History of American librarianship
|
 University of Wisconsin-Madison
Library & Information Studies 569
(crosslisted with History)
3 credits. Prerequisites: Junior standing, or graduate student
in SLIS (preference to SLIS students)
4191F WHITE (in the SLIS library classroom)
Tue 2:30pm-5:00pm
(we will take a break from 3:30-3:45 and attempt to end by 4:45 for those
catching the 5pm bus)
This course is intended to introduce students to the historical
development of American librarianship, with special reference to the
relationship of library institutions to their contemporary social,
economic, cultural and political environments.
Key topics and themes:
- Intertwined development of different types of American library organizations,
such as public libraries, school libraries or media centers, academic
libraries, archives, and special or corporate libraries.
- Differing attention of libraries and librarians to various American
social groups over time, as defined by age/maturity, gender/sexuality,
race/ethnicity,
occupation/employment, class/wealth, or education/training.
- Development of librarianship as a profession, including social, functional,
technological, and gender divisions of labor.
- Evolution of technologies and techniques for information management
within libraries and outside of libraries, from cataloging systems
and publishing processes to desktop computers and internetworked telecommunications.
- Relationship of librarianship to other social, cultural, and
political-economic processes, especially in the areas of intellectual
freedom, social control and censorship, cultural pluralism, democratic
principles, lifelong education, and the "free marketplace of ideas."
In Spring 2008 we will focus mainly on public libraries and use the
organizing principle of "imagining
the library of the future" as a way into these topics and themes.
Each class will be structured through a mix of lecture and discussion,
with some components led by the professor and some portions the responsibility
of students.
Course web site (this page)
www.journalism.wisc.edu/~gdowney/courses/lis569
Course weblog (for discussion and announcements)
lis-569.blogspot.com
Course wiki (for building a library history timeline)
libraryhistory.pbwiki.com
![[icon]](GIF/idea-icon.gif) Assignments and grading
Attendance and participation - 20%
Some absences are inevitable, but please make sure that when you
come to class, you come to participate rather than simply to listen. If
you can, inform the instructor in advance when you need to miss
a class. In any case, you will always be expected to keep up with
each week's readings.
Group leading of reading and context discussion - 10%
In your assigned small group, lead the first hour of class
discussion around a particular time period. Students
should seek out both secondary and primary-source
contextual
information
on the state of librarianship during this time period, from the
New York Times historical archive, back issues of the
Library Journal, the Bowker Annual, or some other readily-available
source.
In your assigned small group, lead the second hour of class discussion
focused on that week's readings. This involves writing up a list
of several possible discussion topics or questions, with about a paragraph
of elaboration on each, to be posted on the main class weblog at least
24 hours before class. (This can be drawn directly from the reactions
you post to your individual weblogs that week.) All other students
not presenting should feel free to post reactions as "comments" on
the main class weblog.
Contribution to library history wiki - 10%
Building upon work started by previous LIS 569 students, our
class will engage in a creative, group-based learning activity
in order to flesh out a wiki-based "timeline of American
library history"
over the last 100 years. Each student will be expected to contribute
a substantive (500 word minimum) entry to this history, describing
how the "library
of the future" was envisioned at a particular moment in
time.
Students will be expected to use both the secondary
sources of class (books and articles) as well as scouring primary
sources available in our library (like back issues of the Library
Journal) in writing their entry. See if you can link your
wiki article to other related articles already in place.
Weblog reactions to weekly articles - 20%
Each student will create a weblog using the Blogger service
and post a substantive (250 word minimum) reaction to each
article on their weblog, as a sort of reader's
diary. These
reactions will be viewable by other students so please write
with clarity and civility.
Weblog critiques of the four books - 20%
On weeks when we read books rather than articles, each student must
post a 750-word (three-page, double-spaced) summary/critique of each
of the four books we read in class to their diary weblog. Do
not simply write a "book review" encapsulating the
topic of the book; write a critical review in which you suggest
what
is most valuable about the author's story/argument, as well
as anything that is unclear, unconvincing, or left for further
study. These reviews are meant to help students organize
their thoughts in advance of class discussion, and to be a
document that students can refer to in future classes where
these books might be useful.
Final analytic book review - 20%
Each student must write a 2000-word (eight-page, double-spaced)
typed analytical review of a library or information
studies book, relating the arguments of the text to the historical
themes of the class (citing specific class readings and discussions
to support your analysis). Please
note: The book doesn't have to be a "library
history" -- you can apply the themes of the class to
any kind of serious
book.
