Along with a bout of insomnia, serendipity strikes! Scanning through ourmedia.org reminds me of how much I love the internet. I love the way technology allows us to respond to the world in so many creative, interesting ways. With the right amount of patience, skill, and source files, you can get world leaders to see the world your way. And there’s something truly beautiful about that.
“I’ve been a librarian for ten years and I have to tell you, I feel like a fraud. I don’t really know where to start when it comes to figuring out whether a site is believeable or not.”
Wikipedia. The word that makes many librarians (and teachers and academics) tremble, or snort, or turn up their noses. I’ve been reading a fair bit recently about wikipedia and how we’re supposed to react to it, to think about it: there’s the Wikipedia Lesson Plan for grade school classrooms, which, while interesting, seems designed to underscore that the Wikipedia is essentially untrustable and of poor quality as a source of information; there’s the sad mewling at the Chronicle of Higher Education forums, where one academic says,
Having found a fairly serious problem on Wikipedia, I contacted the owners of the site. They were less interested in the problem than I was (they were violating copyright) and one of them argued with me about it. I don’t know what they did about it, but their attitude convinced me that these sites are not vetted carefully and while they might provide some useful information, they are not academic and should not be given even the slightest nod by academics. We could be sending our students into some dangerous waters.
The basic principle I glean from my library school education and from all of the discussions around Wikipedia is this: for a source to be creditable, we want it to pass through the hands of a third party, for-profit company. That is, essentially, the mark of success according to the old rules. Sure, we say we’re looking for peer-review, and most of the time that’s true, but it’s not always true. Do reference works pass through peer review? Not really. They are collected by an editor, but they don’t need to be peer reviewed the way an article does. Or the way a monograph does. I’m fairly sure the Oxford English Dictionary didn’t go out to 3 un-named reviewers before it releases updates. Many of these sources are simply prepared or written by people of some repute, people that other educated people respect. Sources that have been published by one of the Old Boys are waters free from danger, right?
Not to say that there isn’t some validity to the old rules. Having to pass through to a third-party publisher means that at least one other person has read over this work of yours and find it worthy. That vetting process is very important to academics; while so many seem to prize the ancient practice of thinking and writing alone and uninterrupted, they prefer the results of that work to pass through the hands of others. Communal acceptance is one way to divine truth, and since communal acceptance finds its hallmark in publication by one of the Old Boys, that’s one way to provide validation. That’s one way to sort out the truth without engaging with the subject matter.
I understand the fear a lot of people have around Wikipedia, I do; in principle, it’s chaos. Everyone can edit these webpages, and no one is entirely sure who did what. Anonymously imparted information sits there on the page alongside information provided by a known quantity. We can’t tell who has a phd and who doesn’t. We can’t tell who has published books on this subject and who is a construction worker by day and a Pliny fan by night. In the traditional world we want to draw big lines between those people and be able to have a mental picture of the author before we read the work. We want to know if the University of Smart Folks has endorsed this person or not. We want to see the Mensa membership cards before we decide whether or not what you say has value.
Because here’s the problem: while people are upset that Wikipedia isn’t authoritative enough and is likely to contain errors, we largely ignore the fact that the sources we hold so dear, the ones published by the Old Boys , vetted by all the right people, are filled with errors too. Encyclopedia Britannica was proved wrong by a 12-year old boy. There are reportedly numerous errors in the new Dictionary of National Biography. We don’t trust Wikipedia because there might be errors in it, but we have no problem referring patrons to these stalwart pillars of the community, errors and all.
There is a growing disconnect between the traditional conceptions of knowledge we inherited from the Enlightenment and our current understanding of valuable information. As David Weinberger so gracefully points out in his talk to the Library of Congress, Everything is Miscellaneous, the difference between the Encyclopedia Britanica and the Wikipedia is that that one is theirs and this one is ours. And librarians don’t trust ours. There are too many of the unwashed among us. We can’t account for them all.
