Voyage of the Paradigm Ship

Librarian John W. Neth, Jr., with his student assistants. Photograph from the 1954 Milligan College yearbook.

The other day a professor colleague handed me a photocopy of an article he stumbled across while browsing back issues of The Stampede, Milligan College’s student run newspaper. The article was entitled “Library News,” and was dated Tuesday, October 15, 1953.

The article reported on the recent arrival of the new librarian, John W. Neth, Jr., and changes he was instituting in the Library. In 1953, the Milligan College Library was not housed in its own building, but occupied several rooms in Derthick Hall, the main administration and classroom building. A floor plan of the reorganized library was included in the article.

I read the article with a mixture of amusement over how much has changed in libraries and librarianship over the past 55 years, and admiration over how much has remained the same.

The users of the Milligan College Library are noting a definite trend toward a more efficient arrangement of the available facilities in relation to usability…[The] atmosphere of the library is taking on an air of interest.

Giving priority to “usability” and providing an “atmosphere of interest” for users remain very important in the contemporary library. Of course, deference to the user had its definite limits.

[T]hese changes have been accompanied by correspondingly necessary rules.

Well sure, we still have “rules” today—print periodicals and reference works do not circulate, and we still expect the “return of circulated books on or before the due date”—but we have broken down other long-standing library mores. We no longer prohibit “bringing…soft drinks namely cokes, into the library,” and student discussions (talking) in the library are no longer limited to “subjects relative to their search.” Today we merely ask students who bring food or drink in the library to clean-up after themselves, and while we no longer shush students for talking, we do ask that they consider and respect their neighbors as they interact. 

The old rules reflect an understanding of the library as a place primarily where information resources are stored and searched. Emphasis was placed on protecting these resources and controlling the study environment. Today we have a primary desire to make the library a more open and welcoming place. We are less obsessed with control. We recognize that learning is a social activity, and learning is best facilitated when the study environment is comfortable and (even) domestic (I got this term from Scott Bennett).

In 1953, students had to come to the library because that was the only place where information resources could be accessed. Today, while we still stock our physical shelves with physical books to support the research needs of our students, the storage function of the library has diminished significantly in the face of anywhere/anytime access of information resources in electronic format just a few clicks away, starting from the library website. Students no longer have to come to the library. Whether or not they will depends on the library being more than a storage facility. The question of whether the relaxation of “rules” is pandering to the user, as I imagine Mr. Neth might have insisted, is way past moot. The role of the library itself has changed that much.

But what about the role of the librarian? Rule 5 presents an interesting paradox:

The last resort in any research problem is seeking the assistance of the Librarian. [Consult] the Card Catalog, the encyclopedia and dictionaries, the special reference collection and periodical indexes, and then finally consult the Librarian. However, no one should leave the library without an answer to the question at hand until all the above have been consulted.

The last resort?! At first I was taken aback by the brashness of wording that could be construed as communicating the librarian’s time was too important to be pestered by students seeking assistance with their research questions. But in fairness to Mr. Neth, he was the only full-time staff person, running all the functions of the library with the help of some student workers. (Today we have three full-time librarians, a part-time librarian, two part-time paraprofessionals, and a small army of student workers.) Even considering that the library was significantly smaller in 1953, Mr. Neth’s time was definitely at a premium.

Seen more positively, this rule (even if originally motivated by pragmatic concern) provoked students to take greater ownership for the research process, and propagated in them a self-service attitude well before its time. Although there are still students who come into the library (often at the last minute) hoping that a librarian will do all their resource searching work for them (yeah right), the democratization of information access fostered by the Web has encouraged all of us to rely less on professionals and experts as authoritative mediators—at least initially. We like being able to seek-out our own answers. The librarian’s role has shifted from mediating information to instructing students how to search effectively for information, and how to better evaluate the quality and relevance of that information for the intended use. Librarians are also more involved educationally in getting students to think-through their research topics, and composing a managable thesis. We then set them loose. Assuming we aren’t leaving students entirely to their own devices as we endorse a self-service attitude, the rule has a very contemporary ring to it. I like it.

I also like the way the article closes. Mr. Neth expressess a key affirmation of the function academic libraries should play on every college or university campus—both symbolically and in actuality. This affirmation remains every bit as timely and relevant today as it did over half a century ago:

The library is the hub about which the academic wheel of education turns. It is as much a tool in the process of gaining knowledge as is any other individual tool in that program. 

