the profession of LIS. It seems we are below the real sciences, and corporate world, but are trying to leech off their success and carve out a niche for ourselves. Her message though is for educators of future librarians to inform the new future information professionals of this class divide and continue a debate about it. Personally I would like to be still keep some dignity trying to bridge the class divides while still being a respected professional with sufficient remuneration for my compassion and what not. But often it is not possible to make good money and be a good person too.

Teaching at the Reference Desk by James K. Elmborg

Instead of simply helping people find what they need, Elmborg believes it is the duty of reference librarians to educate those in an academic environment to become independent researchers. One interesting point that he discussed was about the “chaos of composing” a paper or any literary work, and how he compares this to research. Often people just go pell-mell into their research without any clear idea of what it is they want. Elmborg realizes this and tells us that we need to be aware of students’ diverse backgrounds and learning styles. His approach to the actual “reference encounter” is noteworthy. Instead of telling the student where to go, we should be asking the right questions that get the students’ researching juices flowing. Questions that help the student think in a systematic way. The most important part I saw though was that teaching should be student centered, not simply some authority figure speaking at a student. This promotes independence and involvement, ultimately leading to better understanding.

Toward a User-Centered Information Service by Ruth C.T. Morris

A knowledge nugget that I took away from this article is the inarticulateness of users. It was clear that users often do not know what they want until they see it, but I did not realize this until Morris pointed it out. Searching for information is a very subjective process. A user may be looking for one thing and as the search progresses they select materials little related to their original search. This is because an information need is hard to define. The reason for this is it is because it is something we do not know. There is a gap in our knowledge and we can see that, but what exactly fills the gap we are at a loss to explain. I am still a bit confused about the difference between user-centered and information-centered though. I have trouble demarcating actual examples of each. I believe discussion and more reading will help me better understand this.

Mom and Me by Wayne Wiegand

This is a heartwarming tale of senior citizens and their recalcitrance towards change, and trying new things. In actuality it does show how our own information needs are based on our own conditioning, values, and personal context. Wiegand’s mother’s needs were for a smooth ride, and something people commented about after church, not a car that received a five-star crash test rating, or one whose fuel economy was best in class. Wiegand’s proposed “personal information economy” is an interesting idea. It may be obvious, but people are value different types of information differently because of their own backgrounds.