The ironic thing is that the Wikipedia is the best example we have of pure peer review. There is nothing posted on the Wikipedia that is not vetted by a cast of thousands, including lots of accredited Smart Peopleâ„¢. Writing in the Wikipedia is like writing an article at a conference, with the document itself open and projected on the wall, and everyone in the room shouting out responses as you type, grabbing the keyboard from you, arguing about your facts and interpretations. The errors found in the DNC and Britannica would have been corrected rather than reported had they been wikis rather than paper publications. The problem with Wikipedia is that we don’t trust everyone.
The advantage of the traditional, print reference materials we work with is that we’re used to working with them. We know that they were produced by intelligent, qualified people who may sometimes make mistakes or overlook something or may not be able to remember every single little factoid. They are few and human, after all. But they are humans who have passed through the refining process of graduate school, of the interview and hiring process, the tenure system, and then, finally, through the final sieve of the peer-reviewed print publication process. We rely on all of those steps to create authority for us. We don’t want to look at a source and see if what its saying is reasonable, we don’t want to have to judge a source on what it actually contains. We want to judge this book by its cover. That’s our comfort zone.
But we need to move beyond that. We’re not living in a positivist state anymore. We can’t be objective, we can’t efface ourselves from the catalogues we produce or the reference advice we dispense. We can’t be the 19th century matrons who tell people what’s good for them and keep the stuff that will rot their brains out of the library. We just have to give people the tools to think critically, to ask questions of the sources we help them find. And if we do it right, we help produce the paradigm shifters, the ones who question even the people with millions of publications, with a research chair at Big Whoop Dee Doo University, and a sizzling article in Very Expensive Quarterly. And in spite of all our fetishes around academic publications and citations, that’s’ exactly what we want.
I spent today in Toronto, getting in some quality time with my favourite Torontonians in an outrageously overpriced tea house. The price tag, however, was justified by the fact that we were permitted to spend a ridiculous amount of time hanging out in the comfort of their establishment, hashing out everything from grad school to the future of instructional technology. I was able to show off my incredibly ability to drink two entire pots of tea in one sitting to boot.
I walked back to the bus station through a stunningly beautiful Toronto summer day. And on the way there I saw a policeman on horseback.
I’m used to seeing police on horses. They clop around Queen’s Park all the time, and Queen’s Park is right in the middle of the U of T campus. I used to walk through Queen’s park every day. And nearly every day I saw police on horseback.
Since he was right in front of Union Station at the time, this particular policeman on horseback was getting a lot of attention. All the tourist eyes were on him and his noble steed; the tourists pulled out their cameras, they pointed, their children trotted along beside the horse. No one said anything, but you could very nearly hear them thinking it: wow, look at that! A horse! On a city street! How quaint!
As I say, I’ve seen policemen on horses before, but this time, after an afternoon spent throwing around many and varied ideas about technology, teaching, and learning, I looked at this fellow and his horse a little differently. Here we have a society with a preferred mode of transportation: the automobile. We have built out cities to accommodate them. We build houses with a special added room our automobile can drive right into for the night. There are painted parking spaces on the streets, sized just so, because automobiles are expected to be a certain size, and that size can be predicted. The size of the car is one of the standard measurements of our lives, built into our consciousness at this point.
This is where we can so clearly see how good technology works, how good thinking about technology can lead to impressive results. While one technology may take over, become the standard, the obvious and the unthinkably necessary, the validity and usefulness of older technologies remains. Because there is a standard size for automobiles and because a congested city spawns traffic jams, a horse, which is not the standard size, can evade traffic. The problem presented to the standard technology is no problem at all to a older technology. The fact that one standard took over the transportation business means using a older standard gives police an edge.
In an environment where the latest thing is usually considered the best and only thing, sometimes an older technology can add something we didn’t think possible. Just a nugget of thought on a Saturday.
Via my curmudgeony friend Jeremy: Bloggers need not apply: how job seekers with blogs eliminate themselves from contention by keeping a weblog.
Job seekers who are also bloggers may have a tough road ahead, if our committee’s experience is any indication.
You may think your blog is a harmless outlet. You may use the faulty logic of the blogger, “Oh, no one will see it anyway.” Don’t count on it. Even if you take your blog offline while job applications are active, Google and other search engines store cached data of their prior contents. So that cranky rant might still turn up.
The content of the blog may be less worrisome than the fact of the blog itself. Several committee members expressed concern that a blogger who joined our staff might air departmental dirty laundry (real or imagined) on the cyber clothesline for the world to see. Past good behavior is no guarantee against future lapses of professional decorum.
I have two opinions about this article. On one hand, I am cringing at the behaviour of some of the blogging candidates the author mentions. These people appear to be keeping named, public blogs wherein they talk about things as if the search committee (or their students, parents, and exes) will never see it. This is one of the issues I wish bloggers would be more conscious about; there is no hiding on the internet, there is no difference between a formal conversation and kitchen table banter on the internet. This isn’t a matter of “dance as if nobody was watching”. Dance as if the world’s eyes are on you.
However, the author of this opinion piece is expressing more about the toxic environment of his own department than he is about any of the bloggers he interviewed. One of the bloggers he nixed has a phd in the humanities, but also has a passion for computer hardware and software. Rather than be pleased about this well-rounded candidate who would be a valuable addition and support in the areas of personal computing and instructional technology, this department chose to see his technological hobby as threatening. The “technogeek” is not a true academic, because he has other interests beyond his (apparently solid) research. The ideal candidate for this department is one who will not even potentially share interests with any other department in the university. Note to applicants: while you may have other interests, it’s best to keep those a secret. While interdisciplinarity is interesting in principle, in general it’s best not to rock the boat and do anything vaguely different. Additionally, while universities are heading in a technological direction for teaching and learning, those who abhor computers and prefer a pencil and paper for communication are preferred.
The author of this article is also seriously concerned that the bloggers are using this self-publishing platform to air opinions about current events. This, also, is apparently a bad idea. While every academic search committee must know that people with phds are prone to thinking, arguing, and expressing their views, this committee apparently prefers to imagine that each candidate has no opinions; at least, none that anyone will ever find out about. A blank slate candidate is better than a known quantity, apparently. This part of the article begs the question: what’s the point of academics in society? In the grand scheme of things, aren’t the learned supposed to be guiding society, presenting views, correcting misinformation in the mass media and in our culture in general, and adding to the collective knowledge and understanding of a society? Apparently, when it comes to getting a job, it would be best if candidates appear meek, mild, and without opinions, ready to be inoffensive to everyone she meets. Again, I realize full well that there are inappropriate rants that get published on blogs, and I’m the first to cringe at them and work on writing up the blogging policy, but doesn’t it seems odd to disqualify a candidate because s/he is prepared to express opinions in any forum? It would be nice if the concept of academic freedom actually meant that academics generally respected and supported the idea of free thought and expression for everyone, but apparently this doesn’t work everywhere.
Finally, the author notes that merely having a blog is a negative for a candidate, because his department is concerned that such a public individual would air dirty laundry. If anything is revealing about the author’s department, this is. Rather than be afraid of an outspoken new hire, wouldn’t it be best to actually clean that dirty laundry? Make the department one that no one would want to air dirty laundry about? Re-invent it as a positive, non-toxic place to work?
I’m glad these blogging candidates didn’t get the job in the department described in this article. It seems to me that they (any of them) could do better.
Moments like the ones we endured this morning, watching the tragedy of the London transit bombings, remind me over and over of the power of the internet. These moments of crisis act as a kind of case in point in the argument between the mainstream media and the forms of media developing online. I remember in the days following September 11th, 2001 that articles were appearing announcing that the internet failed us in the crisis; major news sites were bombarded and being dragged down into uselessly slow loading; while the internet was supposed to be rapid-fire, it wasn’t providing the news fast enough for its hungry audience. Live television, with it’s ability to quickly interrupt itself with the latest news, was faster at getting the news out. There was an air of “I told you so” about the articles, a sort of finger-waggling, reminding us that we still need the wire stories and our tvs. I read these articles and shook my head in disbelief. These people accusing the internet of failure were not looking for information in the right places. The internet did not fail us on 9/11, and it didn’t fail us this time, either.
