The Cynical Librarian

A Return to School...

2009-08-26T12:55:00.000-07:00

Today is the first day of Fall Semester classes at my institution, and the heralded the return of professors needing their LCD projectors activated for their classes and students desperately scrambling about the campus in near futile efforts to arrive at their classes on time. The summer was slow, but today is a stark reminder of the nature of the regular academic session.

I find myself reflecting on the nature of librarianship as we serve as the stewards of the university's knowledge systems. We maintain the very systems that allow for other scholars to conduct their work and we preserve that knowledge once it has been "found." It is a noteworthy shame that so many of our colleagues do not collaborate with us more in the educational endeavors of higher education. We librarians can do much to facilitate student success BESIDES finding books on shelves. We are the stewards of knowledge and as such know the best ways to access it.

As always, the first day back is a busy, but it is a busy that we do not mind as we librarians have returned to what we do best - helping others with their information and knowledge needs. It is far more preferable to being in committee meetings under the weight of university bureaucracy, perhaps one the last vestiges of feudalism in the known world.

Mediocrity and the Road Most Taken

2009-06-10T06:57:00.000-07:00

It occurred to me in the past few months that many institutions of higher learning operate under a culture of mediocrity. Now I am not going to be pointing any fingers, but it is not hard to tell which institutions are included in this general criteria. One may even be the place you are in now...

I came upon this notion after the results of my last annual evaluation, one in which I scored rather high. The fact that I scored high did not result a call for congratulation by the administration, but instead raised a red-flag in that I did score high in the face of the majority that scored average. It was explained to me by my director that if a supervisor turns in an evaluation that exceeds the basic average, the administration frowns and demands written proof of why such an evaluation has been written. Such written proof was provided in the forms of e-mails and unsolicited faculty letters heaping laud on my work.

Later, my director explained the mechanics of the evaluations. She said that administration expected everyone to score average, and score average, you just have to show up to work and just basically do a minimal effort at you job!! Those people that exceed the average must prove why as this in turn makes everyone else look bad.

A culture of mediocrity.... Just what we need for the status quo to remained unchanged and progress to be limited.

The Road to Employment....

2009-01-27T13:18:00.000-08:00

My Director asked today, "Have you read any of the Chronicle?" No, I say. "Well, you need to read this article. It's about why NOT to go to humanities grad school." Her exact words I can't recall, but you get the idea.

So, off I go reading this article. (By the way, you can find it here and it worth every second of your time to read.) I said to myself as I read the article, "This was me like five years ago!" Unbelievable! I was a star-struck grad student working on my masters in history with great aspirations of getting my Ph.D. and becoming a professor. So, when the first go around of applications I sent out came back, it was nearly a unanimous NO, aside from one acceptance with NO FUNDING. I was extremely distraught!

By this time I had secured a full time job with with a state institution (I have been full time temporary for years) and this opened the door to free education. So, I bided my time by going to Archival Science school and waited for the next application season to begin. Ha! I got in another Ph.D. program, but with NO FUNDING!! Some decisions had to be made.

First, I got a whole ton of rental information mailed to me about where I was potentially going to live. Not good - way expensive. In addition, the first realization that I would NEVER find a job entered my mind. "What if I spend like 50 to 75 thousand for a degree and never get a job in like 10 years?" Something was wrong with that equation. Lucky for me, I had a Plan B.

Plan B was library science school. I had been working in a library for years at this point and applied to library school on a whim. I got in! I called them and ask if I could defer my admission one year and they said yes! Well, that year was up and I needed to get in, so I went to library school. Librarianship was my second career choice, but it was almost a certain bet that I would get a job upon graduation....within six months of graduation anway. (Took me three, actually.)

So, here I am, the cynical librarian that you see before you now! Grad school in the humanities was a course for self-destruction, a collision course with a moon, so to speak, and I was able to divert my flight path in time to avoid oblivion. I still consider myself an historian as much as I do a librarian, though there will never be a time when I will be history professor it seems.

