The fiction texts that Pennavaria examines while looking for visions of libraries and books in the future generally either represent an ideal situation where technology let us access information conveniently or a world where books and libraries as we know them are gone as a result society suffers. In both utopian and dystopian conceptions books and recorded knowledge prove to be vital not just for intellectual enrichment but maintaining a balance in power. Even in Pennavaria’s bleak interpretation of On the Beach where to urge to record history seems useless it is at the very least humanizing.
As far as librarians writing about the future it is interesting how persistent the idea is that libraries will become increasingly popular and important to their communities while the basic concept of the library stays the same. I understand the value in staying positive but it is as if some librarians are just waiting for the day that society will be miraculously and overwhelmingly draw to the library without any change on the librarian’s part.
I liked reading about speculation regarding technology in the library. I was surprised at the number of people who seemed to feel that the needs of the library that was facing information overload could only be met by technology although most of the authors weren’t necessarily sure what direction technology would go. Pennavaria did see most visions of the future included both books and some form of a card catalogue. I don’t know much about the science of cataloging but the card-type-catalogue must be pretty convenient and reliable given that Pennavaria didn’t find many who felt otherwise.
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
The Dismissal of Miss Ruth Brown
The greatest impact of the Ruth Brown story is not only the importance of the event to the history of intellectual freedom in the public library but the event, maybe due to the small size of the Bartlesville community and it unique place in the country and in time, makes it a good example of how such things unfold and how multidimensional they can be. Robbins’ talk with us in class really helped to clarify some of the issues in her book and especially brought home how important and personal the events were to the community.
Robbins mentioned several points in the talk that weren’t really emphasized in her book. For one, the lack of press in local white newspapers concerning the early stages of the library controversy. The Black Dispatch specifically honed in on the upset at the first community meetings concerning the library board and the controversy over the park plans and the use of the new YWCA building that set the tone of the communities’ attitudes toward “the race problem.” The lack of discourse about race related issues in the press highlights the white communities’ ignorance about what was going on in the lives of black Bartians, for example, the divisive issue of whether or not to accept the gift of a segregated park.
Robbins also brought up an interesting point concerning the impact that the YWCA had in Bartlesville. The growth of Phillips Petroleum caused the company to hire scientists and engineers from the North that brought with them educated middle class wives who had different ideas about race relations and time on their hands. Therefore, when the YWCA held their membership drive with the intent that people would join who were in favor of letting the African American Y-teens use the new facility there was an overwhelming response. This also brings up the role that Phillips played in the case of Ruth Brown. There were Phillips employees that were both friends of Brown and enemies and in fact they seemed to be disbursed pretty evenly. My guess is that some individuals who felt strongly enough about their black neighbors ignored the discouragement from Phillips until the pressure was too much as their livelihoods were at stake.
As part of our in class discussion Robbins shared an intellectual freedom timeline with us that really helped to illustrate how far ahead of her time Brown’s struggle was. It was approximately tens years before the recognized start of the civil rights movement and almost twenty before the ALA took their strongest stances on civil rights and intellectual freedom. The civil rights movement was a grassroots movement and the ALA was far behind the concerned citizens of Bartlesville. That is why the ALA and OLA official statements on the firing of Brown sidestepped race because they weren’t really to tackle that issue yet. Even Berninghausen’s position as head of the ALA’s Intellectual Freedom Committee was in no position to really give Brown the help she needed although he was able to show support through publicity to a certain degree. The timeline also showed that when the massive civil rights and intellectual freedom changes did come to the ALA they were instigated by grassroots movement of library school students.
Brown’s involvement in racial equality may have been the key issue behind her firing but censorship was the other and while it may not have been the issue it was an important factor in how and why events happened. While the national climate may not have been ripe foe civil rights it was right for cold war hysteria. The timing of McCarthy’s Wheeling speech weeks before the local committee passed the resolution saying that they could oust the library board without warning can’t be overlooked. The fact that several Bartians really thought that racial equality was a communist plot can’t be overlooked either. It is easier for contemporary readers to see cold war witch hunting and racism as two different things but apparently some people could reconcile them.
