LIBRARY SERVICES FOR A NEW AGE

What do you think of when you think of a library? A building? A collection of books? A circulation or reference desk? Whatever the image that comes to mind, it is likely to change in the next few years. As we enter the new millennium, we face the prospect of re-inventing libraries. Certainly our concepts of the library as a place, a physical collection, and a location for services will change drastically. It is a time for questioning what we are doing, how and why. While there seems to be no agreement on what the new model will be for libraries, the process of introspection makes us realize that there are some basic principles that we all value and that will somehow be translated into the future. Among these principles are freedom of information, equity of service for all types of users, privacy for our users, and a strong commitment to quality services.

While books and mortar are important and have been the center of attention for some time, it is library services which provide the "value added". Selecting materials, organizing them into a useful form, and helping our users navigate the increasingly-complex world of information are all critically important. While these services will take a different form as libraries move from print to a mixed print/electronic mode, they remain at the core of our mission.

This issue of Library Liaison will explore some of these services, how they are delivered at Brandeis now and how they may change as the library evolves.

Ann C. Schaffner
Associate University Librarian for Research Services, Instruction, and Planning

SERVICING THE RESEARCHER:
COLLECTION BUILDING IN THE NEW AGE

New information technology seems to have no limits. The imagination of scholars putting such technology to work is running rampant, and every second more and more bits of information are becoming available via electronic means. This recent proliferation of information and the formats used to deliver it has turned libraries into sophisticated entities. No longer the central repositories of printed material they once were, libraries are now conduits for the dissemination of information from a multitude of different sources and locations.

In this complicated and volatile information world, what to include, and not include, in a library's collection must be carefully thought out. In which subjects should the library collect? What resources are the best within a given subject area? Which format-print, electronic, microfilm-should the library purchase when more than one is available for a given resource? Providing answers to such questions is the job of collection development librarians, or selectors.

Selectors are schooled in the subject discipline for which they are responsible. They work in consultation with faculty from the various disciplines to ensure that the appropriate materials are selected for the collection. They keep abreast of any changes in the curriculum and maintain an awareness of faculty and student research interests. In addition, collection development librarians must follow the latest scholarly and publishing trends to anticipate changes that might impact the library and its collection. All of this knowledge helps the collection development librarian decide which materials should be added to the library, all within the limitations of the library's budget and physical space.

Selectors must also look beyond their library's own collection. Librarians now recognize that it is impossible for a single collection to represent all research needs. Consequently, libraries are now building relationships with other libraries for the sharing of items, since such cooperatives can offer the researcher more subject coverage than any single library can. Collection development librarians initiate such cooperative agreements, and they must be mindful of their library's role within such a collective as they shape their own library's collection.

In this fast-paced technological world, there are many decisions to be made about what libraries should be adding to their collections. Collection development librarians must constantly monitor the university and scholarly environment to ensure that libraries continue to fulfill the research needs of faculty and students. Without careful thought about which resources are appropriate for inclusion in the library, researchers might never find those obscure but crucial pieces of evidence that solidify their arguments.

Anthony Vaver and Mark Alpert
As Humanities Librarian and Social Science Librarian, Tony and Mark are responsible for selecting many of the materials added to the library's collections each year.

DESIGNING GATEWAYS TO INFORMATION

Many people today feel that they are drowning in information - that too much unwanted data inundates them every day. How do you get to the information you really want? And how do you know, once you've got it, that the information is reliable?

Libraries have traditionally offered a variety of ways to access information. The assumption has been that since librarians choose the information found in libraries, some quality-control is asserted over the information offered. The card catalog is a gateway to information resources held in one physical location. Research Guides and Finding Aids are typical library publications which list the information resources available on specific topics. Librarians themselves have always offered expert guidance in finding information.

What is happening to these library gateways in the "Age of Information?" What happens when the Internet and the World Wide Web suddenly make information from all over the world available 7 days/week, 24 hours/day outside of the library proper? Where is the quality control for the information that is now available to everyone? How does the library continue to offer access to evaluated information resources?

Libraries have embraced technology as a tool to offer access to this new global information. The card catalog has morphed into an online, integrated library system, and libraries are exploring ways to provide clickable links not only to locally-owned resources, but to evaluated information resources located around the world. The online systems are capable of offering much more than a citation to an information resource. That citation may now include a link to raw data, to the text of a journal article, or to the electronic version of the resource itself. Citations may have additional linked information such as author information or evaluative reviews.

This new online gateway is presented to users via the Web. One of the challenges facing librarians is how to assert quality control over the information offered to users via this electronic gateway. Librarians must now evaluate and judge electronic information resources from all over the world. The design of the user interface is in itself no small matter - everything from ADA considerations to information retrieval habits must be considered. The Brandeis University Libraries are exploring all of these issues now. We expect our new Ex Libris integrated library system, to be installed in July 2000, to provide us with the technology needed to create a dynamic new electronic gateway to information.

Susan V. Wawrzaszek
As Librarian for Personnel, Budget and Technology Support, Sue chairs the Libraries' Web Advisory Group.

TEACHING INFORMATION SKILLS

Within our two libraries at Brandeis, we house multiple journal and book collections and offer a variety of services, but we occupy a web space as well: our library website provides access to thousands of electronic resources accessible across the campus network.

With this virtual configuration, teaching in the libraries has a new focus. We strive to provide students with the skills to navigate the electronic gateway provided by the library web page and to help students distinguish between our scholarly resources (in their web incarnation) and the multitude of web pages they encounter through search engine results. Our two formal library instruction programs, the First Year Library Instruction Program and the Library Intensive Program, continue to evolve as information access via the web becomes both routine and increasingly complex.