Universities are too much about vocations and not about knowledge and the love of learning anymore, hence the decline of the humanities. I am glad I changed course when I did because being a librarian is a great job...a job with benefits...and not just an adjunct posting.

Higher Education an Entitlement? Ha!

2008-10-16T11:29:00.000-07:00

While watching the presidential debate last night, it occurred to me that both candidates support an education idea that is slowing brining this nation to ruin - the idea that higher education should be available for all. This is total nonsense.

Once, the United States represented the zenith of industrial achievement, both in terms of industrial output and the wealth of knowledge created by skilled labor. Such is not the case any longer as the frivolous idea of everyone being able to go to college has eroded our industrial base. No longer do people want to learn a skilled trade and enter industry - they want their worthless MBAs or accounting degrees. They want their computer science degrees and masters of arts in the humanities. While all these are well and good, if everyone has them, who the hell does the damned work in the industrial sectors? Once, those degrees meant something as a sign of status and elitism, but if everyone has one, that levels the field. No wonder bachelors degrees are viewed as near-worthless documents.

This nation has been transformed from a skilled labor nation to a service nation. Without heavy industry, this nation is doomed, and the idea that everyone can go to college is destroying this nation! The middle-class quest for education is ruining this state! One reason factories are shipped overseas is because people don't want to work there any more! When parents tell their children they are going to college to get an education (more like a vocation) so they don't have to work in the factory like they did, it is no wonder the work ethic of the United States has been brought down!

Higher education is NOT an entitlement. When it is, what will there be left?

Education for All?

2008-09-15T06:58:00.001-07:00

I was reminded of my last letter to the editor last night as I wrote again to the editor of the local newspaper. Back then I was living in Tennessee and I argued for the creation of a state lottery. The lottery was designed to provide higher education access to students that would otherwise not be able to afford it. A lofty dream then when I was a graduate student in history; now, having spent considerable time on the "other side" of the desk as a professor, I see the complete error of that opinion.

Higher education should not be for all. Some people are not cut out to go to university and have no business being there. The results of lottery-financed students are the watering down of education, overcrowding of classrooms, over taxation of already strained teaching faculty, and worst of all, the erosion of the ideals of enlightened thought! Our universities (the ones that are glutted with lottery-financed students) have become breeding grounds for mediocrity!!

Some people were not meant for college...period. Vocational jobs require workers as well and the delusion that someone of substandard ability can achieve in a university classroom is wholly without merit while they could succeed in other, less academically challenging, environments. Call me an elitist if you will, but universities are symbolic of the elite. They have been for millennia!!

I say take lottery money and put it to use in the universities by increasing staff and faculty wages, buying new resources and equipment, and expanding areas of study. The last thing needed are more substandard students clogging the hallowed hallways of learning.

Faculty and Librarian Collaboration?

2008-07-17T12:06:00.000-07:00

The grand failure of librarian/faculty collaboration in my institution has come to fruition at last! Of late, an English instructor has given out an assignment that requires students to cite at least three critical essays about an author's play in their paper. Of four given plays, my library and its extended resources can only provide information on three of them. Student's come to me day in and out seeking information about the one play for which there is no information, save one article. This is my lot...

If only the instructor had bothered to consult with us on the assignment, we could have avoided this dreadful situation. But alas, after years of repeated attempts to gain access to assignments before hand, we still have nothing. Students come to the library seeking information that cannot be provided for assignments that cannot be completed.

We are not sure what the problem is with faculty not wishing to share their assignments with us before they are given out. Is it that it will indicate their ignorance of what is actually available in the library? Perhaps, but it certainly would save them the trouble of having students say that they cannot find enough sources because there is nothing available!

Academic Hiring...

2008-06-30T08:52:00.000-07:00

Last week I had the opportunity to observe the presentations of several candidates that were being interviewed to fill the newly created position of Coordinate of the Writing and Learning Center. Let me tell you about my experiences.

First, in typical academic administrator fashion, the announcement that everyone was welcome to attend the first presentation was made at 10am when the candidate was presenting at 10am. It seemed to me that the admins did not want anyone coming. So, I missed the first person. However, I was able to make the others.

