From the Editor: A Thirty-Year Reflection on the Value of Reference
Abstract
As RUSA is exploring how, if at all, the word “reference” succeeds in describing what its members do in the twenty-first-century library, it seemed an opportune moment to publish David Murray’s column reflecting on reference services. I hope that this column will help us to continue the discussion of how best to describe, in a usable fashion, the complex work that public service librarians are engaged in. I would be eager to feature the work of other writers who would like to contribute to this discussion, and encourage anyone interested in writing on this topic to contact me at btrott@wrl.org. We all agree, I believe, that our work is important to our users, and the challenge is in finding a way to recognize the changes that have happened in that work without abandoning the strengths that brought us to this point. I believe that David’s column is a good start to that discussion.—Editor
References
ODLIS: Online Dictionary of Library and Information Science, s.v. “reference services,” accessed April 19, 2016, www.abc-clio.com/ODLIS/odlis_r.aspx.
Daniel Goldstein, “Library Inc.,” The Chronicle of Higher Education, October 17, 2010, accessed April 25, 2016, http://chronicle.com/article/Library-Inc/124915.
NYPL established a dedicated telephone reference department at the Mid-Manhattan Library in 1968. It inspired the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh to establish its own Telephone Ready Reference Unit nearly ten years later. But as anyone who has watched Desk Set (1957) knows, telephone ready reference easily predates 1968.
Sheila Jackson, “Telephone Ready Reference Unit: Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh,” accessed April 19, 2016, www.andrew.cmu.edu/user/lberard/ready.html.
Richard Kaplan, “Re: VR Question,” email to David C. Murray, April 20, 2016.
Richard Kaplan and Holly McCullough, Staffing for Reference in the 21st Century (Pittsburgh, PA: Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, 2010), accessed April 20, 2016, 2.
ODLIS, s.v. “ready reference,” accessed April 19, 2016, www.abc-clio.com/ODLIS/odlis_r.aspx.
Anthony Verdesca, “What’s in a Word: Coming to Terms with Reference, Part Two,” Reference Librarian 56, no. 3 (July–September 2015): 216, 219, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02763877.2015.1022849.
Anne Houston, “What’s in a Name? Toward a New Definition of Reference,” Reference and User Services Quarterly 55, no. 3 (Spring 2016): 186–88, http://dx.doi.org/10.5860/rusq.55n3.186.
“Statement of the Librarian,” in Statements, Opinions and Testimony Taken by the Committee of Inquiry, Appointed by the Trustees of Columbia College (New York: John W. Amerman, 1857): 5, accessed April 23, 2016, http://hdl.handle.net/2027/coo1.ark:/13960/t9v12mk82.
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Janice M. Jaguszewski and Karen Williams, New Roles for New Times: Transforming Liaison Roles in Research Libraries (Washington, DC: Association of Research Libraries, 2013).
David A. Tyckoson, “What Is the Best Model of Reference Service?” Library Trends 50, no. 2 (Fall 2001): 186–87, 190.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.5860/rusq.56n1.2
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