Communication Quandary

It’s not often that I feel overly sympathetic for inmates of the criminal justice system. In fact we are taught not to feel “sympathy” but instead, “empathy” for their situation. That said, a Hispanic female was housed in my pod the other day. As I was doing a security check I noticed her sitting on the floor of the bathroom crying. Having introduced her to the pod moments before, I was aware of the fact that she spoke almost no English.

After five years of high school and college Spanish I have to say that I can speak very little Spanish. Normally, I would just find another Spanish speaking inmate and have them translate. Unfortunately, out of 36 inmates, she was the only Spanish speaker. I attempted to use an online translator to a degree and hopefully got across a few main points of being in jail. For the most part though, there was almost no communication and I think we both felt a little helpless.

And so, yet another instance of how communication plays a key role in reference, and other, transactions. Is it necessary, as a professional to be able to speak other languages, especially Spanish? Are we obligated to learn a second language? If so, shouldn’t the United States follow the techniques of Asia and Africa where English or a second official language is taught in primary school and earlier?

I’m very torn on this subject because it is frustrating not to be able to get your point across due to a language barrier, when there are already so many other barriers to get over. And yet I feel bad that the US has managed to wipe out so many other cultures in the assimilation process. Ah how I would love to speak German with my grandma. While I did my best to purge the library carts of Spanish reading material, all I can say is that I am glad I wasn’t able to tell her that INS was picking her up in the morning.

Readers Advise....Divisadero

Well, I have been sooo busy lately with school, work and family that I am going back to my roots a little readers advisory, again, and submitting a book review on a recent book I've read (and by recent I mean like two months ago). I don't think reviewing knitting books from the 80's and 90's would be very beneficial...

DIVISADERO

- Michael Ondaatje

“He pushed the glass doors open and walked into the night so the coldness filled his shirt. He noticed the square of a window on the slope of the hill. There was a tightrope between the two farms, and below it an abyss.” (221)

Anyone who knows me knows that The English Patient is not only my favorite movie, but also my favorite book. Ondaatje uses his skill as a poet to write beautiful lyrical prose that simply carries the reader away to the mysterious worlds of Herodotus, Caravaggio and turn of the century France.

Yet, Divisadero is not without its problems. The beginning of the text, which is unusually set in the 1970’s is clunky and without much direction. The plot is slow if not non-existent. Ondaatje focuses on Claire, Coop and Anna who are raised like family since childhood. Anna and Coop have an innocent liaison and then a tragic separation takes place thanks to her father. Then, the story jumps several years down the road to Coop’s self-destructive behavior. The problem is, it isn’t until this section of the novel that the reader really gets hooked onto the characters. Up until then, the reader feels passive, like they are on the outside, looking in. A reader doesn’t want to be on the outside, they want to be there, transformed to where the action is happening.

The final part of the novel transports the reader to turn of the century France, following the life of a recluse writer whose life subtly parallels that of Anna. This was the best and most interesting part of the whole story. Ondaatje’s writing remains beautiful and excels in this section. It is his fluid verse that gives life to the story. Ondaatje also has that gift for weaving history into the mundane and making the whole world seem like one big canvas. Unfortunately, when the writer’s section ends, so does the novel. Anna says a few last words as she reflects on her time spent researching in France, but aside from that there is no conclusion. Part of Ondaatje’s style is that he doesn’t visualize things linearly. The plot starts in the middle, moves backwards and then ends in the present. Ondaatje loves to just end books without a solid finale. This vague conclusion leaves the reader hanging in a most disturbing way. Sometimes the unknown is good, but this is too much.

Overall, the characters all have the beginning of what makes well-developed characters. Unfortunately, the segmented style that guides the text keeps the reader from gaining an attachment to the text. While this method works in The English Patient because the characters come full-circle, it doesn’t work for this novel.

BOOK MARKS...

Since we have recently read about Reader's Advisory in our SLIS textbook, I thought it would be fitting to share my favorite book magazine, "Bookmarks." Technically, I believe it's a popular magazine, unfortunately it's hard to find sometimes. Although, Borders and Barnes and Noble are pretty reliable sources. Bookmarks is published bi-monthly (6 times a year) and is a quick, aesthetically pleasing read. There are several aspects that make this a great and useful source for librarians.

First, it has a list by month of interesting titles that are coming out, usually up to four months.

Secondly, the magazine consists primarily of short reviews, divided by genre, including non-fiction, history, biography, science fiction and crime, etc. Along with the reviews, two authors are featured each month along with a topic. For example, this month the authors are Isabel Allende and Edwidge Danticat and the topic is World War II. The articles are well-written and accurate. I always end up reading about authors I've heard about, but haven't read any of their work yet. The articles for the authors that I am familiar with are still an interesting refresher. Each authors work is highlighted and includes a pretty thorough synopsis of each piece.

