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Good advice for new docs librarians needs two more tips
Bernadette J. Johnson, Reference Librarian and Government Documents Coordinator at the Francis Mason University, writes a good article on getting up to speed as a new documents librarian/government information specialist.
She also has good ideas on educating non-documents librarians, faculty, students and others on the existence and value of government information. If you’re a government documents librarian and especially if you are new and/or in an academic library, I encourage you to read the whole article.
As good as Ms. Johnson’s article is, there are two major sources of support not mentioned in her article – govdoc-l and the Government Documents Roundatable (GODORT).
Govdoc-l is a mailing list for government document librarians that has operated for decades. It currently has 2,000 plus subscribers, most of whom are government information specialists. It is a rich source of expertise. In my decade or so of documents work, I don’t think I ever saw a question go without a response. No documents librarian should be without this support system. If the volume of mail is too heavy, that’s what the “digest” feature is for. It also has an extensive archive.
While Ms. Johnson rightly points new docs librarians to fdlp.gov, she doesn’t also point people towards GODORT at the state and national level. These organizations are also important sources of information, advocacy and general support. I have to admit that State GODORT’s can vary – a few only exist on paper. While states may vary, the national GODORT is in pretty good shape, as their wiki attests to.
One particularly useful GODORT generated tool for librarians of any tenure is the Government Information Clearinghouse & Handout Exchange. As their page says, “We don’t need to reinvent the wheel. We can provide templates for one another to save time, share models, and work smarter.”
Other government documents librarians/government information specialists are one of the greatest resources any docs librarian has. Use them, cherish them and contribute back to the community when you can. You’re not in this alone.
Reference:
Bernadette Johnson, “Government Documents Usage and Awareness in Education,” DttP: Documents to the People, 40, no. 3 (2012): 22-24, http://wikis.ala.org/godort/images/b/b4/DttP40n3.pdf#page=22
Objective civil discourse
Recently, when I have spoken about “data as evidence” in several academic settings, there has been a recurring question. Essentially it concerns the fact that dishonest people acting in bad faith will generate false, badly formed, or misleading data and propose it as evidence in support of predetermined (i.e. prejudiced / pre-judged) positions. To this day, parties or groups that base themselves in “values” or “beliefs” that are assumed a priori – i.e. values that are non-negotiable – in fact, not subject to discussion — dominate our political landscape. One has only to watch the response of some of the Republican Congressional caucus to President Obama’s discussion there this past week to see clear evidence of this. A fundamental tenet for these believers is that compromise with any other set of beliefs represents moral “relativism” – which is equivalent to amorality (if not immorality).
I believe that much of the trouble we experience in contemporary civil discourse can be traced to a confusion, conscious or otherwise, of the distinctions between “Church” (institutionalization of religious belief) and “State” (government based on trust in a diverse and tolerant community). From the time of European settlement of this continent we have had problems in separating Church and State [See LoC for an excellent summary history ] AND, concomitantly, in maintaining the distinction between empirical knowledge as a basis for public policies and commitments to “truth” based in belief. The former can be understood as “objective and invariant” (as discussed previously) the latter as subjective and highly variable — the phrase used by John Searle of UC Berkeley, “first person ontology” is well applicable.
With objective, scientifically based knowledge, we have the opportunity of arriving – through investigation and discourse — at common agreements (within some bounds of reasonable, relative probability). Respecting contending “truths,” based in belief, we have the very strong possibility of violence and conflict — consider – Northern Ireland or South Asia? It is wrong and misguided to characterize the separation of Church and State as somehow inimical to one system of belief or another.
Separation of Church and State is fundamental to a diverse and inclusive society and protects religious freedom and the right of individual conscience. Without separation – and religious tolerance (as clearly expressed in the Bill of Rights) – a change in political power may result in murder. We are all too familiar – elsewhere in the world — with the consequences of confusing government and religion.
And so we must return to the problem of objectivity and pragmatism in civil discourse. Today we are faced with a range of a priori values – beliefs that are considered “true” and above debate. On the right, the most fundamental of these a priori tenets is that “government is bad” [The Reagan/Thatcher formulation being: “Government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.”] coupled with the corollary that raising funds to support government (taxing) is bad. Aside from the fact that this is fundamentally subversive (!) of the common welfare – it is also impractical and nonsensical. But I would also argue that on the left, there are similar a priori values – i.e. that government is good and corporations are bad.
All forms of human organization are subject to corruption and abuse – certainly this is true of government at all levels – but is absolutely true of corporate governance and is also true of private sector non-profit governance. I believe that the most stable and sustainable principle for our American system of democracy is justice based in the common value of fairness, and this value demands commitment to tolerant civil discourse embodying both rationality and science. It will be protected by an ongoing commitment to transparency and accountability in governance of all sectors: for profit, not for profit and public. (In recent years we have all seen flagrant examples of abuse in all three sectors. Journalism and publishing under first amendment protections together with free, open and effective access to data and information have been essential to the process of transparency and accountability.)
The previously mentioned GRI [SEE: http://www.globalreporting.org/ ] — and similar initiatives working for transparency, accountability and rigorous standards of evidence –- present a clear alternative to organizational business-as-usual.
