books open hearts wide,
reading causes the readers
to birth brave new dreams
THe LINE BEtween adult and YA books is fiction
Children of all ages are currently reading and may have always been reading and sometimes light-years beyond age/grade level. So distinctions seem to really do little more than make parents happy, give them some guidance on what is “age appropriate” or that fits the particular schools requirements for grade level material. These blurry at best distinctions also provide basic scaffolding for a structure to bookstores and libraries.
The idea of discovering and promoting crossover materials as a way to entice and tempt the more advanced or older young adult readers is a great idea. I need to start creating a list of crossover titles for my future librarians self and for my current job in a local independent bookstore. The crossunder books are harder to define and find and I am more then a little confused about them. I find the term new adult a very accurate name for the cross over/ cross under subgenre.
NO CENSORSHIP
It is essential to my beliefs of what it means to be a public librarian is to be as liberal and progressive with liberty and freedom for all. This means casting the widest net as wide as we can given our limitations, in the books public libraries carry, trying to be as objective and open minded as possible.
I can understand why some people want to sensor certain books due to their defensive natures and their own types of sensitive discriminations. This said there is little to defend such insecure personal judgments. I think much arrogance is based on ignorance, so if people were exposed to more things the less arrogant and more open-minded people would be. Hence more exposure to greater diversity equals a better world.
Now stepping back to the articles Campell has a compelling argument for more positive literature about Christianity and Judaism and spirituality and religion in general, to be balanced I would add that YA books about evolution and YA fiction about science in general is also underrepresented. I agree with pretty much all of what Levithan wrote about in his activist article about the under representation of Gay (and LGBTQ) teen literature. I specifically like his point about library collections being representations, and that it is a librarian’s obligation to make this representation as welcoming and as accurate as possible. So true, I also agree with his point about identities of all kinds need to be defended and represented as fact.
As future librarians we must have the most diverse representation of literature possible. It is our duty to our country, to each other and to all humanity.
Relabel Non-fiction, get real
I feel that labeling our nonfiction as informative texts and our fiction as simple narrative would be a great disservice to discerning readers. Harris is wrong on a basic level. As fully literate human beings, we learn “information” from stories sometimes even more fully and carefully than we learn from “preachy” informative work. The assertion that learning/teaching is the proper domain of “experts” and that all narrative “stories” must be entirely separate is, in my view, evolutionarily incorrect. As I understand prehistory, we learned much of our information through stories--of events, of hunts, of heroic deeds -- not through anything close to scientific studies of these phenomena. I feel that Harris is both historically inaccurate, and wrong today, for people of all ages continue to learn from stories. Consider what happens at the dinner table, in bars, at the beauty salon, or on fishing trips. Harris’s idea that young people would somehow benefit from inaccurately labeled sections is absurd.
21st century YA reference
I think that we, as librarians in information professionals, need to harness and empower our young adults technical savvy with information literacy through various methods. Whether it is online or digital reference services (like those we read about) and other resources or using e-readers for reference help or effective communication with librarians in the physical space of our libraries, our young people need to be well prepared for working with the resources and services that our 21st century public libraries provide.
To give better reference help for teens we need to pay special attention to the young adults we serve. As the Walter and Mediavilla article points out, if we want to be effective as librarians for young adults we will need to focus on helping teens achieve development outcomes associated with adolescence. We must provide informational and reading resources and services that meet their individual objectives. For their individualistic cultural world, the “average” will not do. If we use more advanced inquiry-refining techniques and effective language, then the inquiry has better chances for success whether the reference question needs to be met in cyber space or in the physical space of the library itself.
Relabel Non-fiction, get real
I feel that labeling our nonfiction as informative texts and our fiction as simple narrative would be a great disservice to discerning readers. Harris is wrong on a basic level. As fully literate human beings, we learn “information” from stories sometimes even more fully and carefully than we learn from “preachy” informative work. The assertion that learning/teaching is the proper domain of “experts” and that all narrative “stories” must be entirely separate is, in my view, evolutionarily incorrect. As I understand prehistory, we learned much of our information through stories--of events, of hunts, of heroic deeds -- not through anything close to scientific studies of these phenomena. I feel that Harris is both historically inaccurate, and wrong today, for people of all ages continue to learn from stories. Consider what happens at the dinner table, in bars, at the beauty salon, or on fishing trips. Harris’s idea that young people would somehow benefit from inaccurately labeled sections is absurd.
21st century YA reference
I think that we, as librarians in information professionals, need to harness and empower our young adults technical savvy with information literacy through various methods. Whether it is online or digital reference services (like those we read about) and other resources or using e-readers for reference help or effective communication with librarians in the physical space of our libraries, our young people need to be well prepared for working with the resources and services that our 21st century public libraries provide.
To give better reference help for teens we need to pay special attention to the young adults we serve. As the Walter and Mediavilla article points out, if we want to be effective as librarians for young adults we will need to focus on helping teens achieve development outcomes associated with adolescence. We must provide informational and reading resources and services that meet their individual objectives. For their individualistic cultural world, the “average” will not do. If we use more advanced inquiry-refining techniques and effective language, then the inquiry has better chances for success whether the reference question needs to be met in cyber space or in the physical space of the library itself.