This is peak public librarian.

Children's librarian here: This is, in fact, 100% the kind of question I'd expect from a kid Matilda's age.

So I just got the notification about Spotify now having audiobooks, and not to have a knee jerk reaction and shoot from the hip, but don’t give Spotify your money. Download Libby and use it if you have a library card. If you don’t have a library card, as a librarian I feel inclined to tell you to go to your local library and get one! They are almost always the low price of free. Libby is also the low price of free. Don’t keep throwing money in the Spotify pit.

If you’re a person aged 13-21, I also just want to plug the Brooklyn Library’s Books Unbanned project where you can get a free eCard, because it’s such a cool program. Anyway. I’ve typed all this in like five minutes and am going to get a snack. Don’t keep giving Spotify your money when you can support your local institutions who will get you this stuff for free

I have a really sweet coworker who just immigrated here from another country about a year ago. She came into work all excited the other day, saying “I heard some news on the radio that I think is good for you!” 

She proceeded to tell me about the Florida law (HB 1467) requiring a certified media specialist to review books before they can enter school libraries and classrooms.

“More jobs for future librarians like you!” she said.

Sad to think this is how a lot of people probably see this law, and that many won’t bother to investigate further into how vague and harmful it really is for students (not to mention the teachers who could face a third-degree felony for violating the law). 

I don’t know if this is an area of librarianship I really want to go into, but literacy has always been at the forefront of my academic/professional interests. That includes cultural literacy, which tends to fall under HB 1467′s broad language (re: theories that could lead to "student indoctrination”). 

I’ve found myself thinking about the ways I could shape my librarian studies/career into something that involves combatting these and similar laws affecting our education system, but I’m still not 100% sure what that would look like--hoping to take Intro to Info Policy in the fall for some insight. 

In the meantime, if anyone has any knowledge or experience regarding this topic, I would love to discuss it! I have a few friends in the K-12 teaching space but none on the librarian side, and they are dealing with enough already, unfortunately. 

I don't really know if I can talk about this anywhere else because social media is primarily where this has been happening, but it's been a hard time to be a librarian lately. Please, please support your public library right now and tell them how much you love what they do. I can assure you that they need your positive comments more than ever.

TW: right-wing language used to belittle amd shame people doing their jobs, including mentions of pedophilia.

I work in a public library as the archivist for the local history collection, and my library did a program earlier today in which various townspeople read banned books; nothing explicit was read, of course, and we had a family friendly Drag Queen Story Time at the beginning to kick it off.

A few days before the event, an alt-right Twitter account shared it to its 80,000+ followers, and from Wednesday onwards we started getting phone calls and emails from out of state. We were being called groomers and pedophiles for planning to read family-friendly banned and frequently challenged books to children. It's hard to even tell if these people genuinely believe this or if it's just them desperately trying to sling mud because they don't like these things.

All I know is that they've been harassing my staff on the library's social media accounts because they don't want us to talk about anything LGBTQIA+. A lot of the books in the program involved race, and there was a separate adult portion of the program (all things read from those were still appropriate for all ages), but these people have one argument that they fall back on again and again. Right now my library's social media pages are a free block list. It's really scary to see it. We even received phone calls from people - all of them out of state - because this Twitter account basically told them to harass us.

If your public library is doing anything for Pride, please tell them how much you love it and how much it means to you. The same goes for any other months in which a persecuted minority is being discussed. If you give your library positive feedback, it means we can keep doing this stuff because our patrons love it and want to see more of it. We're on the front lines for you right now, and we need as much help from you as we can get. Please make your local librarians feel safe, loved, and supported by using your library and giving us positive feedback on these things!

Random Fact #6,480

The most complete ancient library we know of is known as the Villa of the Papyri.

It's located in the ancient Roman town of Herculaneum, which faced a fate similar to Pompeii's when Vesuvius erupted that infamous day.

^ The black shadow represents the area affected by the ash cover.

The library contains a whopping 1,800 carbonized scrolls with its contents still (relatively) intact.

Researchers are still learning how to best open the papyri without destroying the inscriptions, but from the fragments already opened they have been able to uncover what was written in the pages.

The Friends of Herculaneum Society has a website on the town, complete with information for if you want to travel to see the different towns that were destroyed by the infamous Vesuvius eruption. Their site also includes a link to an online library of the papyri opened so far - divided by genre, author, and date.

If you’re interested in the event that led to preserving the scrolls, you might also enjoy Pompeii: The Last Day by the BBC. It’s a 2003 recreation of the events based on the then-current knowledge and talks about how the eruption affected Herculaneum and Pompeii differently.

There is also a 2003 documentary by PBS specifically about the library entitled Out of the Ashes: Recovering the Lost Library of Herculaneum that I would recommend.

“I've never seen so many books in all my life”

🕰️📖✨📜🕯️🌔

I've visited the Biblioteca Casanatense in Rome a few days ago and, as soon as I walked in, I felt exactly like Belle in THAT scene from Beauty and the Beast (you know the one) ♡

Currently reading 'Trees with Edible Leaves' (Perennial Agriculture Institute - Toensmeier & Klopf, 2022) and it is a fantastic read. It has been made freely available under the the CC-BY-NC-ND 2.0 license, and I put the link to the blogpost where you can download it in the book title. It's also embedded in the page, so readers don't need to download it.

It's neatly divided into sections according to climate type, has reference images, and is written for the layperson instead of expecting specialised knowledge from the reader. Names for plants are provided - where possible - in the 20 most spoken languages. 10/10 would recommend for anyone interested in carbon friendly solutions to food and nutrition problems. Happy reading!

Battle for Libraries

Today (3/24/23), Hachette v. Internet Archive was decided in favor of the publishers. This is a huge blow to the integrity of digital lending libraries across the country, and it is crucial that the Internet Archive wins its case if it makes it to the supreme court.

Libraries are a vastly misunderstood and vital resource, even (and especially) in the digital age. For centuries, public libraries have provided patrons with access to information regardless of economic standing, and as corporate greed causes paywalls and subscription services to rise in prominence, digital libraries are more important than ever for our minds and our democracy. In a profit-motivated world, public libraries are our saving grace.

Here’s how you can help:

Petition:

https://www.battleforlibraries.com/

Supporting your local library:

Libraries are very local, so I won’t post a donate link for any specific library. Instead, I encourage you to ask a librarian what you can do to support your local library. This may be in the form of volunteer work or a book donation, depending on your library’s needs :)

Have a library card, but can’t find time to get to the library? Find out if your library uses Libby! Libby is a free app that allows you to borrow e-books, audiobooks, and magazines from your local library. You get to read digital books for free, and you can support your library at the same time!

Hello!

I was wondering, how does working in a library looks like? Is it fun? What responsibilities are there? Would you mind telling about it?

YES I want to talk about the library!! Always and any time!! Ask me any library questions and I will be excited to answer them!!

I will say that any experience in any library will depend on what role you were hired to fill. I would have a vastly different experience if I was hired to work in a college library with students, or in a medical library with student doctors, or in a law library, or in a private library or in an archive...There are lots of roles librarians fill, and each one is unique!

I, however, took every child psychology class my undergrad would let me, and now I work with the tiny babies! 🥰❤ (And the medium babies, and the preschoolers, and the kindergartners...)

I work in a public library, which means we serve a certain geographical area, and I work with a certain age group, which happens to be birth through K ages, which means that my role is to support the reading habits, language acquisition skills, and local educational efforts in town and in our school district for all the kids who fit that age group. Therefore, my responsibilities are to:

Manage the collection! This means that I make sure we're getting hot new kids books in, [especially kids books with huge educational value (ask me about how we judge this sometime)], that all the gross old busted books are tossed summarily, and that they fit our library's mission statement. Since I work with the little kids, I manage the Picture Book section, the Board Book section, the Early Reader section, the read-along books (CD books or chip-reading books), and sometimes the audiobooks and the kid tablets. I also have to know about the chapter books, graphic novels, nonfiction books, and tween/teen books, since kids will ask me about them at the youth services desk, but I don't manage those collections.

Provide programming! Librarians usually have a specialty in...something. Everyone finds their niche. It's guaranteed. This may be because most librarians are secretly neurodivergent but also because it's great to be good at something and have people learn to expect it. Some people are great at research in certain topics or know a lot about local resources or can lead certain craft programs that may be specialty only. Since I work with babies, My role is to provide a lot of storytime programs, age-appropriate craft programs, and help facilitate outside performers in the library to provide educational things I can't. (Ex. I don't know sign language, so I can't do sign language storytime. We hire someone to to this for us since it's not an easy thing to branch out.)

Perform outreach! Outreach is what it's called when the librarian shows up at your school and says "you know we have sonic comics, right?" And kids are like 'YOU HAVE SONIC??' And we're like, 'yeah, we have Dogman too'. Outreach can take many forms— Adult Services librarians might head to a community home or the food pantry or nursing homes to check out books and make library cards, but Youth Services librarians usually go to community centers, parks, and most importantly, schools! This is so that we can preach the good word of library cards to kids at an age where they can learn the values of never paying for books but still being voracious readers. Want a million books at home? Check out ten at a time, and you'll hardly ever run dry!

Now...is it fun?

I mean. I think so? I love my job; I get to see babies every day, I get to recommend the books I read as kids to kids now, and give them the hot new books when they need something more modern; I get to tell moms to stop being so weird about their kids' reading habits and just let them read comics, no, really, it has a massive impact on their willingness to fall in love with reading; I get to tell kids that they can get to pick out their own sticker if they clean up the toys when they're done playing (HUGE for them); I was trained to sing since I was yea high, and I love picture books as an art form, so planning storytimes is super fun and exciting for me! On the other hand, I'm basically performing half hour mini-shows once a week— or maybe even multiple times a week on outreach weeks— and have to have them scheduled months and months in advance before they're actually designed, and each one is new and untested. Every week. The performance anxiety can be unreal, even when I love what I'm doing. I love gossip, but I actually get overstimulated in rooms with a lot of active people for a long time, so some on-desk days can be stressful. People will harass you about changes upper admin make, but you're the one on the desk, do you're the one they yell at. My coworkers are all amazing and I love them, and that's pretty lucky, haha. The kids who see me come to their school ALL come up to me to tell me I visited ("I know, I was there! What book did you like the most?") and ask after the books and resources I showed them while I was there. I show them books and things from my childhood, things that are about to disappear. We sing songs older than some of the parents are and songs released last year. All things are give and take.

