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Margy Burn

Continuing the Conversation

 

Regardless on which side of the reference desk we stand the situation for librarians and historians has changed dramatically. Manning Clark used to tell of conversations with Mitchell Librarian Ida Leeson, who would apparently effortlessly reach for a particular volume mid-sentence, open a page and find the sentence in the manuscript or book she had in her hand to illustrate the particular point she was making. Such was the depth of her knowledge of the collection. I don’t imagine Ida Leeson‘s days in the beautiful office that still accommodates the Mitchell Librarian were much encumbered with writing strategic plans, quarterly reporting on outcomes and outputs, devising an organisational Balanced Scorecard and making responses to Departmental requests for information. In the last few weeks I’ve been asked to report on protocols for access to secret and sacred collection material; the amount of funding allocated to Indigenous projects; strategies to advance Reconciliation or actions which can be "badged" as Government initiatives to promote the International Year for the Culture of Peace. These demands rather constrain the development of becoming what Peter Cochrane called a well-read librarian or bibliographic wonder. I used to read a lot of books before I became a librarian, is my lament.

And in the last two days there have been several references to the changed situation for historians: Ann Curthoys has described the difficulty of getting to the library or archives. When I began working in the Mitchell Library in 1984 I remember receiving a phone call from a regular reader’s wife, letting us know that her husband was sick and wouldn’t be in that day. She didn’t want us to worry. Readers used to bring in home-grown flowers or vegetables for the staff. North Sydney local historian Eric Russell once brought in a box of broadbeans he had grown. I still have the note he included which read: Some eat broadbeans, some grow broadbeans, some have broadbeans thrust upon them. I’m sure there are similar stories in the annals of the National Library, I just haven’t been here long enough to have heard them yet.

My previous work in a university library had not prepared me for the encounter with what what was almost a club of regular readers in Mitchell Library in the mid-1980s. The staff certainly called them the Mitchell Readers, I don’t know whether that is how they would have described themselves. Carol Liston was one of them. They were in the Library virtually every day. The readers and the reading room staff would have a Christmas lunch somewhere together. That’s a tradition that has now stopped I believe. These days academic historians no longer have the luxury of spending days of their life in the Library and the limited hours of research that can be billed to the clients of public historians imposes other kinds of constraints on the research adventure.

But whatever the constraints we work under it is important that libraries continue to be places where there are opportunities for conversations between librarians and readers. This conference is one manifestation of the National Library’s desire to build relationships with historians, one of our most important stakeholder groups. Harold White Fellowships are another example. The three most recent Harold White Fellows have all been historians: Dr Michael Symons, Dr Sarah Lloyd and Dr Bridget Griffen-Foley. The close relationships that are forged between the Fellows and Library staff have enduring benefits for both parties, I believe. Senior staff of the National Library meet annually with representatives of other stakeholder groups such as the Joint Academies Forums and the Independent Scholars Association to exchange information about priorities. There are some other more formal mechanisms for consultation and contribution by stakeholders. The National Library has recently established a Collecting Advisory Committee established to help us to continue to build collections which will meet the needs of researchers for the next hundred years. Stuart Mcintyre will chair the committee.

Yesterday Jill Roe referred to the work of the Australian Library Collections Task Force which was established under the auspices of the National Library with representation from the Academies, the Committee of Australian University Librarians, the Council of Australian State Libraries and CSIRO to provide advice to research libraries on ways of improving access to library collections. Very importantly the Task Force is seeking information from users of libraries, not just from librarians. Jill quoted the disturbing statistic that nearly 50% of academics in English and Psychology surveyed by the Task Force regarded their institutional library collections as insufficient. Jill asked what strategies the National Library has to address this situation. The answer in a nutshell is that we are working with other library sector organisations to make Australian library resources known by ensuring they are catalogued and accessible on the National Bibliographic Database and to strengthen mechanisms for resource sharing, such as interlibrary loan, so that they are reliable, efficient and cost effective. A particular goal for the National Library in the next three years, which we have published in our Directions statement, is that "All Australians, at their place of choice, have direct, seamless access to print and electronic sources of information". Although the Australian library system has some wonderful foundation stones in place to meet that goal it is a statement of aspiration, rather than a reflection of present realities. Or in the jargon of management consultants it is a stretch target.

