Communicate Better: Librarians on Librarians via The New York Times

I talk at length about how bad we, as a profession are at communicating with the general pubic. I have a longer, more general post about that here. But I also have a tag for "communicate better" because whenever there is a big library issue, we DO NOT GET AHEAD OF IT and that hurts us.

And as we are currently celebrating Banned Books Week, it is important for us to be loud and proud about our profession, how hard we work, and how much of our job is NOT what the world thinks it is. 

But we don't do it on our own. Not enough. However, recently, The New York Times has been trying to helps be more loud and proud. I first noted this in May with their article explaining how a book get son library shelves and why your book might not be there due to the B&T collapse.

Then in June, there were reporters from the New York Times and a photographer roaming around the ALA Annual exhibit hall asking librarians to talk to them. The resulting article was recently published and people are taking notice!

Librarians on Librarians was reported by and compiled from interviews at ALA Annual in Chicago this past June by Elisabeth Egan and John Maher with photographs by Lyndon French. 

I have provided a gift link for you to read this article. You can read it for free but you will need to provide your email to access it. But here is the introduction:

This year, Americans are marking the 250th anniversary of the country’s founding. The nation’s librarians are celebrating a milestone too: the 150th birthday of the modern American library. 

A lot has changed since the American Library Association was established in 1876 — even just over the past decade. The library has gone from a building full of books to arguably the most versatile civic center in any community lucky enough to have one. 

We spoke with dozens of librarians at the A.L.A. conference this summer in Chicago. They came from rural towns and major cities, elementary schools and universities, local branches and big government agencies. 

These librarians want you to know that they don’t sit around reading all day. They want you to know about book bans and budget cuts, but also about career counseling and crafting groups and pop-up medical clinics. 

They want you to worry, the way they worry, about artificial intelligence, looming legislation and harassment of their staff. But most of all, they want you to know what the library really is: a safe place for people to gather around books, ideas and one another. 

Here’s what librarians had to say, in their own words.

Again, I have provided a gift link for you to read this article.

Yes, you should read this for yourself. Yes, you should find a way to make this available to your patrons. Those two things are obvious.

BUT, I am here to remind you that you should be using the New York Times' example to inspire you to be better about communicating who we are and what we do. Thankfully NYT I making space to speak for us, but you know what would be better? If we more actively advocating for ourselves every single day.

Stop shrinking in the shadows. Get out there and shout from every rooftop about why we are an essential profession and the library is an essential institution to every single American citizen.