There's also a section called "have you read?" that showcases two reader's 10 favorite books. This months reader is from Sheboygan, WI. Go Big Red....

The magazine also features books that have won awards, children's selections and a featured book group that is interviewed. Overall, the reviews are short and useful, but they don't necessarily focus on best-sellers, which is sort of refreshing.

I found this article while looking for a picture of Bookmarks. The author disagrees with almost everything I like about the selection. http://www.flakmag.com/misc/bookmarks.html.

Enjoy.

THE POLICE OFFICER LIBRARIAN

On Monday, I gave a presentation on safety and being a police officer at my son's day care. Two things occurred to me throughout preparation and during the event: One, I don't know why I didn't think of taking a book with me to read sooner. And, two, that was the most fun being a police officer I have had since I started with the department two and a half years ago. The sad thing is, it was my day off and I wasn't even getting paid.

Other things to share: talking to a group of 27, 3-5 year olds is very challenging. They have short attention spans. They are also very talkative. It's been awhile since I've been around kids of that age group. I'm still use to my son who just makes funny sounds and giggles.

Although I planned badly and wasn't able to find a halloween book to take with me, the children's librarian helped me find two really good books: "Keeping You Safe: A Book About Police Officers" by Ann Owen and "Officer Buckle and Gloria" by Peggy Rathman. I opted out of reading the latter because of the length and age group, but it's looks like a cute story, none-the-less for the right group. The first book had nice clear pictures and simple sentences that was perfect for the 3 and 4 year olds. It even featured lots of women police officers which is important in a room full of girls who want to be princesses when they grow up.

All in all, it was a very good day.

INTERVIEW OR INTERROGATION

As a police officer by day and librarian wannabe by night, I realized that while I don't spend much time working on my reference interview, I spend more than enough time "interviewing" the counties convicted felons and other mishaps. Let me just say, I've pulled out a few hairs over the inane, repetitive and mind-numbing questions I have to answer day after day. Let me put this into perspective for you so you don't think I'm the most anti-friendly cop out there. I work in a work-release center, where inmates are granted permission to go to work, school, appointments and job interviews. I'm basically a county-paid information center for inmates trying to make it on the outside, inside.
We have a process where all questions, regarding anything they have to ask, are written on request slips and collected three times daily, once on each shift. While this is a good method in theory, as it allows the deputies to answer the questions at their leisure and get back to the inmates when finished, attempting to get people to follow these rules, who can't follow rules on the outside is another story altogether.
And so, these past months I have become an interviewer not an interrogator, fielding for information from people who don't want to give it in order to help them with bus schedules, work schedules, appointments, huber law, criminal law and so on. It is tiring and tedious and I wish I were helping with books instead of bus routes, but such is life.

It's Hard to Be a Reader

It seems that reading is all around us. Directions, signs, mail, the infamous text message, email, work email, school email, all these nonchalant forms us reading just to make it through everyday life. Sometimes after a busy day at work when I've spent all day trying to read, and decipher, other people’s questions, it's surprising that I want to go home and read for fun.

The idea of reading for fun should be exactly that: fun. On the contrary, sometimes searching for that right book, the book that will hit that arbitrarily established, perfect selection is almost impossible to find. Why is this?

I have a few reasons and a few examples to suggest:

Reason #1:

My first answer to this frustrating question is publishing. Have you ever browsed through a bookstore and seen the massive amount of totally off the wall titles? I can't think of any off the top of my head, but there is a book dealing with anything you can think of. Has the publishing world even heard of the word discretion? Do they know the difference between utter garbage and useful, entertaining material? I'm not talking about bestsellers and children's books. I'm talking about the How to Manuals for everything under the sun. The plethora of self helps books that restate the same topics monthly. Do people actually read these books?? I'd just like to know? Are these the types of books that geniuses read so that they can win Jeopardy?

Reason #2

Great Expectations. Anyone who has ever read a really good book, a book that they absolutely just loved, now has their expectations too high to ever really enjoy a good book again. This is why reading a good book is bittersweet. You can no longer purely enjoy a book if you take the time to think about how much you're enjoying it, getting out of it, learning from it and the impression it's made on you. Oh, you can think about it and how much you like it, but in the back of your mind you're gradually counting down to the end.

It gets worse; after you've read that title that blows away all other options you spend the rest of your time trying to find something better. It's a vicious cycle.

