From: 20676TPL@MSU.BITNET (Terry.Link)
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.libref-l
Subject: Rethinking Reference
Date: 18 Nov 92 18:45:26 GMT
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU
Approved-By:  "Leslie M. Haas" <LHAAS@KENTVM.BITNET>

----------------------------Original message----------------------------
The recent discussions on TQM and Reference services and a
talk I gave recently  at the annual conference of the Michigan Library
Association on the "Green Side of Reference" have led me to attempt to address
this "rethinking" from another light.

How we think about a problem or an issue is often steered by how the question
is framed. In this case it appears that we are framing the question in terms
of technology and whether we need librarians to do what we have been doing for
years. Many respondents have railed against the dehumanized vision that was
painted for us of the "new environment".

I offer another way to frame the question of what is wrong with reference. If
I may take liberties with the GREEN's Statement of Principles I would offer
them as standards for organizing, not only reference services, but entire
libraries and other community organizations.

        GREEN VALUES

1) Ecological Humanism--Human liberation and ecological harmony are
   inextricably linked

2) Anti-Racism--No compromise with racism and full support for affirmative
acti
   on to create substantive equality.
3) Eco-Feminism--commitment to liberation of women and treatment of both
    genders as equal
4) Gay and Lesbian Liberation--Substantive equality in jobs, housing, and
child custody


        GREEN GOALS

1) Grassroots Democracy--policy from below, at all levels, with direct
   democracy and confederation between community assemblies
2) Cooperative Commonwealth--Economic democracy with local(municipal control)
3) Social Responsibility--every person has basic material needs met
4) Ecological Reconstruction--use of eco-technologies that harmonize the
   economy with the ecology of the region and are human in scale
5) Non-Nuclear, Home-Based, Democratice Defense--immediate nuclear disarmament
   combined with non-provocative conventional and nonviolent defense
6) Non-Aligned Democratic Internationalism--support of human rights regardless
   of national boundaries and military  blocs

       GREEN STRATEGIES

1) Independent Politics--alignment on principles, not party
2) Direct Action--Voting is not enough. Resist abuses, work though
   parliamentary and extra-parliamentary action
3) Movements from Below--the basis for a green organization
4) Fundamental Opposition--No compromise for short term "influence".
   Fundamentally opposed to the present social order
5) Programs, not Personalities--Green candidates and spokespeople are
   mandated, recallable and accountable.
6) Thinking Globally, Acting Locally--Understand the large scale social forces
   but work on creating local framework
7) Organic Grassroots Growth--exercise patience and care in building from the
   grassroots. There are no "shortcuts or Quick fixes".
8) Strategic Nonviolence--Oppose armed struggle except in self-defense but
   support militant nonviolent action.


       GREEN ORGANIZATION

1) Grassroots Democratic Confederation--confederation among local communities,
   using coordinating bodies and recallable representatives.
2) Democratic Decentralism--strive for consensus, but differences are
   acknowledged. Minorities are free to abstain from implementation and may
   publicly dissent.
3) Participatory Membership--decision making rights reside in consistent
   regular participants. Those whose participation is casual or irregular are
   excluded from decision making.

These principles are generally agreed to by hundres of GREENS groups in the US
not to mention around the world. We could discuss them each for some time, and
indeed that would be good. What follows from here is a lose train of thought
that culls from these principles and directs them more to our predicament.
Please excuse the looseness of the flow.

WE NEED MORE HUMAN INTERACTION--NOT LESS!!!!!!! We need caring people guiding
other fellow humans thru the avalanche of information. We need generalists to
help pull the many pieces together in our overly specialized information
world. We need people who are capable of rephrasing questions so we can direct
queries toward the better paths.

We need MORE discussions within our organizations. We need governance of our
institutions to be less top-down and more bottom up. We need more
confereations, not simply between libraries, but also between library and city
hall and computer center and citizen groups and PTA's. We need to realize
there are other ways of knowing outside of the Western European Intellectual
tradition.

We need to show a commitment to people vs. machines. I am dying to read in the
literature where a library director goes to the wall for more people before
more machines. We need to contemplate arrangements of people space vs. machine
space. We need to connect with older ways of knowing, ie. indigenous people's,
and to foster those ways as much as we do the we do the European Intellectual
tradition so ingrained in our experience that we fail to pause and question
it.

I highly recommendd two books for every reader of this list: Jerry Mander's
_In the Absence of the Sacred_ and Bill McKibben's _The Age of Missing
Information_. These books examine our culture and more explicitly the role of
information and learning within it. They turn our world upside down--or is it
finally right side up. McKibben has written a wonderful two page article in
the latest issue of _Index on Censorship_ that summaries the message of his
book. No library should be without a subscription to _Index on Censorship_.

These are thoughts collecting in the vacuum of my head but brought to the PC
by recent events. I hope to write a longer more tightly woven piece that
builds on values, information learning and libraries, but that's a bit away. I
offer these thoughts as a way of looking at what we are about in reference and
library land and what kind of values should drive us in making decisions
regarding service.

Comments are welcome and encouraged in any format. This is a dialogue devoid
of human speech, smell, sight, hearing and touch. The addition of one or more
of these senses would improve that dialogue. This is the best I can do for
now, I look forward to discussions that add more SENSE.

all good things,

Terry Link
Reference Librarian
Michigan State University
East lansing, MI 48824-1048
20676tpl@msu

These thoughts are obviously my own, no one else would want them.
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU