As we've outlined in these pages, solutions have been offered that range from steps that individual librarians can make to system-wide solutions. Both the American Library Association and the Special Library Association have sponsored media campaigns to combat stereotyping. Many of these are activities librarians have already been involved in. Larger societal changes may affect professional image even more. Technological shifts may very well alter our profession and our image in ways we cannot yet predict.
Some people think it does.
Each individual librarian resolves henceforth not to write about, discuss, or feed in any way the public stereotypical image of the librarian. It could be that the profession has dwelt too much on the issue. Faced with a complex set of information about people or occupations, the tendency is to simplify these facts by extracting only the most obvious. Although other careers have stereotypes, librarians seem to take alleged misrepresentations of their image more seriously than others. We may also be wrong about public perception of the field.