The American library consultant overseas

Abstract

What is a library? In many parts of the world to which American library consultants have gone, the idea of a library is limited. A library is a collection of old manuscripts and books, rare and valuable. It is not for use by anyone except the most respected scholars. It is not related to a curriculum. It is not related to daily life. In such a library it is natural and justifiable policy to keep everything under lock and key. There is no need for a circulation system. There is no need for general reference services. Of course, there are no open shelves. And although we tend to ignore the fact, American libraries of rare books and manuscripts are operated under very much the same policies. In contrast to this idea of a library, one of my scientist colleagues at the University of Minnesota complains that libraries and librarians are so obsessed with the urgency of safekeeping of treasures-with the principle of preservation-that he finds the information services he needs unavailable. His chief needs are for immediate access to minute pieces of data in current journals in his special field of science. He regards the indexing in the modern library as very ineffective, indeed, almost useless, for his purposes. He hopes that the new techniques of mechanization and information retrieval will revolutionize libraries and provide the services he needs. (Perhaps I should add that his view of what a Library is does not include the opposite, extreme idea of a library as a collection of old and valuable books and manuscripts.) As library educators we must accept both of these answers to the question : What is a library? Our notion of a library must embrace both extremes, and also every kind of library collection and service that falls between them. Library educators are challenged to prepare librarians with a wide variety of skills and knowledges to work in today’s libraries. Nearly 400 Americans have been confronted with this problem in Asia. Up to 1967 there had been 550 assignments of American library consultants to Asian countries. Some of these were for short visits, and a