I really got a lot out of Brown’s personal account of her interrogation by the mayor and the commissioners. At one point Margenau questions why Brown didn’t read all of the free periodicals that the library received saying, “Wasn’t it your duty?” To which Brown replies that she saw it as the role of the public to decide what they wanted to read. I may seem simple but it reveals the divergence in thought about what a library should be. Some Bartians saw Brown’s job as being a guardian of their version of morality. One man in the interview claims that Brown’s choices in the collection did not reflect the popular demand of the town’s citizens. Which raises the question of at what point does a librarian defy the status quo in favor providing a well rounded collection much like what Ruth Brown did?
Robbins mentioned several points in the talk that weren’t really emphasized in her book. For one, the lack of press in local white newspapers concerning the early stages of the library controversy. The Black Dispatch specifically honed in on the upset at the first community meetings concerning the library board and the controversy over the park plans and the use of the new YWCA building that set the tone of the communities’ attitudes toward “the race problem.” The lack of discourse about race related issues in the press highlights the white communities’ ignorance about what was going on in the lives of black Bartians, for example, the divisive issue of whether or not to accept the gift of a segregated park.
Robbins also brought up an interesting point concerning the impact that the YWCA had in Bartlesville. The growth of Phillips Petroleum caused the company to hire scientists and engineers from the North that brought with them educated middle class wives who had different ideas about race relations and time on their hands. Therefore, when the YWCA held their membership drive with the intent that people would join who were in favor of letting the African American Y-teens use the new facility there was an overwhelming response. This also brings up the role that Phillips played in the case of Ruth Brown. There were Phillips employees that were both friends of Brown and enemies and in fact they seemed to be disbursed pretty evenly. My guess is that some individuals who felt strongly enough about their black neighbors ignored the discouragement from Phillips until the pressure was too much as their livelihoods were at stake.
As part of our in class discussion Robbins shared an intellectual freedom timeline with us that really helped to illustrate how far ahead of her time Brown’s struggle was. It was approximately tens years before the recognized start of the civil rights movement and almost twenty before the ALA took their strongest stances on civil rights and intellectual freedom. The civil rights movement was a grassroots movement and the ALA was far behind the concerned citizens of Bartlesville. That is why the ALA and OLA official statements on the firing of Brown sidestepped race because they weren’t really to tackle that issue yet. Even Berninghausen’s position as head of the ALA’s Intellectual Freedom Committee was in no position to really give Brown the help she needed although he was able to show support through publicity to a certain degree. The timeline also showed that when the massive civil rights and intellectual freedom changes did come to the ALA they were instigated by grassroots movement of library school students.
Brown’s involvement in racial equality may have been the key issue behind her firing but censorship was the other and while it may not have been the issue it was an important factor in how and why events happened. While the national climate may not have been ripe foe civil rights it was right for cold war hysteria. The timing of McCarthy’s Wheeling speech weeks before the local committee passed the resolution saying that they could oust the library board without warning can’t be overlooked. The fact that several Bartians really thought that racial equality was a communist plot can’t be overlooked either. It is easier for contemporary readers to see cold war witch hunting and racism as two different things but apparently some people could reconcile them.
I really got a lot out of Brown’s personal account of her interrogation by the mayor and the commissioners. At one point Margenau questions why Brown didn’t read all of the free periodicals that the library received saying, “Wasn’t it your duty?” To which Brown replies that she saw it as the role of the public to decide what they wanted to read. I may seem simple but it reveals the divergence in thought about what a library should be. Some Bartians saw Brown’s job as being a guardian of their version of morality. One man in the interview claims that Brown’s choices in the collection did not reflect the popular demand of the town’s citizens. Which raises the question of at what point does a librarian defy the status quo in favor providing a well rounded collection much like what Ruth Brown did?
Thursday, March 20, 2008
Bush Article
Vannevar Bush may have been talking about a different kind of information overload than we mean today when we use the term but the idea that all that information useful or not doesn’t do much good if we don’t have access to it. He goes even further with his thesis to say that ease of access to info shouldn’t be the only goal and technology should aid people in making real use of knowledge. In this article Bush never takes the human element for granted and in fact sees it as an integral part of the success of new technology.
