1 1 Reference Traditions From “Personal Assistance” to Instructional Intervention A librarian should be more than a keeper of books he [sic] should be an educator. . . . No such librarian is fit for his place unless he holds him- self responsible for the library education of his students. —Otis Robinson (as quoted in Tuckett & Stoffle 1984) While programs of instruction are most often considered the special province of academic and school libraries, the realization that public libraries could and should contribute to the creation of an informed citizenry emerged in Ameri- can public libraries as early as the 1820s. Indeed, the practice of educating the library user to locate and use appropriate library resources can best be understood as an outgrowth of traditional forms of reference services in public libraries that date back almost two centuries. As chronicled by Rothstein (1955, 1994), Lubans (1974), Hardesty, Schmitt, and Tucker (1986), and others, the first efforts in this direction, which actually predated the adoption of formal reference services by many decades, included provision of all the information requested by library patrons as well as “guidance and direction in” its pursuit (Schiller 1986, 191). This direction established the practice of courteous “per- sonal assistance,” which eventually evolved into the public service orientation that still guides contemporary approaches to reference and instruction. “PERSONAL ASSISTANCE” IN PUBLIC LIBRARIES Slightly more aggressive patterns of reference service than the sporadic offer- ings of the personal assistance characteristic of the early years first appeared
Document Details My Account Print multiple pages
Print
You have printed 0 times in the last 24 hours.
Your print count will reset on at .
You may print 0 more time(s) before then.
You may print a maximum of 0 pages at a time.
Help