The mainstream media cannot do what the internet does; it can’t connect us to each other. On the morning of September 11th, 2001, I was getting my reports from a friend of mine living in Manhattan, feverishly taking pictures from her rooftop and sending them to me, and waiting for her daughter appear on the street below, her shoes covered in ash. I called her friends in Toronto for her to let them know that she was okay, because the phone lines were down, but her broadband internet connection was still working. She could talk to me, and a whole slew of us who had gathered together in a multi-user synchronous space, but not anyone who was offline. While the anchors on my tv were scanning the latest news release, I was hearing the same information from my earphones, as live streaming radio from the US and from the people in the same virtual room as me, living the events as they occured. I was following this thread (warning: slow loading, as it is a huge, fascinating page) on metafilter, which is a moment by moment group blog detailing each excruciating detail, partly by people at the site itself, in and around New York City, and partly by those around the world watching and listening to the news. Mainstream media can show me the official video and hand me the official stories, but they can’t be hundreds of people on the scene, reporting directly back to me. They can’t be my friends, and I don’t feel for the mainstream media what I felt about the people there that I knew and loved.
Today was a bit different, but not that much; I started my day by hearing the story on the radio and being completely without an internet connection. I felt helpless, my hands tied. I didn’t know what was going on, I was blind and deaf because I didn’t have my contacts at my fingertips. I got into work early and checked on my friends. Someone created a group blogdedicated to check-ins from Londoners; people were desperately logging on, trying to find out if their friends were okay. The phone lines might have been down, but if you were online and had a blog, you could contact your friends and family and fill them in on what’s going on. The comments to these blog posts are filled with comfort, concern, and offers of help.
I talked to a couple of Londoners over YM and AIM; they told me about their empty offices, the long walk home, the eerie calm. We listened to radio streams together, and a friend of mine corrected some misinformation in the cbc radio broadcast. (“It’s not a tourist bus, it’s just a regular one.”) As was the case four years ago, a metafilter thread stands as a historical record of information as it appeared.
When it comes to big events, big tragedies, the internet has not failed us. Expecting the internet to act as if it’s just another version of the mainstream media is setting it up for failure. When it comes to connecting us to each other in ways we were never able to connect before, the internet has provided us with a whole new view of world events. By connecting us with each other, the internet brings the news so close to our hearts it hurts.
I’ve written previously about rethinking traditional reference in academic librarianship, and I suggested it was time for a complete radicalization of our notions of reference. We can’t stand behind the desk anymore; increasingly, no one is turning to us there. Reference stats at university libraries are universally down. This is one of the hardest things for reference librarians to swallow; there is so much knowledge and experience sitting there behind those desks, and no one is stopping to appreciate it. Reference librarians are like those last few literate monks watching the barbarians sack Rome and proceed to build up a culture that didn’t have a place about all those manuscripts, all that learning, the medicine, the theory, the literature. I imagine them in their little libraries, clutching the books and gazing over the hoards, all naked and dancing in the firelight, none of them literate, none of them encouraging their children to read. Nothing I can do will make you care about these things, they must have thought, with that sinking feeling that no one would care for a long, long time.
But it doesn’t need to be this way, of course. In fact, there hasn’t really been a golden age for librarians yet. Our stronghold as keepers of information has been built entirely on the complexity of the thing; we were the only ones who knew how to find anything, of course everyone was reliant on us. But we don’t live in a world where someone types your memos for you, answers your phone, does your photocopying. What we’re facing is an increasingly information literate world; or at least, one that believes itself more information literate. People have empowering tools at their disposal and our libraries are rarely closed-stack anymore. We are no longer the gatekeepers of knowledge; the world may freely wander in and pick and choose from our wares.
So what are some alternatives? There is something very safe and important about the reference desk itself; when you walk into the Gap, you want to know that if you need something, you can go and find someone who will help you. You want to know not just that people are there, but where you’re likely to find them. Unless we’re going to start littering the stacks with staff wearing happy “I work here” buttons, we’re probably going to need one central place where people can go for help.
But that’s at the peak of frustration. Our system is set up so that you can get help after you’ve basically gone through dozens of research steps on your own and found nothing helpful. You need to completely frustrate yourself into a frenzy before you turn for help. We have set up a system where students need to reach a boiling point before we know the water’s on.