I think the most exciting part of Bush’s article is his ideas on “associative indexing.” It really shows the importance of people in the information system. With all his faith in technology he is willing to admit that it would be nearly impossible to replace the intuition and abstract though of a person. Bush never suggests that a machine could take over the building of associative trails only that they can make it possible for people to do so.
I found two places where Bush brings up libraries. One is where he mentions that rapid information selection “might even be of use in libraries, but that is another story.” The second is where he recognizes that “the modern great library is not generally consulted, it is nibbled at by a few.” These to quotes seem to indicate that Bush saw libraries as unnecessary in the world of the memex. At the very least one could say that Bush was talking about only scholarly texts but when we think about the associative trails of the internet they concern everything and anything. In a lot of cases it is faster and easier to consult Wikipedia than a book in a library.
I think the most exciting part of Bush’s article is his ideas on “associative indexing.” It really shows the importance of people in the information system. With all his faith in technology he is willing to admit that it would be nearly impossible to replace the intuition and abstract though of a person. Bush never suggests that a machine could take over the building of associative trails only that they can make it possible for people to do so.
I found two places where Bush brings up libraries. One is where he mentions that rapid information selection “might even be of use in libraries, but that is another story.” The second is where he recognizes that “the modern great library is not generally consulted, it is nibbled at by a few.” These to quotes seem to indicate that Bush saw libraries as unnecessary in the world of the memex. At the very least one could say that Bush was talking about only scholarly texts but when we think about the associative trails of the internet they concern everything and anything. In a lot of cases it is faster and easier to consult Wikipedia than a book in a library.
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
Leigh Article
First of all I have to commend the ALA for recognizing the value that could come from an inquiry like this but I wonder if everyone anticipated what was going to be said or if anyone was surprised or upset.
I found some problems with Leigh’s six assumptions. For one he assumed that librarians would exert ultimate control over management which I take to include management of the collection. He puts a lot of emphasis on librarians “as conservators of the classical and permanently valuable in knowledge, morals and taste” as if them things won’t change.
Under the “Direction of Development” chapter Leigh states that libraries that supply books based on patron demand are controversial minority which makes some sense when one considers his above assumptions but still seems like a very closed minded view for someone who has done such an extensive study on libraries. Leigh goes one to use what seems like circular reasoning to claim that demand oriented collections would mean that the present library system are “irrelevant or hopelessly inadequate” to choose popular texts. Leigh does express the fear that libraries that serve the purpose of entertainment versus education run the risk of abandoning its role in a larger information/ communications system.
Leigh’s elitist ideas and contradictions concerning collections continue when he advises libraries to choose quality texts over popular ones and to keep in mind that book choice should be objective in relation to the criticisms of the day.
I didn’t disagree with everything that Leigh said. I think he made some good points about how library boards and librarians need to work together to make a careful mission statement and specific plan concerning the goals of individual libraries.
I found some problems with Leigh’s six assumptions. For one he assumed that librarians would exert ultimate control over management which I take to include management of the collection. He puts a lot of emphasis on librarians “as conservators of the classical and permanently valuable in knowledge, morals and taste” as if them things won’t change.
Under the “Direction of Development” chapter Leigh states that libraries that supply books based on patron demand are controversial minority which makes some sense when one considers his above assumptions but still seems like a very closed minded view for someone who has done such an extensive study on libraries. Leigh goes one to use what seems like circular reasoning to claim that demand oriented collections would mean that the present library system are “irrelevant or hopelessly inadequate” to choose popular texts. Leigh does express the fear that libraries that serve the purpose of entertainment versus education run the risk of abandoning its role in a larger information/ communications system.
Leigh’s elitist ideas and contradictions concerning collections continue when he advises libraries to choose quality texts over popular ones and to keep in mind that book choice should be objective in relation to the criticisms of the day.
I didn’t disagree with everything that Leigh said. I think he made some good points about how library boards and librarians need to work together to make a careful mission statement and specific plan concerning the goals of individual libraries.
Free to All
I’ve learned about Andrew Carnegie’s role in American history as a Robber Baron and even as a philanthropist but Van Slyck gives a lot of good information about what his philanthropic projects did for libraries and their communities. I really liked the architectural history perspective that she used because it was a concrete place from which to make her claims but she still had to make well informed and reasonable arguments when she gave her interpretations about library architecture and space.