(As an aside, I will here note that expressions of anger – verbal or physical – as a part of political discourse – for example shouts of “You lie!” — are signs of impotence, sure evidence of the abandonment of civil discourse, of the rational intention of serving the common welfare.)
As custodians of knowledge, as teachers and as advocates, librarians have always been primary defenders of fair and equitable access to knowledge for the common good. The World Wide Web is a technical fulfillment of the most basic ethos of librarianship. For the first time in human history, we have the technological means of sharing knowledge worldwide. But the existence of a global network does not assure that all people will have access, it does not assure that what flows across the network will be effectively useful in informing public discourse for the largest number of people.
We, librarians, have an obligation, in all our interactions to support the broadest possible access by all – freely, openly and effectively. We must maintain critical sensitivity to the practical usefulness of resources provided over global networks, to teach critical and evaluative skills and to assist wherever possible in interpreting and refining available resources.
What Should The Next President Read?
I’m begging your indulgence for a post that’s not really within the scope of Free Government Information, but should be of interest to the many pro and amateur policy wonks out there.
I got to thinking that no matter who wins in November, the next President will face some major challenges. But many of these challenges require knowledge and ways of thought that haven’t seemed to be common to our political leaders.
So, being a good librarian, I created a reading/viewing list for the next President. I used OCLC Open WorldCat to build my list and you can find it at http://www.worldcat.org/profiles/dcornwall/lists/188566.
I tried to keep the list short because I know the next President may well be too busy to read much other than reports from his staff and hopefully some outside sources once in a while.
Here are my choices:
Rosenberg, M. B. (2001). The basics of nonviolent communication an introductory training in nonviolent communication. Sherman, TX: Center for Nonviolent Communication.
York, S., & Sheen, M. (2001). Bringing down a dictator. [Washington, D.C.]: York Zimmerman.
Flynn, S. E. (2007). The edge of disaster: rebuilding a resilient nation. New York: Random House.
Theoharis, A. G. (2004). The FBI & American democracy: a brief critical history. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas.
York, S., & Kingsley, B. (2000). A force more powerful. [Princeton, NJ]: Films for the Humanities & Sciences.
Muller, R. (2007). Physics for future Presidents, supreme court justices, congressmen, CEOs, diplomats, professors, and other world leaders. Southbank, Victoria: Thomson.
Beck, A. T. (1999). Prisoners of hate: the cognitive basis of anger, hostility, and violence. New York: HarperCollins.
Prothero, S. R. (2007). Religious literacy: what every American needs to know–and doesn’t. [San Francisco]: HarperSanFrancisco.
You can read the reasons for my choices on my list.
I think all these items could be consumed and digested between the election and Inauguration Day.
What do *You* think the next President read or watch? Make up your own WorldCat list and post the link to the list here. Tell your friends to make up their own lists. If enough people take up this call, maybe I’ll search for ways to get the lists to the attention of our next chief executive.
Librarians without Libraries?
December 27, 2008 / Leave a comment
In his continuing series about Government Information Liberation, John Shuler considers the role of collections in libraries. One particularly revealing moment in his discussion is his day 60 post in which he describes a series of questions that he poses to his graduate students to get at the “fundamental things we do.”
The Question and Conclusions
One would hope that the questions prompt a discussion and don’t just end in “dead silence.” Although John doesn’t tell us what the discussion, if any, was, he does give us his conclusions: possession of “material” might have once been central to the purpose of libraries but, in the digital age, possession is much less important part of what libraries do.
Even though John qualifies his conclusions to allow for some limited role of collections for some libraries, he overwhelms his caveats with assertions that collections begin and end with the physical ownership of “material” and that “we will not own (possess) much of the material.” He even coins the phrase “Gutenberg Librarians” to deprecate “possession and/or control” (66) of information by libraries.
So, John’s essential, bottom-line conclusion, regardless of his caveats, comes across clearly: The net, John says, has brought on “the beginning of the end” of library collections (35).
I think his conclusion is wrong and the question he asks is misleading. You can see how misleading the question is by turning it around and realizing that the professions/institutions he uses are not parallel:
But the real problem is that the question implies a shared understanding of what a library is — a shared understanding that I think we need to articulate explicitly. I think that, before one asks “Can you be a librarian without a library?” one should ask “What is the role of the library is in the digital age?” John has been outlining what he thinks the role of librarians should be and he apparently wants to separate the role of librarians from the role of libraries. Very well: let’s examine the roles of both with some discussion, not dead silence.
Librarianship
I think John is implying is his series of posts that librarianship in the digital age will be about helping people navigate a complex, networked maze of shifting, changing information. Librarians will help users “connect the dots” and find connections that are not otherwise explicit (47). While there is nothing wrong with this view, and there is much to recommend it, it doesn’t go far enough and it misses a key role for libraries.
As John portrays it, this view accepts that libraries will be less about selecting and preserving information and building digital collections and more about providing services for information over which librarians have no control. Librarians, in this view, are valuable precisely because they have no control over information.
