or, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Fear and Loathing at a Public Library Reference Desk


Snapshot of a Future Male Librarian

   August 8th, 2013 Brian Herzog

I saw this photo and immediately though, "hey, that's what it's like to be a male librarian":

only boy at a girls princess party

Of course it's not entirely true - I always see other guys at library conferences and things (especially tech-oriented library conferences). And I know I enjoy my job as much as any princess with a balloon. But it is not at all uncommon for me to go to meetings with reference librarians in the region and be the only guy in the room.

In fact, I thought that would be a good title for my memoirs: The Only Guy in the Room.

For a bit more on librarian gender stereotypes, check out Mr. Library Dude's post on Image, Public Perception, and Lego Librarians. The whole thing is funny, but the male fashion choices minifig especially made me laugh. However, I'm still unrepresented there: I don't drink coffee.



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Last Call for Salem Press Library Blog Awards 2012

   June 5th, 2012 Brian Herzog

Today is the last day to nominate your favorite library blog for an award! Read all about this year's contest in Salem's Library Blog Center or simply make a nomination by emailing them at [email protected].

Last call for nominations
Last call for nominations

Use Salem's Library Blog Directory to search for or browse library blogs by focus, type, or audience.

2012 nominees will be announced on Friday, June 8th. Also be sure to check out last year's winners (full disclosure, I won in the public library category).



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Librarians, What People Think We Do

   February 22nd, 2012 Brian Herzog

A coworker sent this to me - I've been enjoying these on failblog, but I hadn't seen this one yet:

Librarians, as seen by... image

Here are a few others:

More about these at KnowYourMeme.com. Thanks Sharon.



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Support the Stack Exchange Library Forum

   January 10th, 2012 Brian Herzog

Unshelved by Gene Ambaum and Bill BarnesThe beginning of the year is apparently my favorite time for good causes - although this is one I've mentioned before.

Last year, Unshelved Answers, a Q&A site for librarians, went offline. A replacement was proposed on Stack Exchange, but to move forward it needs 894 people to support the idea.

I used Unshelved Answers a lot, to both ask questions and share knowledge (sometimes that I had to find out the hard way). If you're interested in a professional open forum (essentially, a reference desk for librarians) to communicate with each other and share tips and tricks and best practices, take a look at the proposal and consider clicking the Commit! button. Thanks.



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Reference Question of the Week – 6/26/11

   July 2nd, 2011 Brian Herzog

Unshelved comic stripInstead of a reference question I've answered this week, I wanted to bring attention to a resource for librarians to ask questions.

In April, the very useful Unshelved Answers went off-line - it was a forum that let librarians ask professional questions of other librarians. I used it frequently, both asking and answering, and was sad when this resource went away.

But recent tweets from @codinghorror and @jessamyn reminded me of an effort to start up a replacement Libraries forum - I say "effort," because it'll take your help to make it happen.

The new home will be at stackexchange.com, which requires a critical mass of people to "commit" to a new forum before it is activated. As I write this, we've got 316 of the 894 needed committers, so we still need more librarians to get involved. But don't let the word "commit" scare you - you're not dedicating your life to anything, just showing that you support the idea of the forum and will use it (at your own level of involvement).

The idea behind this Libraries forum, and Unshelved Answers before it, is to create a "reference desk for librarians" - but the official proposal description reads:

Proposed Q&A site for librarians and library professionals where they can share their expertise about libraries and everything in them.

In other words, this will be a place where we can ask questions about working in a library, seek help on reference questions, find out how other libraries are handling a particular issue, and, yes, whether or not we need more signs in the library (no).

And who better to ask than other librarians?

So please, take a minute, visit the new Librarians forum proposal page and click the green Commit! button - together we can make this happen, and together we can help each other make libraries better. Thanks.



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Ich bin ein Bibliotecario

   November 4th, 2010 Brian Herzog

Babel Fish from the Hitchhiker's Guide to the GalaxyLanguage is fascinating to me. I'm particularly interested in the idea that our brains are shaped by the language we use to interpret our environments and communicate - and therefore, people of different cultures do perceive the world differently.

So, apropos of absolutely nothing, here are the translations for a few library-related words, according to the Babel Fish translator.

English library librarian book reading information reference
Dutch bibliotheek bibliothecaris boek lezing informatie verwijzing
French bibliothèque bibliothécaire livre lecture l'information référence
German Bibliothek Bibliothekar Buch Messwert Informationen Hinweis
Greek βιβλιοθήκη βιβλιοθηκάριος βιβλίο ανάγνωση πληροφορίες αναφορά
Italian biblioteca bibliotecario libro lettura informazioni riferimento
Portuguese biblioteca bibliotecário livro leitura informação referência
Russian архив библиотекарь книга чтение информация справка
Spanish biblioteca bibliotecario libro lectura información referencia

Something else neat is that other language can be clever sources of product names - who among us wouldn't buy into a chat reference product called "Referencia?" But my favorite is the word for librarian - "bibliotecario" - I think I might change my business cards.



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