The relationship between the profession of American architecture and librarianship was fascinating because both were searching for validation as legitimate and important fields and both had to content with desires of the client and more practical considerations. Still, I can’t help but think that librarians (or library boards) were more at fault for not resisting the beauty and grandeur of, for example, the alcove design and its foreseeing problems. Did American librarians not have any dialogue with European librarians about the shortcoming of the medieval monastery inspired design? Maybe the library boards that approved such designs were guilty of the same feelings of paternalism that philanthropists like Carnegie had and wanted patrons to be constantly reminded of the relationship.
The main way that Van Slyck portrays the evolution of public library architecture is by showing how in general they became more and more user and librarian friendly. Van Slyck points out that a lot of the reforms in Carnegie library design was for financial reasons; funds could be made better use of going to things beside elaborate buildings. The issue of open versus closed stacks had financial ramifications too because as the price of books when down it was less imperative to keep the collection from patrons who might damage texts. The presence of multi-purpose and lecture rooms especially in Bertram’s “Notes” show that while Bertram warns against moving away from the library’s book-centered-ness he also thought that some library space could be used as the community wished. The need for extra space be it for expansion or rooms for community groups was also important when one considers that libraries didn’t always use space for what it was designated for in the floor plan. Design suggestions offered by Bertram gave libraries wiggle room so that they could keep up with the needs of librarians and patrons.
Like Garrison, Van Slyck makes claims about the feminization of librarianship. In chapter four she briefly mentions the role of women’s clubs in rallying support for Carnegie libraries. These women cited their morality and inherent mothering skills to give their calls for public libraries authority. Women and men made these same claims for why women were suited to be librarians. As part of her analysis of library space Van Slyck also examines libraries as a female work place. According to Bertram’s “Notes” the changing desk was to be centrally located so the librarian could keep an eye on patrons but Van Slyck doesn’t mention that at the same time patrons could see her too. The position of charging desks between the entrance and the stacks let the librarian oversee the movement of people but it also restricted the size of her work space (so that it looked similar to those of typists and phone operators) and again everyone could see what she was doing. Van Slyck doesn’t make it sound like these interior design choices were intentionally meant to do what they did (much like how the club women didn’t consider the ramifications of their appeals based on gender) but contemporary librarians still have to contend with the effects.
Van Slyck gives a lot of good information on the role of female librarians in the formation of children’s collections. There seems to have been some contention over how home-like children’s space in the library should be which contrasts with Garrison’s assumption that female librarians always exerted a homey and feminine influence on the library. In the pictures that Van Slyck includes there is little difference between the aesthetic of adult and children’s reading rooms until you read her comments about the presence of parlor-like tables and child scale chairs. It seems like the attitude toward children’s libraries started out with them being a place where children could go in order to keep out of trouble but then ended up being a place that paid attention to the unique educational needs of children. Van Slyck doesn’t really get into it but I would be interested in knowing want the view of child psychology and education was in the public school system at this time. Simply realizing that child weren’t little adults seems to have been a big advancement in education in both the school and the library.
The relationship between the profession of American architecture and librarianship was fascinating because both were searching for validation as legitimate and important fields and both had to content with desires of the client and more practical considerations. Still, I can’t help but think that librarians (or library boards) were more at fault for not resisting the beauty and grandeur of, for example, the alcove design and its foreseeing problems. Did American librarians not have any dialogue with European librarians about the shortcoming of the medieval monastery inspired design? Maybe the library boards that approved such designs were guilty of the same feelings of paternalism that philanthropists like Carnegie had and wanted patrons to be constantly reminded of the relationship.
The main way that Van Slyck portrays the evolution of public library architecture is by showing how in general they became more and more user and librarian friendly. Van Slyck points out that a lot of the reforms in Carnegie library design was for financial reasons; funds could be made better use of going to things beside elaborate buildings. The issue of open versus closed stacks had financial ramifications too because as the price of books when down it was less imperative to keep the collection from patrons who might damage texts. The presence of multi-purpose and lecture rooms especially in Bertram’s “Notes” show that while Bertram warns against moving away from the library’s book-centered-ness he also thought that some library space could be used as the community wished. The need for extra space be it for expansion or rooms for community groups was also important when one considers that libraries didn’t always use space for what it was designated for in the floor plan. Design suggestions offered by Bertram gave libraries wiggle room so that they could keep up with the needs of librarians and patrons.