![[icon]](GIF/book-icon.gif) Texts
to purchase
All of the article readings will be available in a bound, xeroxed
packet from ASM StudentPrint in the basement of Memorial Union. Price
will
be reasonable
(likely under $25).
All of the four textbooks are available at the University Bookstore.
 Dee Garrison, Apostles of Culture: The Public Librarian and
American Society, 1876-1920, updated edition (Madison: UW Press,
2003). First published in 1979 and recently revised, "it
remains the most recent — and
most cited — interpretation
of the public library's past, a landmark in the history, and the historiography,
of libraries and librarianship." [from the foreward]
 John
Battelle, The search: How Google and its rivals rewrote the rules
of business and transformed our culture (New York: Penguin,
2005). Wired cofounder and Industry Standard founder Battelle
has written a history of the search engine giant Google that attempts
to place the phenomenon of Internet searching within the broader
context of society and culture. If the "Database of Intentions" sounds
like a kind of high-tech holy grail, you're getting warm. This is
Battelle's terminology for the totality of Internet searching that
reveals to us as a culture (not to mention to marketers) who we are
and how we think and feel. The tale of Google's humble beginnings
in a Stanford dorm room and eventual domination of the search landscape
is an interesting enough story in itself. But it becomes fascinating
against the backdrop of geeky entrepreneurs and their fledgling companies
waging battles of ideas and ideals. Along the way, Battelle skillfully
examines ethical and political issues of search-personal privacy
being a big one. The implications of search as a cultural marker
and what its future might hold make this a thought-provoking work
with relevance beyond business and technology. [from Library
Journal]
 Abigail
A. Van Slyck, Free to All: Carnegie Libraries & American Culture,
1890-1920 (University of Chicago Press,
1998). This history of the Carnegie libraries was written
by an assistant professor of architecture, art history, and women's
studies at the University of Arizona. A revision of the author's
Ph.D. dissertation in architecture at the University of California
at Berkeley, the work examines the funding, design, staffing, and
use of monumental urban central libraries and more functional urban
branch libraries and small-town libraries. This is interpreted in
the context of the professionalization of both architecture and librarianship
and of the role of class in the large urban areas and of gender in
the small towns. Van Slyck's study is based on extensive archival
research concentrating primarily on Carnegie libraries in 13 cities
and towns in 11 states and includes numerous illustrations. This
broadly conceived work makes a contribution not only to architectural
and library history but to social history as well. [from the publisher]
 Louise Robbins, The Dismissal of Miss Ruth Brown: Civil
Rights, Censorship, and the American Library (University of Oklahoma Press,
2001). In
1950 Ruth W. Brown, librarian at the Bartlesville Public Library,
was
dismissed
from
her job after
thirty
years of exemplary service, ostensibly because she had circulated
subversive materials. In truth, however, Brown was fired because
she was active in a group affiliated with the Congress of Racial
Equality. This episode in a small Oklahoma town almost a half-century
ago is more than a disturbing local event. It exemplifies the strange
period
of the Cold War known as the McCarthy era, foregrounding those who
labored for racial justice, sometimes at great cost, before the civil
rights movement. The fundamental issues of the Brown case make it especially
pertinent today, when differences--in race, gender, class, and national
origin--are
again feared, and as challenges to materials in library collections
again escalate. Ruth Brown's story helps us understand the matrix of
personal, community, state, and national forces that can lead to censorship,
intolerance, and the suppression of individual rights. [from the publisher]
![[icon]](GIF/info-icon.gif) Students with special needs
Persons with disabilities are to be fully included
in this course. Please let me know if you need any special accommodations
to enable you to fully participate. I will try to maintain confidentiality
of the information you share with me. To request academic accomodations,
please register with the McBurney
Disability Resource Center.
![[icon]](GIF/warning-icon.gif) Academic
honesty and respect
Academic honesty requires that the course work
(drafts, reports, examinations, papers) a student presents to an instructor
honestly and accurately indicates the student's own academic efforts.
If you are unsure about what qualifies as academic
dishonesty, please consult the Academic
Misconduct Guide for Students. It
goes without saying that copying or paraphrasing material
from web pages without proper quotation and citation is plagiarism
and will be taken very seriously, quitely likely resulting in a failing
grade for the course.
The UW-Madison is committed to creating a dynamic, diverse and welcoming
learning environment for all students and has a non-discrimination
policy that reflects this philosophy. Disrespectful behaviors or comments
addressed towards any group or individual, regardless of race/ethnicity,
sexuality, gender, religion, ability, or any other difference is deemed
unacceptable in this class, and will be addressed publicly by the professor.