No keep in mind, these people were interviewing to lead a new Learning Commons system and none but ONE actually talked about it! It was quite odd. Finally, the last person seemed to have a vision of what to do, had the desire to do it, and was not only my pick, but also the director's choice.

Ultimately, the search committee picked the first person because she was "doctorally prepared," but had never had a real job outside of being a teaching assistant while in grad school! And she is going to be the Coordinator of the entire Writing and Learning Center?

This proves beyond all doubt that degrees count more than experience in academic settings. Now don't get me wrong - I understand the value of degrees, but experience MUST count for something. Knowing how to apply that degree is also valuable.

What a world...

Truth...

2008-06-18T10:51:00.001-07:00

Truth is a big topic to consider on a blog. LOL! It is a big topic to consider for anything, actually, but the nature of truth has me in its grips again and I feel that I must put something down.

I'm nearly finished with Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance and it has proven to be quite extraordinary. Pirsig's discussions about "quality" seem to have something to do with truth in the universe, but I am not certain what, or even if I'm correct. Quality, as he notes from the Greeks, is excellence in all things, a virtue to strive for beyond the moral, modern implications of virtue. When quality is reached, is it true, or it is in a state of excellence beyond this plane of existence?

While reading about truth yesterday, a sentence a philosophy book jumped out at me. The author notes that "it is obvious that St. Paul's Cathedral is beautiful, and the new Lloyd's building is repulsive; but is there some 'aesthetic reality' that makes these judgments true?" I immediately contemplated the idea that some people may see St. Paul's Cathedral as repulsive and the new Lloyd's building beautiful. Is one more beautiful or repulsive than the other? Pirsig speaks of quality as something that makes things true, that the most ugly things (as perceived by people) that are made with quality are actually beautiful. So, if the cathedral was made sloppily and Lloyd's made carefully, then Lloyd's has quality and is beautiful while the cathedral is without quality and is thus ugly. This is way too much of an oversimplification of concepts far too important to include here, but it is something to think about.

Quality is excellence and the striving for excellence is the striving for things beyond us, but reaching for them makes us better, and thus gives us quality. I've got to put this into action the next time I get to teach a class.

Thinking about Dan Brown's books...

2008-04-22T10:08:00.000-07:00

Having just completed Angels and Demons and The Da Vinci Code, I must now take a moment to reflect on the general themes of both books. I have never read any other Brown book and cannot speak to them, but regarding these two, I have a grasp of their meanings.

Angels and Demons has the basic theme of science versus religion/faith. Such a meaning is not hidden at all and is evident as one reads the book. This debate has been one of the cornerstones of Western thinking since the days of the Enlightenment when the very foundations of the Church were shaken by the re-emergence of scientific rationale. While not nearly as controversial as The Da Vinci Code, Brown brings into question the possibility of whether science can explain the creation of existence in logical terms devoid of religion. This is a hot topic for sure and one that all scholarly people should engage in at least once in their lives.

The Da Vinci Code has a message that is a bit less obvious. Many seem to think the theme is the credibility of the Church regarding nearly two millennium's worth of cover-ups, lies, and deceit. While these are elements of the story, the real theme is facts versus beliefs and power of each to effect human thinking. This is a theme that transcends Brown's adventure-type stories and permeates all of human history. Are beliefs so powerful as to block out obvious facts that contradict beliefs? That is was The Da Vinci Code is about - not about a lie perpetuated by a Church, but what facts, of any kind, can do to beliefs when those facts come to light.

After having read The Da Vinci Code, I formulated this basic philosophy, one that I had always known, but for the first time was able to put into words: The Facts are what they are; the Truth is what you make of it.

Technology as Religion

2008-04-01T19:58:00.000-07:00

I’m reading The Da Vinci Code and it forces me to look back to graduate school when we all sat around and debated religion, faith, and the nature of spirituality. Ah, those were the days! I still ponder these notions today; not doing would besmirch the education and training I received as an historian.

