On Fri, 25 May 2012, Karen Coyle wrote:
> ... the public library should be a source of joy, curiosity, and other
> human emotions that can be associated with the brain.
Or with distracting the brain. A Republican I was talking with yesterday
agreed with me on the dangers of encouraging ubiquitous interest in
"entertainment" (we were specifically thinking about smart phones, "social
media" and triviality as utterly distracting from thought). Watch what
happens: surely this will become a rationale for funding "public"
libraries that promote their "entertainment" value to a greater extent
than "academic" or "dull" informational libraries.
> I want libraries to be fun -- if they aren't, we might as well close
> them.
Whaaaaat? Our society would be better off if libraries encouraged people
to have fun with serious thinking instead of trying to "escape."
PS: It's a bummer (and an effort), but we really have to be careful about
how speech *may* be interpreted. I like to picture being able to give a
high school class in thinking an exercise in listing all the possible
meanings any particular political speech may have, and all the possible
related motivations and/or consequences.
> I also want people to associate reading and thinking and wondering about
> things to be fun.
Whew! But that (especially critical thinking) has to be the dominant
paradigm, not an after-thought.
> If a book cover entices a person to read a book, so much the better.
Except that such enticement only applies to certain types of
"entertaining" books, or makes it necessary to be frivolous with serious
topics (e.g. politics) to attract readers. In other words, it only
justifies "enticement" (emotional manipulation) itself.
> But giving only dry facts, like the number of pages, is hardly the way
> to promote reading.
The type of reading we (librarians, not dust jackets or collations) need
to promote is that which competes with and deconstructs manipulative and
intentionally misdirecting influences people face just about everywhere
(e.g. the media, politics and other sales-pitches). In fact, let's just
say, while it is still ever increasingly necessary, that we're here to
alleviate distortion, not further promote manipulation by example.
> Blurbs, reviews, recommendations... all of these help people discover
> new things to read.
Or mislead them into reading things that are not good for their brains.
Remember the anti-drug adds on TV that showed an egg frying as a metaphor?
"This is your brain on emotional manipulation."
> If the covers didn't serve this function, believe me, publishing houses
> wouldn't bother with them.
You betcha!
> And, BTW, in the typical public library today around 30% of circulation
> is non-print, mostly DVDs. I can guarantee you that they aren't all PBS
> documentaries.
Don't you think that's unfortunate? :)
It's interesting to note that PBS has had to prostitute itself somewhat
to stay afloat (due to the efforts of the vampire robots to eliminate
public funding), but as Jim said (in other words), we should not do the
same.
There's always talk about making libraries "more fun" to attract patrons
(to justify funding?). Imagine what the vampire robots would *try* to do
to our funding if we tried to make critical thinking "fun" to get people
to visit us? Same thing they are trying to do to education itself, for the
same reason. We should be thinking about what to do about that. Seriously!
Get outraged!
Consider this: Would anyone (other than the vampire robots) consider it a
conflict of interest to place donation boxes for PBS contributions in
library lobbies? Does fear of retribution (again) come in to the concept?
I'm just askin' ...
Cheers!
jgm
John G. Marr
Cataloger
CDS, UL
Univ. of New Mexico
Albuquerque, NM 87131
jmarr_at_unm.edu
jmarr_at_flash.net
**There are only 2 kinds of thinking: "out of the box" and "outside
the box."
Opinions belong exclusively to the individuals expressing them, but
sharing is permitted.
Received on Fri May 25 2012 - 16:00:25 EDT