Empathy

I can't get Justin's comment from the last, last Access Services meeting out of my mind. When we were talking about the Service Excellence experiences, he mentioned the role of empathy in the service interaction. This is what I was writing about as we kicked off Service Excellence, although I didn't put the eloquent label on it that Justin did.

Just what is empathy and how does it relate to positive interactions? We have too many Star Trek: The Next Generation fans in Access Services to leave out an analogy to Deanna Troi, the empathic counselor who can sense people's emotions. Although Commander Troi is "empathic" as opposed to "empathetic" (she can actually feel the emotions of the people around her) she still serves as a relatable example.

Empathy is the ability to understand the world from another person’s viewpoint and the motivation to treat another kindly based on that understanding. Excellent service isn't about bending rules, waiving fines or smiling (although all of these may be the result of empathy). First and foremost it's about putting yourself in the other person's shoes.

When I think about the most positive service interactions I've had over the years (especially the times when I've been able to turn around a negative interaction) it's always been when I've channeled my inner Troi.

The Librarian Stereotype... on the Big Screen and Beyond

I've been thinking a lot, as I often do, about the topics that Jen raised in her last post, on Librarians, Stereotypes, Professionalism, and Pop Culture.

Then earlier today, I came across a new piece on a feminist blog and magazine to which I subscribe:

From the Library: The Librarian Stereotype on the Big Screen

Here, librarian and blogger Ashley McAllister looks at librarian characters in a few famous films through the ages (with clips!), and concludes: "When we see librarians in the movies, they are usually fulfilling the role of a very narrow stereotype."

In my professional experience, the Real World Workplace of the large university library has not had a majority of female staff-members, but has been pretty evenly split. However, most popular stereotypes about librarians and library workers tend to portray them first and foremost as women.

As a well-read feminist, it is hard for me not to get deep into the long and complex history of why that may be the case, or of the general history of Women in Libraries, but I will say that I believe it is very important to debunk these kinds of stereotypes.

How to go about doing so?
That's a whole different story: the story at the heart of Jen's post.

However, where Jen mentions the argument made by some people that "librarians shouldn't complain 'about the deprofessionalization of librarianship... and then do things like this [funny video] and still expect to be taken seriously'", I can't help but point out that in our culture it is most often women who have trouble being taken seriously as professionals in general, and that most of the library professionals in that video also happen to be women.

For me, questions about library work, stereotypes, professionalism, and pop culture are always bound up in questions about gender and sexism. And of course this effects everybody, not just women!

I don't have any answers. Just more food for thought.

Librarians, Stereotypes, Professionalism, and Pop Culture

A little bird (one of the students working in ILL) recently sent me a link to a YouTube video featuring students and faculty at the University of Washington's Information School (teaching Library and information Science) doing their rendition of Lady Gaga's "Poker Face." Less than a week later, I saw the link to this video posted on one of our library's internal list servs (lib-all, I think).

In the video, the students and faculty librarians at UWash changed the lyrics to relate to libraries; the chorus lets the world know that they "can use my, can use my, you can use my catalog (don't forget the databases)."



The video is certainly entertaining and good for a laugh. What I found interesting were a couple of comments posted on New York Magazine's website in reaction to the video.

One comment says that librarians shouldn't complain "about the deprofessionalization of librarianship (i.e. people who don't have a library science degree doing 'professional' library jobs) and then do things like this and still expect to be taken seriously."

A self-identified library student then replied to this comment, stating that there's difference between professionalism and having a sense of humor.

In my library school classes, we talk a lot about the level of professionalism in the field of librarianship. There is a drive to publish scholarly articles and make the profession comparable to other professional occupations in law (lawyers), medicine (doctors), etc. I think, though, that the professionalism of librarianship need not confine itself to the standards set by other long-established professional occupations.

Librarians work with a whole host of people in the library, not just "professionals" with Master's degrees. It is the total group, consisting of library student assistants, staff, administrators, professionals and faculty, that projects whatever level of professionalism they wish for their library. We do so by helping patrons and giving them a sense of how we do business, how we treat them, and how we demonstrate to them that we have specialized knowledge that will help them use the library.

What do you think of this video? What do you think patrons at this library would think of this video? What would they think about their library after seeing this video?

Also, should we make a video?