Week 3 reading response

I liked all the articles for this week. Reading about our troubled past and how we got to where we are today and what barriers are still in the way is great. Also enjoyed the article on women in this profession, of course I have noticed that many in this field are women and the higher-ups, as in many organizations, tend to be men. Although technology is replacing some of our traditional services, evolution is a good thing and I do not feel afraid that our jobs will disappear anytime soon. One of main concern for libraries and patrons is actually the technology gap will continue to widen, leaving many patrons way behind those who have better computer skills. I believe that librarians can act as a bridge to help connect the underserved in our community with resources and information that they are not able to find on their own.
I want to focus most of my post on Radof and Radof’s article on stereotypes in librarianship. I have worked at several public library branches and am acquainted with many people who work in libraries. Although they do tend to be predominately female and white, their backgrounds and personalities are quite distinct. As the article discusses, humans have a tendency to stereotype, but as with any group of people or profession, librarians have many unique characteristics.
Stereotypes can keep us in shallow relationships with people, and also leave the door open to treat some people as inferior. Since some of us have experienced how awful it is being stereotyped, I would encourage us as current and future professionals in the library field, to spend some time thinking about our own stereotypes and how they may affect the way we treat others. Overall I have been immensely impressed with the ways I have observed public librarians interact with patrons from all walks of life, but of course there is always room for improvement. For example, I recently heard a library employee say they thought they should put a sign up for “certain” new patrons: get a library card and a free rap cd! They were referring to a trend they had apparently noticed among African Americans to have hip-hop cds reach “lost” status, at which point they could not check out additional materials until the cd had been returned or replaced. I don’t question that this does occur, but does it necessarily occur more often with African Americans, or might it just be more noticeable, especially since Madison is majority white, and African American patrons may stand out more? Also, I don’t know that there would be a way to trace this assertion with statistics, as the patron’s race is not recorded anywhere. This is just one example, and it is important to note that this type of attitude can become a vicious cycle. If the librarian already believes that African American patrons are more irresponsible with library materials, then they may (consciously or unconsciously) treat their African American patrons not as well. These patrons will likely pick up on this, and may respond in kind…you can see how this can go on forever.
Other parts of the article that caught my attention: they describe us as Sisyphus, with our endless task of organizing, just to have the materials disorganized by patrons (63). Let us hope that most of us are not looking for “patron-free” days in the library. The library is there for the patron, not for us, and it is a good thing that they are interested in materials and rumple them a bit (or a lot) in the process.
On page 65 they talk about the librarian having created a system that seems needlessly complex to the user, and also makes them dependent on library staff. I agree with this to some extent, however, I think advances like the online card catalog with keyword searches, coupled with a good percentage of patrons who are extremely computer savvy, makes this statement a little less relevant. That said, we should be especially aware of patrons who continue to need more assistance and who may be extremely intimidated by the internet, computers, and even the written word.
My last comment on this article is that I have to acknowledge their shout-out to my favorite television librarian, Mr. Rupert Giles. He’s definitely the coolest librarian/watcher ever to be featured on prime-time.