Anyway, while reading Brown’s book, I began to contemplate the role that technology plays in our daily lives as opposed to religion. Which receives more attention? The computer screen you stare at daily or the church, temple, or shrine you visit only a few times per week? Have Intel Duel Core processors supplanted supreme deities and have computer work stations become the new alters? Where do you spend most of your time? Reading the Bible, Koran, or Torah, or reading e-mails?

Historically speaking, religion is the oldest form of technology in human existence, created by a social class determined to control the rest, often by means of fear. Now, the same class of people exists, but they exist as the IT Department in your organization. Interesting isn’t it?

Brown raised many interesting points with his books and sparked controversy to this day, especially concerning the possibility that an entire religion is founded on false principles. He asks the reader if it is worth it to expose such frauds for the sake of truth. If at all came crashing down, how would most ill-educated people cope? The same holds to paying homage to our technological deities. When they fail to work, we curse the day they were made, demanding a return to normal function immediately. Did the Israelites not do the same when all when well in the Promised Land and curse God when their expectations were not meet?

I’m supposed to be the Cynical Librarian, and in keeping with a cynical thread, I postulate that the religion of the modern, western world is technology, the priests, the IT people, the church, the Internet, and the prophet, Google itself!! I invite arguments, attacks, and support.

"I did absolutely nothing..."

2008-03-12T11:32:00.000-07:00

"I did absolutely nothing and it was everything I thought it possibly could be." This is one of the great lines from the classic film "Office Space". It sums up a great deal of philosophy concisely while at the same time opens many doors for further exploration. Thus it must command our attention, if only briefly.

What is the significance of doing nothing? Can it be done? How do you do nothing at all? Surely one would actually be thinking of something at least, presuming the person is not completely brain dead already. The very concept of nothing is a difficult one to grasp if you try to understand it. Nothing is taken for granted in general as is the concept of eternity, but an attempt to come to a full understanding of either is monumental in a universe of material existence and spiritual givens. Is nothing itself something, or is it totally bereft of all existence? And you can measure the total absence of any and all things? It seems immeasurable to me.

Anyway, just sitting around and doing nothing, as the saying goes, can be quite restful for some and unnerving for others. Some people have to be doing something - they can't just sit around. I can just sit and do nothing for long periods. It serves to recharge my brain for when I have to do something else.

BTW - I looking forward to doing nothing later this evening....

In the Land of the Blind...

2008-02-20T19:03:00.000-08:00

My Director said this to me on my way to teach a class last week - "In the Land of the Blind, the One-Eyed is their king." I thought that was quite amusing and said a great deal. I can see how it can apply to any number of situations.

Recently, a colleague of mine in a distant university flew into a rage when her "superiors" came to her with "concerns" regarding her Facebook group and how it was being used to communicate with her student workers. I am paraphrasing, but she said something to the affect that the other supervisors felt as if they were being forced to join her Facebook group. The details are to complicated to fully describe here, but the gist of her rage rests on the reactionary position of her library administrators.

As was described to her, there had not been a complete buy-in regarding using Facebook for library projects. Apparently, as she would no doubt agree, she is forced to live in the Land of the Blind where there is an attempt to blind those with visions of novel approaches to services! The One-Eyed indeed!

If we as librarians are supposed to represent the One-Eyed in a land of the Information Blind, what does it say when the administrators of our libraries seek to put those eyes out? Are we to take steps backwards? This has been the failing of the field for years! We lag behind in technology, and when the few us that see the light reach for it, we are pulled down and chastised! Is it quite depressing on many levels.

It must be noted, in the spirit of fairness, that on the following day, she was allowed to reactive her Facebook group. However, it should not have been stopped in the first place simply because some librarians seek to live in the Land of the Blind.

Toxic Mentors...

2008-02-14T14:59:00.000-08:00

My new position as an Academic Reference Librarian and Assistant Professor has put me into a the position of helping out the Circulation and Interlibrary Loan Librarian. This is no big deal seeing as how we fill only about 3-5 requests every two days or so. I have to scan copied articles and turn them into PDFs, so I get to come across some interesting material every once in a while. This just happens to be one of those "once in a while" events.

