Readings for 2 October 2006

"Hegemony's handmaid: The Library and information studies curriculum from a class perspective," by Christine Pawley

Pawley's entreaty to librarians to be aware of the decision between maintaining class values and ditching them to help spread information is, I think, especially important. She does address this second choice as a "risk", but I'm not sure if she speaks about this as much as I would like. If we risk the status of libraries and librarians, we may end up losing so much that we can't serve anyone, and information ends up completely in the hands of private information brokers, going to those who can afford to pay for their services. This is more of a balancing act than Pawley portrays it as.

“Teaching at the Desk: Toward a Reference Pedagogy” by James K. Elmborg

I found Elmborg's concepts of using reference as a teaching position fascinating. I agree with his point that librarians tend to talk over the heads of students who come to them for help. This is done because: the librarian has expertise, and doesn't realize she's talking over her patron's head; it's easier to do than to engage the patron in an actual teaching process that goes two ways; and she wants to maintain job security by being an irreplacable source of scarce information. Education can help the first issue. Motivation can help with the second. The third just isn't true; if a student has been truly helped, he'll come back again and again with different questions -- this will result in better work, too, and makes the librarian look better, because she's proved her range of knowledge.

"Toward a user-centered information service," by Ruth C. T. Morris

I found Morris' discussion of expertise at the end particularly interesting. Again, I think this is the crux of the problem of resistance to building a user-centered library. Librarians are experts at information-gathering; they thus cannot talk to the information-seekers in an easy way. Patrons have a hard time comprehending what a librarian says a lot of the time, and then don't get true help. It is not just expert patrons who create a communication problem; it cuts both ways, and the more aware librarians are of this issue, the easier it will be to help anyone. They can't be afraid of dumbing things down. Nor can they fear asking patrons to dumb things down. the lowest common denominator is, most of the time, the best way to get a point across.

“Mom and Me: A Difference in Information Values,” by Wayne Wiegand

Wiegand's idea of personal information economies is interesting. It's a good point that people are going to value some information -- and sources of information -- more than others; a good librarian will take this into consideration and shape answers accordingly (with a mind to perhaps stretching the person's comfort zone a bit, as well). This involves active listening and creative thinking. It sounds to me, after reading the other articles, that these are perhaps non-standard concepts for reference. I think it would be good if there was a further discussion on this -- how to cultivate these techniques during the reference interview. That would be helpful.