What we learn from our students is that the web is generally part of their daily routine: they are accustomed to scanning the electronic horizon for headlines, popular music and images, and products to purchase. When scholarship is the goal, however, the web and its multifaceted resources require sharpened critical thinking skills. The evaluation of web resources is now the emphasis of much of our teaching.

The First Year Library Instruction Program uses interactive web pages, hands-on learning and guided discussion to facilitate a first hand exploration of the research process, including the evaluation of sources. Students complete a takehome assignment where initial steps in the research process are defined and practiced. A research topic is analyzed, background reading sources are identified, an online search is formulated, and the web is searched for relevant information. After a library tour, students meet with a librarian for the hands-on session. Again, the web is our vehicle, but it is the library web page that provides the framework for the research process. Students test out their search statements in LOUIS and in a journal index. The librarian leads a discussion about the research process and generates ideas about how the web fits into the process and what criteria can be applied to evaluate web and print resources. Students experience the web in all its diversity, and learn how the library web page, in particular, can support their scholarship.

The Library Intensive Program, designed to meet the needs of students in more advanced courses, presents students with an in depth look at the library resources most relevant to their specific course of study. Librarians and faculty work together to plan and customize the session. Specialized library materials are identified and demonstrated and generally a research assignment is tied to the session content. The librarian often develops a web page designed for the specific course and provides links to the resources covered in the session. Relevant scholarly web sites are identified and demonstrated and discussions about evaluating sources and citing electronic documents are included. It is this discussion on the evaluation of web resources that is increasingly requested by instructors.

Anne Muchoney coordinates library instruction for the Science Library.
For more information on these programs please contact Anne (sciences) or Leslie Stebbins (humanities and social sciences).

ABOUT TO BE SHELVED

q Beth Bailey. Sex in the Heartland. Harvard University Press, 1999.
Sex in the Heartland is the story of the sexual revolution in a small university town. The author argues that the sexual revolution challenged a system of sexual controls based on oppression and inequality and created new models of sex and gender relations that have shaped our society in powerful and positive ways.

q Tom Lutz. Crying: The Natural and Cultural History of Tears. W. W. Norton, 1999.
Tears can be considered pleasurable, dangerous, mysterious, deceptive, foolish, or sacred. They can signify mourning, frustration, happiness, or joy. Lutz examines paintings, literary texts, films, and advertisements to discover the way people have understood weeping, from the earliest known representation of tears in the 14th-century B.C. to the popular culture of today.

q C. Dallett Hemphill. Bowing to Necessities: A History of Manners in America, 1620-1860. Oxford University Press, 1999.
Hemphill analyzes sermons, child-rearing guides, advice books, and etiquette manuals. He concludes that as the hierarchical and patriarchal society of the 17th century gave way to the modern and fluid class democracy of the mid-19th century, manners allowed Americans to act out, and thus reinforce, traditional power relations.

q Patricia Wallace. The Psychology of the Internet. Cambridge University Press, 1999.
The author explores the psychological aspects of cyberspace, a virtual world in which people from around the globe are acting and interacting in many new and unusual ways. She examines how the online environment can influence the way we behave.

q Andrew Ross. The Celebration Chronicles: Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Property Value in Disney's New Town. Ballantine Books, 1999.
Ross chronicles the year he spent in residence in the town of Celebration from September, 1997 to August, 1998 participating in the community life and conducting interviews.

q Douglas Walton. One-Sided Arguments: A Dialectical Analysis of Bias. State University of New York Press, 1999.
Bias in an argument doesn't always invalidate that argument. In fact, in many instances bias is to be expected. Walton argues that a one-sided advocacy of a point of view in argumentation is harmful only when the dialogue exchange is supposed to be a balanced, two-sided exchange of viewpoints.

q William Julius Wilson. The Bridge Over the Racial Divide: Rising Inequality and Coalition Politics. University of California Press, 1999.
The book demonstrates how political power is disproportionately concentrated among the most advantaged segments of society and how the monetary, trade, and tax policies of recent years have deepened this power imbalance. Wilson presents a diagnosis of the problem of rising social inequality in the United States and proposes a set of recommendations for dealing with it.

q Robert A. Gates. American Literary Humor During the Great Depression. Greenwood Press, 1999.
Gates looks at the rise of literary humor in the writings of Robert Benchley, Dorothy Parker, Ogden Nash, E. B.White, and James Thurber, among others, as an alternative to the economic and political solutions offered to battle the Great Depression of the 1930's.

Anthony Vaver Humanities Librarian
Mark Alpert Social Sciences Librarian

UPCOMING LIBRARY EVENTS

February 9-May 15

Robert D. Farber University Archives Exhibit
Be Realistic...Demand the Impossible! Brandeis Student Activism 1948-2000

Using photographs, original documents, and videotape, BE REALISTIC...DEMAND THE IMPOSSIBLE! focuses on the many forms of activism that students have expressed at Brandeis University. The exhibit covers a variety of topics such as campus politics and relations, community activism, human rights, the environment, nuclear war, and peace.

The University Archives is open from 9:00 to 5:00 Monday through Friday. For more information or to set up a class tour of the exhibit call 781-736-4686.

Friday, March 17, 12 noon-2pm

Wednesday, March 22, 12 noon-1pm

Wednesday, April 12, 12 noon-1pm

Wednesday, May 3, 12 noon-1pm

Science Library Brownbag
Science Library Group Study Room
Document Delivery Options