I was doing a little house cleaning in my email folders the other day, and I came across the following “open letter” I sent to the faculty back on April 27, 2005. I was still Reference Librarian at the time, and just two months into the job. I believe this was my first formal communication with faculty regarding information literacy and the changing nature of libraries and information resources. I hit upon the idea of the classroom and the library as separate “domains” that risked an ever widening “distance” for students. I used this metaphor as the basis of an appeal for greater intentional collaboration with faculty in order to bridge the gap. (The mug shot was original.) 

As an extension of my role as Reference Librarian, I want to make myself available to you as a resource—and potentially more than a resource—for bibliographic instruction and information literacy in your courses. Allow me to share some of my thinking and interests in this area.

It is conventional (for my generation, and for many generations prior) to think of the library as a place where information resources are stored. Users go to the library to access these resources on an as-needed basis. For students, the need is typically oriented toward completing class assignments. Bibliographic instruction in this vein seeks to inform students

1) about the relevant (subject and course-related) resources that are available in the library

2) how to go about accessing relevant resources in the library, and

3) how to productively use these accessed resources in support of the learning process. 

This is an important exercise. However, viewing the library as a place—an information “warehouse”—may contribute to more than just the sense of physical distance required to traverse there from the classroom. A potentially problematic metaphorical distance may also be building up. The greater this perceived distance, the harder it is for students to see the intimate relationship between classroom and library in the learning process.

The sheer volume, availability, and mobility of knowledge and information resources in non-print and electronic formats is certainly one aspect contributing to the increased sense of distance. Imagine all this information, just a few keystrokes away, and all conveniently accessed from the comfort of home or dorm room! Some lament this as the death of the book and the demise of the library as we (my generation, and for many generations prior) have always known it. I am less pessimistic (though I recognize that changes are inevitable). Besides, having access to an ocean of unmediated information is not necessarily helpful. (In fact, it can be exceedingly frustrating!) Access to information never directly translates into the acquisition of knowledge. But the new(er) reality does suggest to me that a broadening understanding of what the library is and how the library functions in the learning process is needed. In many ways, it must be admitted that the sense of distance was there even before the introduction of electronic information resources. Students, to varying degrees, have always complained about having to make the trip from classroom to the library for information needed to complete their assignments. It’s just that we can see the distance more clearly with this increasing (if still largely imagined) student expectation that technology will at last make the trip entirely unnecessary.

Physical distance exists as a result of practical considerations of space. (We need a place where we can store and organize books on shelves so we can retrieve them later as needed.) But metaphorical distance doesn’t take up space. The “ah-ha” for me considering this technological capacity to electronically disassemble information content from information format is not that I should lament the death of the book (which I do not believe) but that I should be provoked to focus even more attention on the nature of information itself. Yes, new information formats require the learning of new skills (e.g., database searching, electronic document delivery, etc.). This is an important part of bibliographic instruction today. But bibliographic instruction in the vein of my present thought broadens beyond a discussion of the format of information resources or where they can be found, to include a discussion about how to think about and use the information contained in whatever format, wherever it is found. This is where bibliographic instruction extends toward information literacy.

I have an interest in narrowing the sense of distance for students, not by lamenting a lost past or resisting an uncertain future for the library, but by proposing a stronger on-going relationship between myself as librarian and you as a faculty member. I fully appreciate and respect that the classroom is your domain, and you have the responsibility to guard it well for the tasks of teaching and learning. But I also believe the library needs to be conceptualized (by both librarians and faculty) as more than just a domain of support to the classroom in the learning process. After all, it is the separation of domains that creates the sense of distance. I believe the distance can be narrowed by inviting the library into the classroom. Information literacy aims for the library to be more integrated with the classroom in the learning process. It proposes a more active role for librarians to respond to partnering opportunities with faculty so that students will more readily sense the intimate relationship, and come to place a higher value on the gift of knowledge as a result. I welcome and look forward to the opportunity to talk with you further about bibliographic instruction and information literacy prospects in your classroom as you begin to plan your courses for Fall Semester 2005.

They say the truth is stranger than fiction. The following are actual interactions I had in the library with students and faculty related to the use of information resources. I shared these interactions, essentially without elaboration, in a series of animated PowerPoint slides at a faculty retreat at the beginning of the 2007-08 academic year.

