The Continuing Debate Over Academic Branch Libraries

Abstract

ver the past century, librarians have debated the organization of the academic library. Two distinct schools have developed, each advancing logical and persuasive arguments. The debate concerns one vigorously contested issue: Should the academic library be centralized in one main building or should it be decentralized into several branches based on differing divisional schemes? For the purposes of this paper, the terms departmental and branch library will be used interchangeably. Both sides of the debate will be examined and some views for future developments presented. The literature distinguishes three types of branch libraries. First, there is the professional library, such as a law or medicine library. In general, few librarians believe that these distinctively specialized libraries should be incorporated into the main library. The second type of library is the undergraduate library, which is separated from the main branch because of the nature of its clientele. Many professionals believe that the undergraduate library should provide a multitude of services that cannot be offered in a modern research library. Finally, there is the departmental library, a library established to serve a university academic department. This type of library fuels continuous debate and will be the major focus of this paper. The concept of the distinctive departmental library separate from the main library building grew out of the seminar movement in late nineteenth-century Germany. German faculty members found it preferable to use their own co1lections of books in their graduate seminars rather than rely on the resources of the existing, but antiquated, library system. Their books were usually more up to date and were kept in the faculty members' offices for easier access. Charles Kendall Adams first introduced this European concept in the United States when he used it in his English constitutional history class at the University of Michigan. From this beginning, the practice of using a private collection to teach a seminar led to the development of the departmental library. The reasons for the early acceptance of departmental libraries are many and varied. Louis T. Ibbotson observed that the departmental library started as a protest. In the late nineteenth century, American education was at a critical juncture. Education had greatly expanded, and