Nevertheless there is a great deal of work being done behind the scenes at the National Library to build the national information infrastructure to achieve that goal. But we haven’t always been successful at communicating these strategies to readers. As librarians we were rather dismayed at the lack of awareness of key library services revealed by the Australian Library Collections Task Force English and Psychology survey. Some users commented that it would be wonderful if there was one big database which provided access to Australian library catalogues — there is. It’s called the National Bibliographic Database and it’s existed since 1980 when it was accessible via the Australian Bibliographic Network. Now it’s available as Kinetica. ABN was a tool for librarians and the power and sophisticated search features of Kinetica means that it can still be a little daunting even for librarians who do not use it constantly. But it is our intention that Kinetica is developed and enhanced so it becomes a tool which is used directly by clients — end users in our horrible jargon, not just by librarians. A number of academic libraries currently offer end user access to Kinetica and the National Library’s Petherick Room readers have been given training and are able to use Kinetica themselves.

The outcomes and outputs framework, our major accountability reporting framework to Government, requires the Library to be able to report on the appropriateness and effectiveness of our services to readers. Apart from the quantitative indicators we keep ourselves, the framework also requires qualitative input from readers. I expect there are people here today who have been approached in the last few weeks by a market research team within the Library for information about your views on our reader services. There was also a major survey of reader satisfaction with reference surveys undertaken as part of the Library’s review of reference services in 1998—99.

Invariably such research reveals a generally high degree of satisfaction with our services, which is gratifying. But worrying concerns also emerge. It is clear that many users feel overwhelmed by libraries. There is ambivalence about technology in libraries. Obviously readers appreciate the enhanced access delivered by technology but there is also a certain lack of confidence. I think some readers are unsure whether the lack of an expected search result is because an item does not exist, or is not held in their institutional library, or whether it is simply that their database searching skills are not up to the task! Some reference librarians can seem terrifyingly proficient when they’re asked for help and I can well imagine that there are readers who are timid about confessing doubts and uncertainties about their information retrieval skills to these paragons. Research undertaken before I left the Mitchell Library confirmed these concerns — I suspect they apply universally to research libraries. Mitchell readers also expressed concerns that reading room staff were not keeping up with new disciplinary approaches to scholarship and research. I’m fairly certain that if Ann Curthoys engaged most of our staff in a conversation about the genealogical approach to historical research she would be directed to the Lower Ground floor to the Newspaper and Microform reading room where most of our family history researchers may be found. We know who Foucault is, but we may not always be sufficiently aware of the implications of Foucauldian-thinking for our collections and services.

The recent research at both the Mitchell Library and the National Library also reveals that readers are very concerned about improved communication between libraries and our clients. Libraries spend a lot of effort endeavouring to communicate with users. The National Library is littered with colourful pieces of corporate communication. We have a most comprehensive and I think very impressive web site. Recently we’ve set up an email listserv to communicate with Petherick Readers and there are regular meetings with Petherick Readers — but despite these and other efforts it seems much of what we do remains impenetrable and mysterious to many of our users. I suspect our location in the national capital creates added obstacles. Unless you are fortunate to be an ACT resident, I imagine research visits to the National Library are an increasingly infrequent luxury for many historians in locations more distant from Canberra. And the constraints on time which can be spent in libraries and the pressures on library staff which are all too obvious to readers inhibit the more extended conversations and interactions between librarians and readers which once occurred.

I believe some library staff are naive about the power position, depending on which side of the desk you stand. I’m sure some readers fear that if they express criticism or ask for a service improvement their access may be in some way reduced. No-one whose work is dependent on libraries wants to become branded as a difficult reader. We should have the sort of communication happening over the desk in every interaction between staff and readers that allows readers to feel they are listened to and heard.

I don’t have all the answers as to how we can once again create the space in the Library where the conversations between librarians and historians can be as they were in perhaps more halcyon days. I hope my remarks today, and indeed the holding of this conference, have signalled the importance the National Library assigns to the continuation of the conversation between our two professions. I would welcome hearing your views on this subject.

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