We were just kicking-off our college’s information literacy program. I was trying to provoke awareness and buy-in from the faculty to the importance of our moving beyond “traditional” library and bibliographic instruction. I was appealing for a more collaborative relationship between the domains of classroom and library, by suggesting that librarians have a unique role to play in the teaching and learning process. If nothing else, librarians observe how students actually think about and use information resources as they try to negotiate the expectations of their professors in research and writing assignments. It was easy to raise a chuckle when exposing the foibles of the students in the situations I shared. It was a little more sobering when I put these in the context of faculty actions and attitudes that sometimes get in the way…

Student performs a catalog search for resources on a topic for a research paper. She requests three books through interlibrary loan. The books arrive. They are “on-topic” but otherwise unusable…

They were written for a juvenile audience.

Student types the following search query into Google (verbatim): “What affect did the crusades haveon the current war between Palestine and Isreal.”

He gets no results.

Students are having trouble finding a journal from which a professor has assigned readings on the course syllabus.

The title of the journal changed… 13 years ago.

Professor forbids students from using “Internet sources” in their research, but leaves the impression that an “Internet source” is any resource accessed using a web browser.

Students don’t think they are allowed to use the Library’s online journal literature databases.

Student is looking for a book to use in a research assignment. In order to direct the student to a useful resource, the librarian asks how he is developing his research topic.

“Oh, I’ve already finished writing my paper. I just need to cite a book… That’s what the assignment says.”

Student doesn’t appreciate research as a developmental and recursive process. It is viewed as a product constructed, in a single sitting, out of a grocery list of loosely assembled information resources.

“Let’s see. I need 3 books, 3 journal articles, and 1 reliable website on this topic…so I can write my paper tonight.”

Student seeks assistance from a librarian about a research paper assignment. While discussing ideas for how she might develop the topic, the student repeatedly expresses concern about her grade.

Rather than pursuing a direction of interest, the student wants to steer the paper in a direction she thinks her professor will approve.

Professor asks librarian: “Is it valid to cite directly from full-text journal articles accessed in a database, or do I need to secure the ‘real’ (i.e., print) article first?”

Both students and faculty are uncertain how to properly cite documents accessed in electronic format. Students are also confused by multiple discipline-based citation conventions (MLA, APA, Chicago, etc.).

Student is caught plagiarizing on a Library Orientation assignment.

When asked to explain his actions, the student replies, “I would have never plagiarized on an important assignment.”

I am a latecomer to Laura Cohen’s blog, Library 2.0: An academic’s perspective. Curious that I should discover it almost exactly one year after it ceased publication! Laura Cohen was Web Support Librarian at University at Albany (SUNY). On February 5, 2008, she wrote her final post announcing her retirement. In that post she also wrote: “My dean has promised that this blog will remain available for at least the next year. Some of my entries are still being discovered by new readers…”

Indeed! And seeing that the year may be about up, I am scampering to glean interesting bits from the year and a half run of Laura’s blog. Of special note, and of enduring value in the rapidly evolving library environment and librarian profession, is “A Librarian’s 2.0 Manifesto,” which she posted on November 8, 2006. I am re-posting it here in its entirely: 

I will recognize that the universe of information culture is changing fast and that libraries need to respond positively to these changes to provide resources and services that users need and want.

I will educate myself about the information culture of my users and look for ways to incorporate what I learn into library services.

I will not be defensive about my library, but will look clearly at its situation and make an honest assessment about what can be accomplished.

I will become an active participant in moving my library forward.

I will recognize that libraries change slowly, and will work with my colleagues to expedite our responsiveness to change.

I will be courageous about proposing new services and new ways of providing services, even though some of my colleagues will be resistant.

I will enjoy the excitement and fun of positive change and will convey this to colleagues and users.

I will let go of previous practices if there is a better way to do things now, even if these practices once seemed so great.

I will take an experimental approach to change and be willing to make mistakes.

I will not wait until something is perfect before I release it, and I’ll modify it based on user feedback.

I will not fear Google or related services, but rather will take advantage of these services to benefit users while also providing excellent library services that users need.

I will avoid requiring users to see things in librarians’ terms but rather will shape services to reflect users’ preferences and expectations.

I will be willing to go where users are, both online and in physical spaces, to practice my profession.

I will create open Web sites that allow users to join with librarians to contribute content in order to enhance their learning experience and provide assistance to their peers.

I will lobby for an open catalog that provides personalized, interactive features that users expect in online information environments.

I will encourage my library’s administration to blog.

I will validate, through my actions, librarians’ vital and relevant professional role in any type of information culture that evolves.

Incidentally, I found this nice video slideshow mashup on YouTube of Laura Cohen’s “A Librarian’s 2.0 Manifesto” by Soren Johannessen, of Copenhagen, Denmark: