Library Day in the Life: Day 5

Readers, this is my final post for the Library Day in the Life, Round 8 project. As you can imagine, Friday was a day with all sorts of different tasks to accomplish, and I have even included some more photos as it's Friday.

Library Day in the Life: Day 4

I am a day late on this, the fourth installment of my Library Day in the Life project this week. It was a busy day yesterday, and I am excited to tell you about it. I am slightly altering my list format from last time, and I will try to include approximate times.

Library Day in the Life: Day 3

Well, it's my third post this week of Library Day in the Life and today has by far been the busiest for me. And, rather than some repetitive narrative for my day, how about a list to change things up.

Library Day in the Life: Day 2

As I stated yesterday, I am participating in Library Day in the Life, Round 8. Today is much more quiet than yesterday, as Tuesday is our "dark day" at the museum. This provided me an opportunity to do something a bit different with my day today.

Library Day in the Life: Day 1

Well, readers, from now until the Friday, I am doing my best to participate in the Library Day in the Life, Round 8.

Here’s the brief about the project, taken from their website:

Catalogers on the Reference Desk

To start the post this week, I would like to start with a quote from Autocat, the cataloger’s discussion listserv:

There is no question that technical services librarians who serve on the reference desk often come back with a great idea or two for improving entries in the catalog. Where the unfairness lies is that reference librarians are not expected to do the reverse. A better knowledge of cataloging would be a huge benefit to reference librarians and yet, while you see many technical services positions advertised that require evening and weekend hours on the reference desk, how many reference positions do you see advertised that require cataloging knowledge and experience? I am willing to bet that if you go to a library jobs site right now and check the first few reference position openings, you are unlikely to see even one that requires a contribution in technical services. It's a double standard. I suspect that this is the reason why many good catalogers will not apply for positions that require reference work.

Preservation and Access

Despite what you might think, or learn in library school, librarianship is a profession of paradoxes and challenges. Many times librarians and other individuals outside the profession talk at length about new technologies and trends that present librarians with challenges externally. However, there are challenges inherent in the job we do as librarians, and one in particular is balancing the mutually exclusive demands of preservation and access.

On the Impossibility of Classification

Last week was an exciting week for me, cataloging-wise, as the library where I work just received our subscriptions to Cataloger’s Desktop and Classification Web. In addition, we wrapped up training on our integrated library system, Millennium. I also finished up the new book of Alberto Manguel’s compiling his writings, A Reader on Reading. I don’t think there is a more erudite and pleasant author who writes on books and libraries than Manguel. Of course, little did I know that the Classification Web subscription and finishing the Manguel book would end up in the same busy week, prompting me to write this short discourse.

A Cataloging Education

As seen on p. 12 May/June 2011 American Libraries:

Periodically there is a post on Autocat, the cataloger discussion list, with some variation on “as a single professional in a (fill in type of library), I am faced with having to catalog. I did not take a cataloging course in library school. How can I…?”

I’ve just been corresponding with one librarian with that problem, who did not even know that the Library of Congress Classification existed as a print publication. Fortunately, she is writing her library school to express her dissatisfaction at being placed in this situation.

Apart from knowing something about cataloging making one a better reference librarian or administrator, cataloging is a basic skill of librarianship, which every holder of an MLS or an MLIS should have.

Isn’t it past time the American Library Association made providing a basic introduction to cataloging a required course, as part of accreditation requirements?

-J. McRee (Mac) Elrod
Vancouver, British Columbia

ArLiS: Closing Thoughts

The past several posts here at The Dean Files have been about my experiences and thoughts on the content presented and shared at ArLiS/NA’s annual conference (2011) in Minneapolis. I focused primarily on the content of the conference, and not on the conference itself. In reflecting on the content, I gave a great deal of thought to the presentation and the format of the content, and I have some constructive criticism in four points I would like to share with you, reader.

ArLiS: Sunday, March 27

Well, readers, here it is: my final post about ArLiS in Minneapolis. I think this was my favorite day, as it had two sessions of great interest to me - the Museum Libraries division meeting, as well as the RDA Test Kitchen presentation in the Cataloging Section meeting. I only thought it appropriate to include a photo of the art cataloging godfather, Sherman Clarke:

ArLiS: Saturday, March 26

Several interesting sessions filled up my Saturday attending ArLiS in Minneapolis. My day was filled with many sessions, but the two that interested me were about book clubs in an art library, as well as ebooks in the same setting.

ArLiS: Friday, March 25

It’s time for my second post about the ArLiS conference in Minneapolis, and today I will be writing about my first full day at the conference, Friday. As I am looking at my notes from the day, there was one very good session, and the rest were a “mixed bag,” as I like to say.

My first session on Friday was the opening plenary, which ostensibly was about copyright, and how bridges can be built between educational users and copyright holders.

ArLiS: Thursday, March 24

Well, readers, it’s a blog post from Jason – gasp! What august event caused me to sit down and write another post? The short answer is that I just returned from the 2011 ArLiS/NA+VRA annual conference in Minneapolis, Minnesota. As you can imagine the conference put lots of new thoughts and ideas into my head, ones which I want to share with you here. In thinking over the past few days how I wanted to share my experiences and reflections with you, and I think (as librarian extraordinaire Erin Dorney does) I will do it on a day by day basis, with some overall thoughts and reflections at the end.

And, as it is brief, allow me to start with my first day, Thursday, March 24th.

Facebook as a Catalog

Well, readers, I have been inundated with periodicals lately. One article that stood out from the flood was From Friending to Research, by Anne Pemberton. I thought this was a great idea - using something familiar to many people (facebook) to explain some of the more abstract concepts associated with librarianship. I have a couple of favorites I want to highlight...

In Defense of the Museum

Last week in one of my classes, a discussion arose about whether or not digital libraries are "the great equalizer" in the "battle" between museums and libraries. As you can imagine, I had some things to share on this point, and so I want to share with you the original post, followed by my response.

Social Media Tools and Libraries

It's Friday - and I'd just like to share a presentation with you. Uber-librarian Jessamyn West recently gave a talk about social media tools and libraries, titled The Mayor of Everywhere: Using Social Tools to Be More Places at Once. I think it's a great talk, and if you click through this link here, you'll go right to the talk. What do you think about it? Have a great weekend!

200 Million Records

In the latest issue of C&RL News (Nov. 2010), there were a few things of note for me. First, if you are going to put a QR code on your cover, please don't cover it up with an address label! Second, Erin Dorney, young librarian extraordinaire, had another great Job of a Lifetime article - so cool!

An eBook Epiphany...

I felt as though I had an epiphany yesterday about eBooks. Someone else has probably had this thought before - I just haven't seen it. Anyhow - here it is:

Visual Explanations and Classification

Remember my previous post about Edward R. Tufte and Classification? Well, my presentation was well-received, and I would like to share it with you.