Like Garrison, Van Slyck makes claims about the feminization of librarianship. In chapter four she briefly mentions the role of women’s clubs in rallying support for Carnegie libraries. These women cited their morality and inherent mothering skills to give their calls for public libraries authority. Women and men made these same claims for why women were suited to be librarians. As part of her analysis of library space Van Slyck also examines libraries as a female work place. According to Bertram’s “Notes” the changing desk was to be centrally located so the librarian could keep an eye on patrons but Van Slyck doesn’t mention that at the same time patrons could see her too. The position of charging desks between the entrance and the stacks let the librarian oversee the movement of people but it also restricted the size of her work space (so that it looked similar to those of typists and phone operators) and again everyone could see what she was doing. Van Slyck doesn’t make it sound like these interior design choices were intentionally meant to do what they did (much like how the club women didn’t consider the ramifications of their appeals based on gender) but contemporary librarians still have to contend with the effects.
Van Slyck gives a lot of good information on the role of female librarians in the formation of children’s collections. There seems to have been some contention over how home-like children’s space in the library should be which contrasts with Garrison’s assumption that female librarians always exerted a homey and feminine influence on the library. In the pictures that Van Slyck includes there is little difference between the aesthetic of adult and children’s reading rooms until you read her comments about the presence of parlor-like tables and child scale chairs. It seems like the attitude toward children’s libraries started out with them being a place where children could go in order to keep out of trouble but then ended up being a place that paid attention to the unique educational needs of children. Van Slyck doesn’t really get into it but I would be interested in knowing want the view of child psychology and education was in the public school system at this time. Simply realizing that child weren’t little adults seems to have been a big advancement in education in both the school and the library.
Dain and Molz Article
The first couple sections of the Dain and Molz article, concerning building a collection and library faith, was a review of things that we’ve discussed frequently in class. I liked the section about the changes in the demographic of library patrons in the 60s. With all the discussion about how the library can best serve people and how library missions change it seems important to look closely at who uses the and how users groups change. The change in urban library patrons didn’t seem to change the education focus of the libraries but the kind of education they offered. For example, community agencies and services directories give useful information to the urban poor while still falling in line with the “library faith” idea of self education and improvement.
I also got a lot out of the “Marketing the Public Library” section. The authors seem to see efforts to “sell” the public library as positive and I would have to agree. I understand worries about the “McDonaldization” of libraries but at least at this point in library history I don’t think many people (librarians or patrons) really want such a thing because even if it is in demand only once every five years, we still would like to have access to that book on literary criticism or philosophy when we want to. I can’t help but feel uncomfortable with the “demand versus quality debate” concerning building a collection. I’m not afraid to say, for example, the New York Times is a higher quality news paper than USA TODAY but at the same time I would be thrilled that some one was actually reading a newspaper. Basic literacy and simply getting people into the library is more urgent than cultivating taste.
I also got a lot out of the “Marketing the Public Library” section. The authors seem to see efforts to “sell” the public library as positive and I would have to agree. I understand worries about the “McDonaldization” of libraries but at least at this point in library history I don’t think many people (librarians or patrons) really want such a thing because even if it is in demand only once every five years, we still would like to have access to that book on literary criticism or philosophy when we want to. I can’t help but feel uncomfortable with the “demand versus quality debate” concerning building a collection. I’m not afraid to say, for example, the New York Times is a higher quality news paper than USA TODAY but at the same time I would be thrilled that some one was actually reading a newspaper. Basic literacy and simply getting people into the library is more urgent than cultivating taste.
Apostles of Culture
Part one of Apostles of Culture put the social situation of the “new gentry elite” library founders into a nice historical context before giving some statistics about 19th century librarians and then specific examples of the careers of some notable men. In was interesting that these librarians were overwhelmingly upper-middle class and were, as Garrison calls them, vocationally unstable which shows that although they were from an elite class they seemed to face a fair amount of struggle in finding their place in society. They way that these early librarians sort of ended up in field makes me want to question their expertise and understanding of librarianship and highlights the “experimental” side of the American public library. What should the library’s purpose be? How should we achieve this purpose? These obably looked up to the elite members of society and once he had achieved a similar level of prominence he may have felt especially deserving of the authority it gave him.
Poole had to educate himself in the manners of the elite and in that way he parallels Windsor’s appreciation of self education. At the end of his career as a librarian Poole worked at the Newberry Library in Chicago. The Newberry library, we are told, was a public library but its staff thought of it as primarily a place for “gentlemen” assuming that the general public wouldn’t be able to appreciate the quality of the library’s collection. It is hard to believe that Poole could have worked in such an environment without having picked up some beliefs about the superiority of the intellectual in the library.
I found part two of the book “Moral Passage: the Fiction Problem” interesting but maybe not that important in the overall history of the library. I was probably worth considering that one of the issues that people had with light fiction was that is was read by impressionable women and at the same time women were the ones working in libraries, being expected to use their inherent superior morality and taste to guide the unlearned public. This double standard is revealed in another light when one considers that the novel has been considered historically as a feminine literary form and thus writing fiction was a fairly socially acceptable activity for a woman. I can just imagine the horror that some might have felt at the thought of a library full of women patrons and workers sitting around and reading books by women authors that might seem like trite romance novels to contemporary readers. At the same time the class distinction between the librarian and the house wife may have been significant enough to prevent either from recognizing the irony of the situation.
By far my favorite part of the book was “The Tender Technician.” I can see how this part could be controversial because in places I get a sense that Garrison is kind of blaming the victim in that women are complicit in a kind of cycle that traps them in pink collar library work. Men like Dewey advocated women in librarianship for often conflicting reasons. Women were suited to be librarians because they were becoming educated but at the same time women were perfect because librarians needn’t be skilled or formally educated. The library was a place for moral nurturing so women fit in well because they were suited to the domestic sphere but they were also expected to be serious intellectuals. I think this conflict not only reveals the double standards that women faced but tensions within the profession at large. Garrison seems to argue that women in the field cause feminization and that cause a lack of professionalization but to me it seems that the factors that led to feminization and professionalization existed side by side.
Poole had to educate himself in the manners of the elite and in that way he parallels Windsor’s appreciation of self education. At the end of his career as a librarian Poole worked at the Newberry Library in Chicago. The Newberry library, we are told, was a public library but its staff thought of it as primarily a place for “gentlemen” assuming that the general public wouldn’t be able to appreciate the quality of the library’s collection. It is hard to believe that Poole could have worked in such an environment without having picked up some beliefs about the superiority of the intellectual in the library.
I found part two of the book “Moral Passage: the Fiction Problem” interesting but maybe not that important in the overall history of the library. I was probably worth considering that one of the issues that people had with light fiction was that is was read by impressionable women and at the same time women were the ones working in libraries, being expected to use their inherent superior morality and taste to guide the unlearned public. This double standard is revealed in another light when one considers that the novel has been considered historically as a feminine literary form and thus writing fiction was a fairly socially acceptable activity for a woman. I can just imagine the horror that some might have felt at the thought of a library full of women patrons and workers sitting around and reading books by women authors that might seem like trite romance novels to contemporary readers. At the same time the class distinction between the librarian and the house wife may have been significant enough to prevent either from recognizing the irony of the situation.
By far my favorite part of the book was “The Tender Technician.” I can see how this part could be controversial because in places I get a sense that Garrison is kind of blaming the victim in that women are complicit in a kind of cycle that traps them in pink collar library work. Men like Dewey advocated women in librarianship for often conflicting reasons. Women were suited to be librarians because they were becoming educated but at the same time women were perfect because librarians needn’t be skilled or formally educated. The library was a place for moral nurturing so women fit in well because they were suited to the domestic sphere but they were also expected to be serious intellectuals. I think this conflict not only reveals the double standards that women faced but tensions within the profession at large. Garrison seems to argue that women in the field cause feminization and that cause a lack of professionalization but to me it seems that the factors that led to feminization and professionalization existed side by side.
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