![[icon]](GIF/people-icon.gif) About
the instructor
Greg Downey <gdowney @ wisc.edu> is
an assistant professor with a 50 percent appointment in the School
of Journalism and Mass Communication and a 50 percent appointment in
the School of Library and Information Studies. His teaching and
research both center on the history and geography
of information and communication technology and labor.
Downey joined the UW faculty in 2001. Downey holds a B.S. and M.S.
in computer science from the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana,
an M.A. In liberal studies from Northwestern University, and a joint
Ph.D. in history of technology and human geography from the Johns Hopkins
University. Before coming to Madison, Downey spent a year as a postdoctoral
fellow in the Department of Geography at the University of Minnesota,
Twin Cities.
His industry experience as a computer analyst includes three years
at the Leo Burnett advertising agency in Chicago, and three years at
Roger Schank’s Institute for Learning Sciences at Northwestern
University. He has held short-term volunteer positions with both the
Center for Neighborhood Technology in Chicago and the Community Information
Exchange in Washington D.C.
 Downey’s
dissertation research followed the story of a particular category of
information workers, telegraph messenger boys, through a century of
changes in the U.S. telegraph network from 1850 to 1950. His book based
on this research, Telegraph Messenger Boys: Labor, Technology,
and Geography, 1850-1950, was published by Routledge in 2002.
He is currently working on a study of the discourse of the "digital
divide" in the US between 1984-2004, and a history and geography
of audio/visual text captioning labor and technology worldwide over
the 20th century.
![[icon]](GIF/link-icon.gif) Other
useful links
Needless to say, the claims and views these organizations
and publications are not necessarily our own. Apologies for any
outdated, stale, broken, or hijacked links.
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Spring
2008 syllabus
|
Before
class begins
A little background on libraries
For students without extensive previous
coursework on (or work experience with) the various types of US libraries,
here are some background readings (in PDF format) from Wayne
A. Wiegand and Donald G. Davis, eds., Encyclopedia of library history
(New York: Garland, 1994).
READINGS
- Charles A. Seavey, “Public libraries,” 518-528.
- O. Lee Shiflett, “Academic libraries,” 5-14.
- Jean E. Lowrie, “School library and media centers,” 564-570.
- Eugene B. Jackson, “Special libraries,” 597-599.
- Richard Cox, "Archives," 39-43.
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Tue 22 Jan
Introduction and brainstorming
DISCUSSION
- Film: "The
Librarian" (19?? -- guess!)
- What is a library? What is library history?
- Introduction to the class, texts, assignments
- Assign 9 groups for in-class presentations
- Explain construction of weblog and wiki
READINGS
- Nicholas A. Basbanes, "Once and future library," in
Patience and fortitude: Wherein a colorful cast of determined
book collectors, dealers, and librarians go about the Quixotic
task of preserving a legacy (2003), 386-424.
- Wayne
Wiegand, “American library history literature, 1947-1997:
Theoretical perspectives?” Libraries & Culture 35:1
(2000), 4-34.
- Christine Pawley, "History in the library and information
science curriculum: Outline of a debate," Libraries & Culture
40:3 (2005), 223-238.
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Tue 29 Jan
Public library origins
CONTEXT - Group 1 presents primary and secondary source contextual
information on 1850-1876.
READINGS -
Group 2 presents readings and leads discussion; others post
reactions to weblog before class.
- J.P. Quincy, “Free libraries,” in United States
Department of the Interior, Bureau of Education, Public libraries
in the United States of America: Their history, condition and
management, 2 vols. (Washington, DC: US GPO, 1876), 389-402.
- Jesse Shera, “Causal factors in public library development,” in
Jesse Shera, Foundations of the public library (Chicago: University
of Chicago Press, 1949), 200-244.
- Robert V. Williams, “The public library as the dependent
variable: Historically oriented theories and hypotheses of public
library development,” Journal of Library History 16:2 (1981),
329-341.
|
Tue 05 Feb
Public library purposes
CONTEXT - Group 2 presents primary and secondary source contextual
information on 1876-1900.
READINGS - Group 3 presents readings and leads discussion; others
post reactions to weblog before class.
- F. B. Perkins, “How to make town libraries successful,” in
United States Department of the Interior, Bureau of Education,
Public libraries in the United States of America: Their history,
condition and management, 2 vols. (Washington, DC: US GPO, 1876),
419-430.
- Sidney Ditzion, “The humanitarian idea” and “Conclusions” from
Arsenals of a democratic culture: A social history of the American
public library movement in New England and the Middle States
from 1850-1900 (Chicago: ALA, 1947), 97-109, 190-193.
