I came across this piece on Medium and thought--yes! If you've seen me present within the last year, you know I've been referencing Brené Brown, but I agree wholeheartedly (reference intended) with this author. While he's a teacher referring to teachers, this is equally as valid in librarianship: Just like supporting the mental health of… Continue reading Empathy does not come for free
Category: Articles and Reviews
WPL Book Reviewed in American Libraries Magazine
The WPL book was one of the selections in a recent American Libraries Magazine column on Building Community Engagement. Check it out!
Buschman, libraries, and the public sphere
Little known fact: before Paul Lai and I started this blog, we very briefly had another one. Though the blog itself had a very narrow focus (reorganization of our MLIS program), this particular post still resonates today.
If any of you have read some useful analyses of the relationship between the values of librarianship and the values of the corporate world, please share them in the comments of this post or email me if you’d like to contribute a guest post. I’d love to see more of this discussion foregrounded on the blog.
I’m about half way through John E. Buschman’sDismantling the Public Sphere: Situating and Sustaining Librarianship in the Age of the New Public Philosophy (Libraries Unlimited, 2003), which Elaine Harger at Progressive Librarians Guild recommended as background reading on the dangers of mixing business and librarianship. The book is revelatory for me, and Buschman put into words (almost 10 years ago!) many of the vague concerns and frustrations I have felt this past year while immersed in coursework and trying to keep up with some of the current conversations in librarianship through online…
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Libraries and Social Services: An International Perspective
Check out this paper published by IFLA earlier this year: Connecting Individuals with Social Services: The Library's Role Author Samantha Hines is Head of the Missoula College Library at the University of Montana and brings a much-needed perspective on the role of academic libraries in connecting patrons with social services. She also undertook an effort to… Continue reading Libraries and Social Services: An International Perspective
Two awesome articles on librarianship and social work
I can't tell you how excited I was to see this title: Westbrook, Lynn. 2015. "I'm Not a Social Worker": An Information Service Model for Working with Patrons in Crisis." Library Quarterly 85, no. 1: 6-25. Library Literature & Information Science Full Text (H.W. Wilson), EBSCOhost (accessed March 31, 2015). This has by far the best… Continue reading Two awesome articles on librarianship and social work
Information Literacy Needs of Social Work Students
Before I dive into a brief review of a few articles published by academic librarians about the information literacy needs of social work students, I wanted to remind everyone that Sara Zettervall will be leading a session, "...And Social Justice for All: How Can Librarians and Social Workers Collaborate?," at the upcoming Minnesota Library Association… Continue reading Information Literacy Needs of Social Work Students
Blurred Lines, the Digital Divide, and the Question of Control
This post has nothing to do with Robin Thicke. With that out of the way, I just finished "Librarian or Social Worker: Time to Look at the Blurring Line?" by Rachael Cathcart.* Published in 2008, it anticipates the current call for public librarians to facilitate health care sign-ups. Cathcart focuses on e-government, stating, Services for which… Continue reading Blurred Lines, the Digital Divide, and the Question of Control
Macro and Micro Librarianship
In discussing possibilities for the conference session this fall, one of our panelists suggested looking at librarianship through social work's "macro" and "micro" views. This blog post* provides a critique of the macro/micro divide, but in doing so, it also provides a good, brief introduction: Macro and Micro social work are interdependent concepts. One cannot… Continue reading Macro and Micro Librarianship
A Review of “NHS and Social Care Interface”: Information Literacy for Social Workers
One of the things we would like to do through this blog is to collect bibliographies of research related to the intersection of social work and librarianship. We will also provide brief reviews of some of these articles to serve as starting points for considering the issues that arise in these two fields concerning social… Continue reading A Review of “NHS and Social Care Interface”: Information Literacy for Social Workers
Questions for the Co-Location of Library and Social Work Services
By Mary Wagner, MLS, PhD Mary Nienow in her blog post, “Why Social Workers Need Librarians,” on April 7, 2013, offers challenging and exciting ideas for intersection of Social Work and Library/Information Science. Two recent newspaper articles, “How Public Libraries Have Become Spare Homeless Shelters” (AlterNet, March 6, 2013) and “Security Getting Tougher at Downtown… Continue reading Questions for the Co-Location of Library and Social Work Services