And sometimes on empty desk shifts, I write fanfic. So. ✨👍🏽📚

I would say that if you're interested in libraries, volunteer at your local one. A lot of things librarians will tell you about will sort of get washed aside when we try to infodump everything to you when you get your card. I'll be like "WE HAVE FREE WIFI HOTSPOTS AND MUSEUM PASSES" and people will be cleaning out their ears like "huh? What'd you say? Whatever." Volunteering is a great way to get out on the floor and get to know all the services public libraries offer. I got a two year degree in two years of working part-time and full-time, and now I make construction paper crafts for kids! I needed a Masters degree for that! Whack. Anyway being a librarian is like doing whatever you want and giving out freebies all at the same time, as long as you also do your homework and make sure your large collection of books is nice and clean and functional.

Also. Weed out all the racist books. "What but racist book #2 was my favorite! :(" Don't care. I work with early childhood education and baby books. If a kid sees that, their self esteem could be harmed irrevocably. Dump it.

Other roles in public libraries are different: you could work in circulation, collection development, marketing, tech services, adult services... But this is what I do! 💜📚💜

Idea for a partnership with local museums for public libraries

The trick for grownup museums with kids is making a scavenger hunt for them related to the collection.

When I was 12 my friend & I went with my mom to the Louvre and she made a scavenger hunt for us beforehand. She had to drag us out at closing time practically kicking and screaming.

It might be interesting to partner up with local museums to have kits that parents can take out that come with a pass and scavenger hunt worksheets that can be filled out and exchanged for a sticker or other small prize at the museum (or the library, idk).

There is no library patron on earth that I love more than a southern woman over the age of 80

How has your engagement with fandom intersected with your librarianship?

What a neat question! Thank you!

Other than wearing cosplays to teach class? (Which, yes, I have done.)

There are a few moments in GO that are nice little amuse-bouches for students. I use "... why is there no index?" when I teach org-of-info (I love me a good index) and I'm holding "... and they NEVER change their passwords" in reserve for my infosec course.

More importantly, though, I have sometimes found it easier to articulate why I take the professional stances I do when something I've read or seen resonates with them. For example, Granny Weatherwax's unblinking insistence that people are not to be treated like things informs my opposition to privacy invasion (CRMs in public libraries, library learning analytics in academic libraries, website trackers on ANYTHING library, that kind of thing).

(Hell, I once yelled "Do you remember your data are people?! DO YOU?!" to a roomful of startled biotech startup dudes during a talk I was giving. Dunno if it made a difference, but I'm willing to bet they remember it to this day. I yell real loud, when I yell.)

Pratchett in particular sometimes does, sometimes doesn't get what librarianship is about and how it works. I appreciate it when he does! I'm rereading Going Postal at the moment and Pelc's wrongheaded reference-interview technique cracks me up, as does "it had a red cover and it turned out they were twins" -- there isn't a reference librarian on this EARTH who hasn't dealt with that kind of question.

As for Gaiman -- well, I cried like a baby at Lucienne being the last faithful guardian of Dream's realm during his imprisonment. In this horrific political climate for librarians and we who teach them, that gave me both catharsis and resolve, and I am unutterably grateful for it.

I could probably like, go looks this up or something, but I've got a headache and looking things up feels like work (cause I'm a librarian so, it literally is my work) so I'm asking here instead:

Does anyone know if the WGA has an archivist or archival team preserving the picket signs being made or recording their contents in some way? As I mentioned, I am a librarian, and I feel like recording things like this is important to history and research in the future. I am also a union steward and the history of labor movements and strikes is so important to future movements.

I really hope someone is archiving this stuff, recording it for posterity. Picket signs would be considered somewhat ephemeral in terms of the type of media they are, and ephemera gets lost in the shuffle a lot, but they really should be kept in some form or other.

And like, not for nothing, but I'd pay a good $50-$100 USD for a coffee table book that was just photos of the WGA picket signs so long as all of the proceeds went to the union and strike funds.

Do librarians ever refer to subjects by their codes because they’re familiar with them? I’m just imagining someone saying “Oh, that’s so 001.9” to mean they think it’s paranormal.

Some people might - I've never heard it at work, but I do know people who do circulation and acquisitions have specific subject Dewey numbers memorized.

For whatever reason, the one a lot of people seem to have memorized is 398.2, which is fairy tales and folklore. It might have something to do with this Judy Freeman song...