International Librarianship: Co‐operation and Collaboration

Citation

Law, D. (2002), "International Librarianship: Co‐operation and Collaboration", Library Review, Vol. 51 No. 7, pp. 379-379. https://doi.org/10.1108/lr.2002.51.7.379.1

One sometimes wonders why anyone bothers creating such compilations rather than publishing the articles in journals, but at least this collection makes a decent attempt at a theme and a purpose. It is dedicated to Les Asheim, a distinguished US library school teacher and internationalist and to the principle that we have become a global profession and as such must both work together internationally and learn from other cultures and contexts. This is then celebrated in 36 shortish articles grouped into a number of large and loose themes such as “Education for the profession” by authors from over 20 countries. It does perhaps cheat a little in that quite a number of the pieces are descriptions of national projects or circumstances aimed at an international readership, rather than pieces about international conjoint activities.

Neither reader nor reviewer would persevere with a set of pithy comments on all 36 articles and so only a few are highlighted below. The work starts symbolically with a short account of the development of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina and is followed by two substantial pieces on the work of IFLA in developing the school library manifesto and on the Advancement of Librarianship Programme. Then a little gem of an apologia pro vita Robert Maxwell from Brian Cox and a piece without humour or irony on aquatic libraries demonstrate the somewhat polarized nature of the content. There are excellent but typically very flat descriptive pieces on a range of consortia, standards and services, whose quality tends to be in inverse ratio to the number of bullet points used. On the other hand, some of the best writing is highly personal, whether Doust’s tales of the development of Book Aid International, an endearingly frank piece by Lazinger on Israeli MARC where long‐term values were sacrificed to short‐term expediency, Owens and Davis with a very personal and combative examination of the US experience of international involvement (they declare it a draw!), or two biographies of Hungarian and Australian librarians which amply demonstrate the power of the individual to effect change.

To the reviewer’s own surprise this is a book which can be recommended. It contains its fair share of the pompous, the po‐faced and the deadly serious as ditchwater. However, it has some substantial pieces on international co‐operation and is enlivened by what are really a series of personal reminiscences which tell one much more about what makes things happen than any number of management texts. Regrettably it weighs in at a heavy £61.75 and one wonders what market it is aimed at. So if you have any interest in Japan or Brazil or Iran or Nigeria or Indonesia or matters international, it’s off to the ILL Department for you. Go on!