So how do we fix this? There are some practical and creative ideas floating around, not all of them tried and tested. But breaking out of the box of both reference and library instruction is difficult, so all new ideas add more fuel to this fire.
Wandering reference. Wireless, handheld devices are getting more and more ubiquitous; what if we send reference librarians out in the wilds (so to speak), equipped with digital equipment to connect them with the resources they need to properly answer questions. I’ve never been entirely sold on this idea. As I said, how are students going to find one of these people if they needed help? But let’s assume that we have limitless staff and someone is already camped out on the reference desk to take the triage. I’ve wandered around libraries enough to have seen that look in students’ eyes, that look that says, I think maybe you can help me, but I’m not sure I want to interrupt you right now and my question is probably too lowly and dumb for you to waste your time on. This kind of service takes a particular kind of personality; wander around and see who appears to need you, and make sure they understand that you’re approachable and no question is a stupid question. This method catches students who are trying to get work done, but are starting to move toward the boiling point. There’s a question there just lurking under the surface, not quite daring to pop out.
But I think this idea has potential not actually because of the mobility of the reference librarian, but because of the concept of connecting a single reference librarian digitally to her resources. What are the #1 top resources in an academic library? Why, the staff, of course. Ages ago, Ann Althouse hit the nail on the head about the possibilities of putting real life people in direct connection with things digital while out in public. If one person is asked a question, why shouldn’t the answer come from a chorus?
What’s wrong with students pooling their expertise on the fly? The student doing the speaking is not rendered passive. He or she will still have to read the messages quickly and integrate them with existing knowledge. It could be lively and energizing. The students who aren’t chosen to speak will have some way to express themselves, which might help them listen to the student who is speaking, and a spirit of community and collaboration might take hold.
Here Prof. Althouse is talking about allowing students to help each other when there is a single speaker asked to engage in Socratic dialogue; why shouldn’t we pool our resources for librarians the same way? Imagine the power of that reference librarian; wandering in the wilds of the stacks, the student lounges, the residences, various study spaces. Seeking out the information needy and providing for them in computer labs. Cafeterias. And all along a crack team of expert subject librarians is at her beck and call, prepared to find an answer, make a suggestion, point out new resources. Print out an article to the nearest network printer on campus to spread the joy around even outside the walls of the library.
Is that radical? Well, it’s mobile, at least.
Virtual Reference is both out there in a new location, but also very traditional. Have a question? Ask us. The problem with virtual reference (well, one of the problems) is that the idea that the reference desk is in the library is translated onto the web; virtual reference links are always sitting exclusively on the library website, and often buried a few links in. Why not offer virtual reference links as a service to other units in the university? Put them on course pages. Attach the link to assignments and tutorials. Fight for a link on residence web pages. Pick an IM client and install it on the lab computers. Sink the link within the catalogue itself; rather than just getting a “no records found” message, why not also link to v-ref as a life raft?
Course Management Software is sneaking into more and more classrooms at universities. These systems are all different and contain many different modules, but most of them contain something like message boards and live chats. Eventually they will doubtless also contain blogging systems and wikis. If students are discussing their essay topics or doing collaborative coursework online, why not provide immediate assistance where it’s needed, where it’s going on? Librarians are used to waltzing into the classroom to bring resources to students; why not start waltzing into the courseware? Answer those questions as they’re forming rather than as they’re exploding.
Since courseware is still in its infancy, lobby the big boys of CMS to write librarians into the system as administrators. Give us our own usernames, let us scan through the messageboards, wikis, blogs, and assignments and offer help where we can. Let us connect directly with students where they need us, not just when they hit the wall of despair. Let subject librarians provide the same level of assistance to undergrads as they do to grad students and faculty. Let librarians sit in the corner of the CMS, ready to speak up when someone needs something and doesn’t know where to find it, or that it exists at all. Where students express their concerns, their hopes, their topics, let the librarians in to comment and help. Link to databases, talk up print resources. Be a resource, a named face, another helpful hand in the great big faceless university.
Librarians have so much more to offer the academic community than most people seem to realize. The more we get out from behind the desk, the more radical reference service we provide, the more people will come to realize it.