First, great job group one! Excellent sources and links. I especially liked Rachel Singer Gordon's comments. You asked if all of the negative stereotypes of librarians will cause our children, or the children or teens we serve as patrons to fear librarians or think that they are a mean, boring old group of people. I think not. We as a profession have many resources to offer. For example, if children love to read at a young age, it is due to parental effort in multiple ways but is also part of a librarian's professional role. First, parents instill love of reading into their children because they love to read, also because parents love libraries too. If they didn't enjoy time in a library, they wouldn't bring their child. If a parent wants their child to read and also loves to read then introducing a child to the librarian is extremely important.
The librarian gets a chance to shine at this point. The librarian can recommend books, can do story hours and "grow" with the child by encouraging them to use the library's resources and inviting them to participate in library projects or serve on the Youth advisory council. All of this will help the child realize that they don't need to be afraid of the librarian and that the librarian is not like Madame Pince in Harry Potter. I agree with whoever commented about the Detroit Public Library HYPE teen center and said that teens get to interact with the librarians on a more personal level instead of just dry research. That idea is important because teens need places to go to have their own space, but they also need someone they trust to be part of that space. Rachel Singer Gordon's ideas about figuring out your style in your library fit in with the aforementioned idea. Individuality is a way to make connections.
If we can debunk myth of the scary librarian idea then we not only gain patrons in the library, we may gain collegues in the future if one of your children or teen patrons enters the Library profession.
An additional point to make about our image in the eyes of others is that we are powerhouses of knowlege. As we've discussed Librarianship is not just about books anymore. We need to be able to handle lots of information in many different ways. This refers to diffusing, teaching and creating knowlege. If we show we can handle all of the information successfully as professionals, our clientele will start to understand the scope of our profession. In the case of youth and teen patrons in public and school libraries there are increasing issues that force librarians to be very familar with legal rights and the legal rights of minors. I am planning on reading a book on this topic for my library book review assignment. If teens know that a librarian will stick up for them then we have increased our image appeal.
Additionally, I read some of the blog comments linked to this blog and like one where the librarian said that "Boomer generation" Librarians were not necessarily "deadwood" because they participated in moving the library forward. The librarian said our "image problem" still exists but I think he reminded us that older librarians (not as old as Mary in It's a Wonderful Life but still older) have had to try and help change the image problem by becoming more tech saavy on the job.
We've mentioned Mary as a stereotypical librarian- I can think of a couple more -Marian the Librarian from the Music Man and a librarian in a song. Someone in the LIS program sent the song over the listserv this summer commenting that they didn't know whether to laugh or cry because the stereotype still exists.
5 comments:
I think one way to help debunk the stereotypes of librarians is to be assertive in our roles, we need to be involved in our communities, try to understand the needs of what the public wants. Furthermore, I think that so many people have had negative experiences using a library. People tend to remember the negative interactions more often than they remember the pleasant ones. So anyone who has had a negative experience they are more likely to share that with others, which give libraries a “bad” name.
I agree Nate,
We need to be more active as well as assertive in our roles. We need to make sure that we are doing our part to better the image of libarians and libraries. Alan Cohen said, "It takes a lot of courage to release the familiar and seemingly secure, to embrace the new. But there is no real security in what is no longer meaningful. There is more security in the adventurous and exciting, for in movement there is life, and in change there is power." Even though we know that younger librarians might not be included in this stereotype we should also do our part in encouraging our colleagues to get out of their safe zone and move away from what was considered the norm. One of my former co-workers used to only get up from her chair to use the restroom or go to her office to buy and sell stocks! She was and still is stuck in the past. She feels her job duties are to be done sitting down in front of a computer or at the back of the library. As future librarians it should be our goal to be different and innovative as well as to educate and encourage our patrons and our colleagues.
Jeehan,
I really like that quote by Allan Cohen.
No doubt that new librarians who have been infused with the ideas of the people paradigm and the importance of keeping up with technology in the information field will and do chip away at the old stereotypes of librarianship. The first lecture in this course comes to mind by Stehen Abram, where he stresses the importance of keeping all of the library workers up with technological changes. Rachel Singer Gordon talks about a computer litreracy program for established library workers, that only took up fifteen minutes a day, and offered incentives for completing it, and was very succesful, because librarians wanted to be more tech savvy. They saw the need for keeping up. Not many people want to be stuck in the past and/or be viewed as "out of date", which is what the stereotypes suggest among other attributes. Most librarians (as it seems from Rachel Singer Gordon's presentation) are open to change, and welcome the opportunity to become "the cool librarian" who is not only helpful, but knowledgable about current issues and technologies.
It is much easier to be helpful and assertive as a librarian, if the chance of having to answer a question with a " Sorry, I don't know" is minimal.
Since 60% of librarians are over 45 years old (and assuming that most of them are not new to the field), it's important to look at the training programs and workshops for established employees as a way to get closer to "updating" the image of librarians.
I agree that we need to be more assertive in our roles as "Library Scientists." As I've stated on the DB, even today my co-workers are still asking me "what *can* you do with a library science degree?" and most of them think that I'll only be able to be a reference desk librarian. I think that we, as librarians, need to bring in more community members to show them how progressive libraries can be. I went to my local library this Saturday and they had set a display up with Paul Newman's movies and even had a print out about his life. I think this is a good way for libraries to reach out to popular culture and current news.
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