Readers have expressed appreciation for the research and perspective I (try) to bring to the blog, and it’s a reflection of the support I receive from the staff of the Beaman Memorial Public Library.
Each week they field my phone calls and emails asking about library policies and practices. They share important perspectives about municipal governance and challenge my thinking on various subjects, which is so vital. And of course they acquire lots of materials for me from academic libraries and databases I never knew existed.
So, in case I haven’t said it often enough — THANK YOU to Louise, Sue G, Sue S, Steve, Ginny, Lauren, Cecile, Jackie, and Denise! I truly appreciate what you do.
As a symbolic space, a type of collection, a kind of building, the library gives institutional form to our collective memory.
Public libraries and other institutions established boundaries between public and private life that have become crucial to the modern meaning and experience of community.
Community in postmodern America has itself become a function of niche marketing, in which “culture” has become synonymous with leisure and consumption.
Where exactly is culture, in a world where the forms of knowledge have been reorganized by new media and digital technology, where the experience of public life is increasingly realized through private acts of consumption?
1 The Library as an Agency of Culture. (Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 2001), 15-16
2 Graphic by Aaron Louie
A new campaign from British Columbia, Don’t Pull the Plug on Libraries, addresses the core, unmet needs I see in American public library funding advocacy:
- An organized central resource for library advocates.
- Direct, concise information for the public and public officials.
Here are a few of this campaign’s strengths:
- Its name is a call to action.
- Its website is a one-stop-shop for all library advocates (the public, library staff, library board, friends and media).
- Each advocacy group has a single page with a concise summary of library benefits followed by a short list of actions.
- The campaign is featured on the homepage of individual libraries, library blogs and community news sites.
Could a campaign like this work in the United States? Yes—in fact, I believe a concerted national campaign that incorporates data for each funding source (state, county, municipality) is the best hope for saving our public libraries.
