New Document Environments and Institutional Identity Joint Use Libraries at the Crossroads between t

1
New Document Environments and Institutional
Identity Joint Use Libraries at the Crossroads
between the Physical and the Digital Library

• Joacim Hansson, PhD
• Swedish School of Library and Information
  Science,
• University College of Borås and Göteborg
  University
• Joint Use Libraries an international
  conference, Manchester 19-21 june 2007

2
What is an institution?

• A regulated practice (marriage, judicial system)
  or organisation (library, court) governed by
  rules, norms and values which follows a logic,
  appropriate for the present society.

3
Libraries as institutions

• Public libraries as social institutions (Lowell
  1937),
• Libraries as agents to the institution of
  knowledge production (Shera 1966),
• Libraries reflect certain fundamental norms and
  values in a democratic society (Harris 1986,
  McCabe 2001),
• Libraries develop professional pratices in
  relation to social demands and needs (Matarasso
  1998, Audunson 2001, Zetterlund 2004).

4
Types of libraries
5
New identities new institutions?

• Joint Use Libraries
• Synthesis of traditional libraries
• Suitible as hybrid libraries
• Intact spatiality
• Digital libraries
• Hard to define
• Independant of traditional tools and practices
• Abandoned spatiality

6
Visions of the future

• End of libraries
• No need for an organised internet
• Norms and values create stability and development
  of
• New private libraries
• Hybrid libraries
• Digital libraries
• Joint use libraries

7
Documentary environments

• The more digital, the more difficult to define,
• Physical basis, digital complement
• Digital basis, physical complement?
• New institutional settings
• ALM

8
Documentary tools in transition

• Traditional tools
• DDC
• UDC
• AACR2
• Renewed tools
• Webdewey
• New tools
• Xml
• FRBR, FRBRoo
• Folksonomies user defined indexing

9
Transition in institutional identity

• Rationality
• Value based or instrumental?
• Professional identity
• Intermediary or administrator?
• Prioritised target groups
• The socially underprivileged (poor) or e.g.
  undragraduate and graduate students (strong)?
• Relation to collections
• Bibliographic control or social interaction?
• New identities through joint use