- Michael H. Harris, “The purpose of the American library:
A revisionist interpretation of history,” Library Journal
(15 Sep 1973), 2509-2514.
- Phyllis Dain, “Ambivalence and paradox: The social bonds
of the public library,” Library Journal 100 (1975), 261-266.
- Elaine Fain, “Manners and morals in the public library:
A glance at some new history [with commentary by Michael Harris
and Dee Garrison],” Journal of Library History 10:2 (1975),
99-116.
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Tue 12 Feb
Professionalization and feminization
READINGS
- Instructor presents readings and leads discussion; others
post reactions to weblog before class.
- Dee Garrison, Apostles of Culture: The Public
Librarian and American Society, 1876-1920, updated edition
(Madison: UW Press, 2003)
|
Tue 19 Feb
Urbanization and immigration
CONTEXT - Group 3 presents primary and secondary source contextual
information on 1900-1935.
READINGS - Group 4 presents readings and leads discussion; others
post reactions to weblog before class.
- Elaine Fain, “Books for new citizens: Public libraries
and Americanization programs, 1900-1925,” in Ralph M. Aderman,
ed., The quest for social justice: The Morris Fromkin Memorial
Lectures, 1970-1980 (Madison: University of Wisconsin, 1983),
255-276.
- Christine Pawley, "Advocate for access: Lutie Stearns and the
traveling libraries of the Wisconsin Free Library Commission,
1895-1914," Libraries & Culture 35:3 (Summer 2000),
434-.
- Redmond Kathleen Molz and Phyllis Dain, "The mission:
Consensus and contradiction," in Civic space / cyberspace
(MIT Press, 1999), 11-44.
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Tue 26 Feb
Philanthropic and public funding
READINGS
- Instructor presents readings and leads discussion; others
post reactions to weblog before class.
- Abigail A. Van Slyck, Free to All: Carnegie Libraries & American
Culture, 1890-1920 (University of Chicago Press, 1998).
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Tue 04 Mar
Libraries and war
CONTEXT - Group 4 presents primary and secondary source contextual
information on 1935-1950.
READINGS - Group 5 presents readings and leads discussion; others
post reactions to weblog before class.
- Wayne A. Wiegand, “In service to state: Wisconsin public
libraries during World War I,” Wisconsin Magazine of History
72 (Spring 1989), 199-224.
- Patti Clayton Becker, "'To meet the needs of a nation at
war': Libraries respond," Books and libraries in American
society during World War II: Weapons in the war of ideas (Routledge,
2005), 71-97.
- Patti Clayton Becker, “In time of war,” American
Libraries (May 2003), 54-57.
- Rebecca Knuth, "Errors of omission and cultural destruction
in Iraq, 2003," in Burning books and leveling libraries: Extremist
violence and cultural destruction (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2006),
201-221.
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Tue 11 Mar
Library assessments and futures
CONTEXT - Group 5 presents primary and secondary source contextual
information on 1950-1960.
READINGS - Group 6 presents readings and leads discussion; others
post reactions to weblog before class.
- Robert D. Leigh, “The Public Library Inquiry” and “The
direction of development,” in Robert D. Leigh, The public
library in the United States [main report of the Public Library
Inquiry] (New York: Columbia University Press, 1950), 3-11, 222-246.
- Vannevar Bush, “As we may think,” Atlantic (1945).
- Katherine Pennavaria, "Representation of books and libraries
in depictions of the future," Libraries & Culture 37:3
(Summer 2002), 229-248.
- Gregg Sapp, "Introduction: Early visions of future librarianship," in
A brief history of the future of libraries: An annotated bibliography
(Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press, 2002).
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Tue 18 Mar
SPRING
BREAK
No lecture Tuesday for Spring Break. Please
drink responsibly!
H O M E W O R K -Please
post to the weblog the name of the book you will read
for your final book review, and why you want to read this book. |
Tue 25 Mar
Censorship and civil rights
READINGS
- Instructor presents readings and leads discussion; others
post reactions to weblog before class.
- Louise Robbins, The Dismissal
of Miss Ruth Brown: Civil Rights, Censorship, and the American
Library (University of Oklahoma Press, 2001).
|
Tue 01 Apr
Discrimination and diversity
CONTEXT - Group 6 presents primary and secondary source contextual
information on 1960-1968.
SPECIAL GUEST - Professor Ethelene Whitmire.
READINGS - Group 7 presents readings and leads discussion;
others post reactions to weblog before class.
- Nelson R. Beck, "The use of library and educational facilities
by Russian-Jewish immigrants in New York City, 1880-1914: The
impact of culture," Journal of Library History 12:2 (1977),
128-149.
