[Publib] Re: "entertain our diverse community"

[Jason Hatton]

I am going to continue with the post modern inquiries of Joshua....What is entertainment?  
 
What about all those fiction books that are seemingly ubiquitious in every library?  Do they count as entertainment?  Harlequin romances...are they part of "being a library." I do believe that this very same discussion was had in library circles when popular fiction started becoming the norm.  What if the library world would have rejected them?  Would the library even exist today?  Or would we have been written off as outdated and useless?
 
I know there are people out there who will say that at least with popular fiction it promotes literacy and allows people to use their imaginations.  Well, don't forget that video games have their benefits too...hand/eye coordination, social interaction (if a multiplayer game), etc...
 
Jason Hatton
Reference Librarian
Bartholomew County Public Library
536 Fifth St. 
Columbus, IN 47201
(812) 379-1260
jhatton at barth.lib.in.us

________________________________

From: publib-bounces at webjunction.org on behalf of Joshua Neff
Sent: Sat 11/4/2006 3:47 PM
To: jbsphx at cox.net; publib at webjunction.org
Subject: RE: [Publib] Re: "entertain our diverse community"



I don't know of anyone who's saying that a public library's mission is
*solely* to entertain, or to entertain above anything else. Including "to
entertain" in one's mission statement (or marketing to the public) doesn't
lessen any other part of our mission, it simply includes "to entertain" as
one of the many things we do. I don't see why that's a problem. In the
instance of your complaining patrons, maybe they're seeing "entertain" as
more important than anything else. And as long as they're being respectful
of others using the library, I just don't see a problem with that. Now, if
they're being loud and disruptive and disrepectful of others using the
library, it doesn't matter if "to entertain" is part of your mission or not.

"What happened to just being a library and being the best at doing that?"

Not to be all PoMo, but...what's a library? Is it a repository of books? An
archive of various preserved materials, including but not limited to books?
Or is it a place of information, education, community-building and
entertainment?

--Joshua M. Neff
Indian Creek Branch
Olathe Public Library

-----Original Message-----
From: publib-bounces at webjunction.org [mailto:publib-bounces at webjunction.org]
On Behalf Of Joe Schallan
Sent: Saturday, November 04, 2006 12:23 PM
To: publib at webjunction.org
Subject: [Publib] Re: "entertain our diverse community"

A Publibber praised this mission statement:

"The Elkhart Public Library provides access to resources which inform,
educate, enlighten and entertain our diverse community.....Books are just
the beginning."

Maybe I'm just an old crank, but the word "entertain" troubles me here, as
does the implication that books themselves are not a worthy end in and of
themselves.

Just yesterday a young male patron raked me over the coals for not providing
a room in the library set up as a game arcade.
We do all this other stuff, he argued, so why couldn't we spend money on a
game room?  We, too, have the "entertain"
word in our mission statement.

Indeed, a parent used that statement to clobber me when we objected to the
hell her son and his buddies had been raising in our computer lab.  The
library's purpose is to entertain, and so what was the big deal with a
little noise and partying?
Why were we picking on her son?  After all, we say we entertain right in our
mission statement, which she had looked up.

These moments are the ones that make me think we have lost our way, and
certainly have lost a clear sense of purpose.

Because of our own muddled sense of our mission, we are asked to be
everything from a social service agency to a branch office of the MVD to a
game arcade.

What happened to just being a library and being the best at doing that?

I shall now return to my lair in the Jurassic era.

Cheers,
Joe Schallan
Phoenix

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