I scanned this article entitled "What To Do About Toxic Mentors". It is from Nurse Educator, vol. 11, no. 2, March/April 1986, pages 29-30, in case you want to track it down for yourself. The author breaks down toxic mentors into several categories with such names as "avoiders", "blockers", and "destroyers/criticizers". While this is from a nursing journal, I know that it applies to all sectors of the known world. Scott Adams would agree 100 percent.

For me, the most dangerous of the the so-called "toxic mentors" is the "destroyer/criticizer". Let me quote the author directly here so the full impact of this most insidious of people is fully realized. "Even more toxic are the 'Destroyer/Criticizers,' who tear down the junior person in some way. In this group, the Underminers are particularly subtle; it takes awhile to realize what you are experiencing." It must be noted that Underminers are not explained in the article. The example given is that when a nurse began to excel at her job, slowly over time her responsibilities were cut back and her involvement was minimized. Quite interesting.

So, be on the lookout for these "toxic mentors" and other potentially poisonous people. They will bleed you white if you let them.

"You can't handle the truth!"

2008-02-13T19:47:00.000-08:00

While I was home over the weekend, the film "A Few Good Men" was on some cable station and I had it on as background noise while eating dinner. I like that movie - I bet the play is even better because theatre is always better than any movie.

Anyway, my wife and I were talking about the election or some such, and I ended up talking about the War. We were talking about waging war on TV and the like and the fact you (a nation) can't win a war on TV because no one wants to know how it is won, just the fact that the war is won. It hit me, suddenly, just what Col. Jessep's speech during the court marshal actually meant. Like a lightning bolt, boom. And to think I've been watching this movie for years and never got it. But I digress...

Col. Jessep says "You can't handle the truth!" And he is right. His speech goes on to say things about walls and men with guns and how freedom is defended by walls and men with guns. He elaborates further by saying (paraphrase here) that deep down inside "you want me on that wall, you need me on that wall" and that "I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to you". The key here in understanding Jessep is this: people want their freedoms defended, but they don't want to know how that is actually accomplished. We won World War II and at the time no one really knew how we were winning until most of the shots had been fired. News was being censored quite well, as were personal letters from the fronts. If WWII had been on TV like Vietnam and Iraq, Europe would be speaking German now.

Anyway, the point of this analytical exercise is the obvious realization of something that I had been expounding on for years - that you cannot win wars on TV. Nations want to win wars, but the people don't really want to know how the wars are won, not until much, much later, when it no longer matters but to academics and armchair generals. Is this a cynical view of a modern, democratic, and supposedly educated society? Some would say so. Others would say it is an statement of how things are. The Abu Ghraib incident is the perfect example. In WWII, we would never have known about it until many years after the fact.

So, the real question is this: can you handle the truth of war, or is it better for you to turn a blind eye and be glad for victory? Think about it...

Starting a new blog off right...

2008-02-12T09:53:00.000-08:00

The world has taken a turn for the surreal. I thought that I was a great cynic, but apparently others make me appear amateurish! (Who would have figured!)

I came across the Annoyed Librarian's blog, from the ALA Direct newsletter where she describes library classes that are never offered but should be, and I would have taken them if they were available. Classes such Library Politics would have been quite good as libraries are terribly political places. I suppose that all academia is political, but my experience in libraries has proven beyond all measure that some libraries are dangerous and Machiavellian - houses of depravity, misery, and suffering! I used to work in one such place and still keep in contact with those that languish there in total hopelessness.

In addition to these woefully and ever-wise class offerings that should be provided, I remember reading the musing of one such cynic from an LIS program in California. The title of the document was "Library School Lunacy" and it hits the mark dead on!

Now, I must say that I love being an academic librarian. Otherwise, I wouldn't have gone to library school in the first place. And it says Red Mage because I used to play D&D eons ago and was a neutral mage that wore red robes. I still read Dragonlance regularly. I like helping people find the information they seek for their various tasks and assignments. It is always good to be thanked by students and professors when you find what they need.

I may be a cynic, but I still do my best to fill information needs.