- John D. Berry, "White privilege in library land," The
whole library handbook 4 (2004), 76-78.
- Cheryl Knott Malone, "Toward a multicultural American
public library history," Libraries & Culture, 35:1 (2000),
77-89.
- Klaus Musmann, “The ugly side of librarianship: Segregation
in library services from 1900 to 1950,” in John M. Tucker,
ed., Untold stories: Civil rights, libraries and black librarianship
(Urbana: University of Illinois, 1998), 78-92.
- Ethelene Whitmire, "Breaking the color barrier: Regina
Andrews and the New York Public Library," Libraries & the
Cultural Record 42:4 (2007), 409-421.
- Barbara Gittings, “Gays in library land: The Gay and
Lesbian Task Force of the American Library Association,” in
James V. Carmichael, Jr., Daring To Find Our Names: The Search
for Lesbigay Library History (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press,
1998), 81-94.
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Tue 08 Apr
Social justice and public
interest
CONTEXT - Group 7 presents primary and secondary source contextual
information on 1968-1975.
READINGS - Group 8 presents readings and leads discussion; others
post reactions to weblog before class.
- Ewald B. Nyquist, "Poverty, prejudice, and the public
library," Library Quarterly (1968), 78-89.
- Sanford Berman, “Libraries to the people!” in Celeste
West, ed., Revolting librarians (San Francisco, CA: Booklegger
Press, 1972), 51-57.
- Toni Samek, "Introduction," Intellectual freedom and
social responsibility in American librarianship, 1967-1974 (Jefferson,
NC: McFarland, 2001).
- Laura J. Miller, "Shopping for community: The transformation
of the bookstore into a vital community institution," Media,
Culture & Society 21 (1999), 385-407.
- John E. Buschman, "On customer-driven librarianship," in
Dismantling the public sphere: Situating and sustaining librarianship
in the age of the new public policy (Westport, CT: Libraries Unlimited,
2003).
|
Tue 15 Apr
The automated library
CONTEXT - Group 8 presents primary and secondary source contextual
information on 1975-1990.
READINGS - Group 9 presents readings and leads discussion; others
post reactions to weblog before class.
- W. Boyd Rayward, "A history of computer applications in libraries:
Prolegomena," IEEE Annals of the History of Computing (Apr-Jun
2002), 4-15.
- Greg Downey, "The librarian and the Univac: Automation
and labor at the 1962 Seattle World's Fair" in C. McKercher
and V. Mosco, eds., Knowledge workers in the information age
(Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2007).
- F.W. Lancaster, “Whither libraries? Or, wither libraries,” College
and Research Libraries (1978), 345-357.
- Clifford Lynch, “From automation to transformation: Forty
years of libraries and information technology in higher education,” Educause
Review (Jan/Feb 2000), 60-68.
- Deanna Marcum, "Automating the library: The Council on
Library Resources," IEEE Annals of the History of Computing
(Jul-Sep 2002), 2-12.
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Tue 22 Apr
The digital library
CONTEXT - Group 9 presents primary and secondary source contextual
information on 1990-present.
READINGS - Group 1 presents readings and leads discussion;
others post reactions to weblog before class.
- Alex Wright, "The web that wasn't," in Glut: Mastering
information through the ages (Joseph Henry Press, 2007), 183-229.
- George D'Elia, Corinne Jorgensen, Joseph Woelfel, and Eleanor
Jo Rodger, “The impact of the Internet on public library
use: An analysis of the current consumer market for library and
Internet services,” Journal of the American Society for
Information Science and Technology 53:10 (2002), 802-820.
- Katie Hafner, "At Harvard, a man, a plan, and a scanner," New
York Times (21 Nov 2005).
- Anthony Grafton, "Future reading: Digitization and its
discontents," The New Yorker (05 Nov 2007).
- Bernard Frischer, "The ultimate internet cafe: Reflections
of a practicing digital humanist about designing a future for
the research library in the digital age," in Council on
Library and Information Resources, Library as place: Rethinking
roles, rethinking space (2005), 41-55.
|
Tue 29 Apr
Google vs. the
library?
READINGS
- Instructor presents readings and leads discussion; others should
post reactions to weblog before class.
- John Battelle, The search: How Google and its rivals
rewrote the rules of business and transformed our culture (New
York: Penguin, 2005).
|
Tue 06 May
Student presentations
Students talk about the final books they are reviewing. |
Fri 16 May
Finals Week
Final analytic book review due by 5pm on the last Friday of finals
week.
Final edits to the online timeline (and your explanation of which
edits are yours) due by 5pm the same day. |
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