#3

Here's a great example: I'm a huge Jane Austen fan. I absolutely love "Sense and Sensibility." Unfortunately, my love of all things Jane Austen does not automatically offshoots and topical related Jane Austen novels any good. I was recently reading "Austenland," a contemporary novel about a New York City writer, of course, lands a trip to a Pride and Prejudice inspired reality vacation. I made the mistake of reading 100 pages more than I should of, trying to trick myself since it's only a 200 page book. Alas, I finally gave up, being bored to death by generic clichés, an obvious story line and a wannabe Carrie Bradshaw. The thing that makes me the most frustrated is that I wasted minutes, hours of my life reading crap that will have no lasting impression. Ugh.

To counter this semi-negative essay I will include some of my favorite titles on the sidebar to the right.

Reading and Vocabulary

This month's cover story in American Libraries, "It's All about Books -- Not!," deals with the ever popular issue of teens and reading.

I think this is an interesting topic to discuss since it addresses the shift in teen reading behavior. I think it's good that the National Endowment for the Arts is going to study teen reading specifically. Although the adult report's definition of reading was a little bit stingy, it was very interesting. The area that I have trouble with is when the article includes reading text messages as a form of reading.

Let's be realistic. Text messaging is a quick form of communication comprised primarily of acronyms and gossip. I don't really see how texting, instant messaging and other like formats should really qualify as a shift in teen reading behavior. I understand that it's really popular and highly used, but how does that play into education and learning? It has been proven time and time again that the more a person reads the larger their vocabulary is and the better they do in school.

While the library can use these tools to get in touch with teens, schools and libraries still need to promote the concept of reading. And by reading I mean physical books, with words printed on the page. I doubt that teenagers are using complex words, spell check, or a thesaurus in their text messages to each other.

In this fast-paced world being able to sit still and read a book for fun is not often looked upon as important. Like I stated before, the effects of reading, especially classic literature has a huge effect on vocabulary development and comprehension.

One of the more prestigious Police Departments I applied for, uses as its first elimination step a reading and vocabulary exam. 1100 people took the exam with me and only 100 people made it onto the next step. I owe my high test score almost exclusively to the extra-curricular reading I did during high school and college. People might be surprised that fields like law enforcement require knowledge of reading comprehension and spelling, but it shows that these are the basic skills that everyone needs to be successful in this world. What's more embarrassing than having a police report, which is an legal document, full of errors and inaccuracies when it's read in a court room? Enough said.

Observations...

I would like to recount my trip to our local public library last night. The trip was an impromtu quasi-observation session so I could pick up my holds that were about to be sent back the next morning. Ironically, it turned out to be one of the best customer service experiences I've had.


Obersvations: Children

I took my lovely eight month old son with me. Did I mention he can stand and crawl like the speed of light. Always take the stoller inside with you, otherwise you will spend the entirety of the trip reshelving books that he has pulled out. Once they can stand, they can pretty much get at anything. While I did manage to grab a few books between reshelving books, chasing him down the stacks before someone stepped on him, and trying to hold onto him, checking out with an baby in your arms is very difficult. After I got all my books up by the self check out, I realized I didn't have my library card. So, I picked him up while trying to hold the stack in my other hand and proceeded to wait in line at the service check out.

Well, smart me had just renewed my overdue Knitting dvd's yesterday. Now the previous "overdue" items had $10.00 in fines, plus the three previous dollars that I liked to leave on my account for good measure. Needless to say, I only had two dollars on me. Long story short, the desk lady was super super nice, saw that I was struggling and knocked $5.00 off of my account, so I could check out my items with getting them sent back or going home to get more money. Uhhh, I felt embarrassed and extremely unorganized, but now I think I get that whole working, tired mom thing.

REFERENCE

After doing the reading for the previous weeks and seeing that reference desks were renaming themselves and restructuring the design of the desks, I was curious to really look and see what my public library's reference area looked like.

Now, this is not a branch library. It is a public library in a new, Craftsman style building that serves a growing community of 10,000.

I was surprised to see that the sign, hanging from the ceiling above the librarians desk said "INFORMATION." Another nearby sign stated, " Homework Help, Reference, Readers Advisory" and three other services that I can't remember off hand. My point is that I liked that the secondary sign made it clear exactly what the librarian can help with. This sign is also very visible and it lets patrons know that the librarian is there for things besides just findingbooks.

The "REFERENCE" sign actually hung over the reference collection, which sits directly in front of the Information desk. My only complaint with the system is that the information desk is sort of hidden behind the reference collection. Granted the reference collection isn't on overly tall shelves, but the desk does tend to be hidden from three sides. Fortunately, the library has very good directional signs hanging from the ceiling.

