Conversations, Participation and Libraries

“Conversations, Participation and Libraries” SILS Colloquium at the Catholic University of America, Washington DC.

Abstract: Too much technology? Too little technology? Certainly the past two decades have challenged our schools to not only prepare librarians for a new practice environment, but to constantly place these technologies in the larger contexts of our field and society. New technologies, both the fads and the fundamental, have filled our traditional cores and electives to their breaking points. How can we decide what is durable in these new technologies? What is the proper balance between concepts and technology features? What is the overall concept of librarianship that allows us to define cutting edge, obsolete, and irrelevant? It is hoped that this meeting and the larger series of conversations taking place in LIS programs around the country, can bring some consensus to these questions.
Slides: https://davidlankes.org/rdlankes/Presentations/2008/Catholic.pdf
Audio: https://davidlankes.org/rdlankes/pod/Catholic.mp3
Video: http://ptbed.org/downloads/Catholic.mp4

Lankes to be Part of RUSA Preconference

Lankes will be part of a RUSA pre-confernece event at the ALA Conference organized by RSS and MARS (and they say libraries have too many acronyms):

Reference and User Services Association: Reference Services Section
(RSS) and Machine-Assisted Reference Services Section (MARS) 2008
Pre-conference, Reinvented Reference 4: Emerging Technologies for
Reference Service. The pre-conference will be held during the ALA
2008 Annual Conference on Friday, June 27, 2008, in Anaheim, CA.

The topic will be on social networking in reference.

Upcoming Participatory Events

Lankes will speak on the topic of participatory librarianship and LIS education at:

Catholic University’s School of Library and Information Science February 13th https://home.cua.edu/index.cfm?main=myannouncements&Detail=5871

and

Rutgers University’s School of Communication, Information and Library Studies March 26th http://www.scils.rutgers.edu/events/index.html

Another upcoming event will be:

Lankes will be part of a discussion on Credibility and participation at the iSchool Conference February 29th http://credibilitycommons.org/index.php/iconference2008_cfp_wildcard

Lankes Featured in ALA’s District Dispatch

District Dispatch Podcast #26

R. David Lankes, Director, Information Institute of Syracuse; Associate Professor, Syracuse University’s School of Information Studies; Office for Information Technology Policy (OITP) Fellow
Andy Bridges, Communications Director, ALA Washington Office
Subject

In his role as OITP Fellow, Dave Lankes (pictured) has been engaging library schools across the country in conversations about the importance of participatory librarianship. In this episode of the District Dispatch Podcast, he tells listeners a little bit about it.

For video of Dave’s presentation at Drexel, please visit his blog. And be sure to head over to ptbed.org to learn all about participatory librarianship and how you can take part.

Program Length
14 minutes, 19 seconds

Check it out:

http://www.wo.ala.org/districtdispatch/?p=355

Video from Drexel Presentation

Here is a video cast of a presentation from Drexel’s iSchool Speaker Series. It covers some of the same ground of Scapes (if you’ve seen Scapes, you might just want to skip over that part), but with an emphasis on the implications of participatory concepts to LIS education.

For those who want a higher quality version, you can go to http://ptbed.org/downloads/BigIdeas.mp4

Participatory Libraries

“Participatory Libraries” Drexel University School of Information and Technology College Colloquium Series, Philadelphia, PA.

Abstract: The library landscape is constantly in flux. New technologies, new practices, and new theories are the sign of an active field. However, these dynamic forces also lead to confusion and conflict. It also leads to a spate of new services and functions that are sometimes awkward to integrate into existing research, operations and curricula. In today’s world of Web 2.0, Library 2.0, social networks, blogs and wiki’s what concepts are durable and what is new that must be imparted to the next generation of professionals? Thinking through this issue – its technological and professional implications and legislative and policy overlaps – is an example of the type of work conducted at the American Library Association’s (ALA’s) Washington Office. ALA’s Office for Information Technology Policy (OITP), a part of the Washington Office, and Syracuse University’s Information Institute of Syracuse have initiated a project to examine this issue under the rubric of participatory librarianship (http://ptbed.org). Simply put, participatory librarianship recasts library and library practice from the fundamental concept that knowledge is created through conversation. Since libraries are in the knowledge business they are, therefore, in the conversation business – in both the digital and physical worlds. Participatory librarians approach their work as facilitators of conversation. Be it in practice, policies, programs and/or tools, participatory librarians seek to enrich, capture, store and disseminate the conversations of their communities. As part of this effort, project researchers are seeking input from library and information science (LIS) faculty and students on how participatory concepts can be integrated into curricula and to identify ongoing related research. The input of the LIS research and education community will be incorporated into a Participatory Library Starter Kit. This starter kit will present case studies from a wide variety of settings including: public, federal, and academic libraries; library vendors; and, of course, the LIS research and education community.
Slides: https://davidlankes.org/rdlankes/Presentations/2008/Drexel.pdf
Audio: https://davidlankes.org/rdlankes/pod/Drexel.mp3
Video: http://ptbed.org/downloads/BigIdeas.mp4

Scapes

“Scapes” OCLC Symposium on Reference and Social Networking, Philadelphia, PA.

Abstract: Who said reference has to be one person, one librarian, one question? Can reference be a social activity? How can we truly put the user at the center of reference? How can we re-imagine reference as a learning activity where the reference librarian facilitates learning? David Lankes will focus on reference as a truly participatory process and how such a process can take advantage in the latest in web technologies.
Slides: https://davidlankes.org/rdlankes/Presentations/2008/Scapes.pdf
Audio: https://davidlankes.org/rdlankes/pod/OCLC-Scapes.mp3
Video: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4867328898935259711