This view accepts that information will be tightly controlled by producers and distributors. What is available, who can use it, under what conditions it may be used, and when it becomes no longer available will all be controlled by government agencies, publishers, individuals, organizations, and other “content” producers.
John also proposes that “librarianship” will be more important than “libraries.” To me, this sounds like librarians will be analogous to travel agents who, because they deal every day with the complex, difficult, disparate, unconnected systems, are better able than the traveller to navigate these systems and find the best flight at the best price. So librarians, in this view, will help casual information users navigate a variety of complex, difficult, disparate, unconnected, public-freely-available and proprietary-and-licensed information systems. Just as travel agents have no control over what flights or trips are available or what they cost or what restrictions are placed on them, so librarians will have no control over what information is available or what it costs or what restrictions are placed on its use.
In this view, librarians will not manage collections but will license the right to read from those who control information. Whether the license comes in the form of payment of dollars to a commercial vendor and a written contract that licenses access, or an FDLP designation, or a contractual “partnership” with GPO, or the anointing of permission by Google Books legal department, the result is the same. As a recent article in Library Hi Tech says, “In future, librarians will no longer manage media, they will manage rights” (Böhner, Dörte. Digital rights description as part of digital rights management: a challenge for libraries. Library Hi Tech 26, no. 4 (2008): 598-605). This view reshapes the role of librarians from information providers to information gatekeepers; from information curators to business-officers who sign contracts and pay bills.
Who would want to go into that field?
Libraries
John hasn’t said much about the role of libraries except to assert that, for many people, the digital environment is now the “default library” [emphasis added] that supports broad access to a “collection” of government information (51).
But, shouldn’t we be asking about the future, not just describing the present?
Shouldn’t we be asking about the relationships between doctors and lawyers and information? Certainly doctors and lawyers need a body of literature to practice their professions. Instead of asserting that users have access today, shouldn’t we be asking, “Who will build and manage and preserve those collections and ensure long-term, free access to them?”
Shouldn’t we be asking what guarantees we have that the information we want today will be available if we want it tomorrow? Shouldn’t we be asking who controls access to that information and what are their reasons for providing access? Shouldn’t we be asking who will pay for long-term preservation and access?
Just because users who are not familiar with information policy, information economics, or information technologies are happy with current access to information does not mean that they will be happy with the access (or lack of it!) tomorrow or in ten years or a hundred years. Providing easy access at one point in time does not guarantee easy access at a future point in time and can actually mask problems of long-term access.
It is one of the roles of librarians to think beyond today and one of the roles of libraries to guarantee access for tomorrow. We need to think about the long-term. Using short-term convenience as a reason for avoiding that kind of thought is evading one of the key roles of librarianship. And assuming that producers and distributors will have the same values and ethics and practices as librarians is to confuse the role of producers with the role of currators.
Maybe the real questions we should be asking are:
The word “library” does not mean “I have some information.” If it did, bookstores would be libraries and publishers would be librarians. We need libraries in addition to publishers and bookstores (and government agencies that distribute information as a by-product of another, primary, mission).
It is all about control
Let’s be clear, then. Even in the paper and ink world, libraries and their collections were about wresting control of information from producers and distributors and granting control to local communities and information users. A publisher could take a book out of print, but a library could keep it available. A user could purchase a book and pay for magazine subscriptions, but could use the information for free at the library. Libraries leveraged economies of scale for the benefit of the community, enabling every community member to have benefits of access to information that no individual could possibly afford.
The need for wresting control of information away from those who wish to control the access to and the use of information has not changed in the digital world. But the battle lines have shifted and we need librarians in the fight to keep free, open, usable access.
“Content providers” want to replace copyright with license agreements. Producers want to charge for every single use and dictate who can use information, under what conditions, and in what way. Governments want to be able to alter and even withdraw information after it has been released. And the proliferation of requirements to register to read or use information portends a world in which people will not have the right of privacy when reading.
It is ironic that, given technologies that enable almost unlimited use and re-use of information and that enable information to be distributed and used and re-used almost without cost, we face a horde of stakeholders who want to limit access, charge for every use, restrict re-use, and look over your shoulder to see what you’re reading.
More inaccurate conclusions
As noted above, John hedges his conclusion a bit. His wording is that “possession is much less exclusive or destiny for any one institution” and preserving and organizing the information sources “will remain important — but is no longer our exclusive responsibility” (66). He expands on that idea:
And from these, he draws conclusions:
To me, these summarize one possible scenario out of many. And, IMHO, this scenario is not one librarians should be content to accept or embrace. Why? Because it almost certainly guarantees that a lot of bad things will happen: loss of access, loss of free access, licensing constraints, DRM constraints, loss of information, loss of usability of information, and more.
Different Questions, A Different Answers
In a separate post, I will examine those issues in more detail, but I’ll close this post with some assumptions and a couple of final rhetorical questions as a way of addressing John’s question, “Can you be a librarian without a library?” The assumptions:
The rhetorical questions:
I think those questions lead us to conclusions that are very different from the the ones John reaches. I will examine this in more detail in another post.
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