To Refer or Not Refer Good Books

We when talk about reference, readers advisory and how to answer patrons questions, I can't help but be a little confused and almost disappointed at the passivist and impartial stance we are expected to take towards patron inquiries. This acquiescent, progressive attitude has been plaguing me since I started this program last fall. Why can't I, a somewhat educated person, who has been trained in the art of library science, use my best judgement and people reading skills and say "Yes, this book is better than that book."

I am constantly reminded of David Isaacson's controversial opinion article in the December issue of American Libraries, "Don't Just Read -- Read Good Books". Isaacson, a retired librarian, takes the stance and is bold enough to say "that some books aren't worth reading at all and don't belong even in the most "balanced" collections." Now, out of context that statement sounds a little harsh, and I think that's what spurned the negative criticism. On the other side, I am sick of being taught to think for myself, develop an opion, be able to back it up and then keep quiet when someone is asking for help.

What is the difference between deciding which materials to include in a collection and which books to suggest to a patron to read? During the collection development process isn't the goal to include the best materials for the library?

Why is it okay, or "normal" for a public library to be stocked with copies of the New York Times best sellers, but I want to borrow a copy of Tom Sawyer, Tess of the D'Urbervilles and Anna Karenina and I have to wait a week because there is only one copy of each and "classics" are only kept in the basement stacks at the central library? Where have we gone wrong?

I agree with Isaacson and I also am not trying to be elitist, however; is it wrong to want to make people aware of their full potential, to challenge their intellect? Clearly, this type of opportunity is not an option for every patron. Yet, somewhere along the lines a person will come in who is welcome to new discoveries, suggestions and yes, an opinion from a professional who is there to give it. People are intimidated by what they do know. Sometimes, all they need is a little encouragement, especially for material like the classics, that patrons associate with English class and too hard to read.

Again, it seems like this profession that is so worried about the future, technology and moving foward, is scared of the idea that the past has something to offer. From the time I was in eighth to tenth grade I read 23 Danielle Steel books. After that 23rd book and 23rd tall, beautiful woman with an aquiline nose and blonde hair in a low chignon at the nape of the neck, I had an awakening, an epiphany. What was the point in reading another Danielle Steel novel? Absolutely nothing because I already knew the ending, the middle and the beginning. I could have been satisfied and continued reading aboout 23 more blonde beauties and help Ms. Steel's statistics, but instead I challenged myself and am now open to many other types of literature.

Overall, I think that most library professionals have this sort of motto and want to help patrons find what they are looking for. Fortunately, Isaacson has the guts to say what others do not and realizes that impartiality is not always the most beneficial choice.


Heidi

P.S.
Here is the link to the article for UW students.

http://ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/login?url=http://proquest.umi.com.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/pqdweb?did=1270899121&sid=1&Fmt=6&clientId=3751&RQT=309&VName=PQD

Shakespeare and Subtlety

In honor of the Shakespeare activity in the Reference Discoveries to Share #1, I picked a classic Shakespeare quote for this week.

I thought it was ironic that as I was reading through that activity my iBook happened to be propped up by my priceless copy of "The Riverside Shakespeare." While Shakespeare is extremely well known for his tragedies like "Romeo and Juliet," "Hamlet" and "Othello" or, comedies like "A Midsummer's Night Dream" and "As You Like It" we must not forget the historical and social implications Shakespeare wove into his work. "Henry V" is a war history. While I'm not going to comment on the current war because what does the average American really know about the inner workings of the military and the U.S. government? I will say that there is relevance in histories, epics and literature written hundreds of years ago. Sometimes we get too caught up in technology, the future and what is to come. There's nothing that new in the world today that separates us from what was and what will be.

That is why I have a bookshelf, filled with books, sitting behind me and not a Sony pagereader sitting on my desk. At a moments hankering I can pull out my warn copy of "The English Patient" and have an impromtu reading. There is something pure and timeless about rifling through a book, looking for the answers, seeing words on the printed page, being able to physically touch the page. So, I think it's funny that the two reference classes I've been in so far, have focused almost exclusively on the internet for reference sources...

Can anyone answer this pop-culture question with/without using the internet..." In what 1997 Award Winning movie is the first line of this passage from Shakespeare quoted?

My Name Is....

Hello. My name is Heidi and this is my blog. ReferSpective is a forum for all things library and reference related. The opportunities are endless. My tentative plan for this blog is to choose a topic or controversial subject each week and write a little essay about it. Discussion and/or comments are welcome and encouraged. I have a lot to say and I'm sure each of you do too.

I may also bring in some guest librarians, from different types of libraries and get their perspective and outlook on reference.

I will also include some random things in the sidebars such as the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) Word of the Week, a Quote of the Week, favorite sites and other oddities. Remember these are the things that make librarians who they are.

Thank you for stopping by, feel free to make comments etc.

Heidi