This is what a Librarian looks like
Not so long ago, ”breaking stereotypes” was a major
trend in library conferences. The
misconception that female librarians wore glasses, their hair in a bun and the
twinset and pearls was prevalent. I’m
guilty of 2/4 of those.
One night many years ago I was out to dinner with a
friend and her workmates. As usually
happens when faced with people you’ve never met before conversation turns to
“what do you do for a living?” Rather than
say straight out, I named some of the tasks librarians do – customer service,
data entry, records management, website work etc, mentioned I worked in local
government and asked them to guess.
Conversation strayed but eventually came back to that
question again. So I again asked them to
guess. Teacher? Typist? PA? No (although that was my first profession). No. And
no.
When I told them I was a librarian the table went
quiet. Eventually, someone said “I
didn’t want to say that ‘cos I thought it might offend you”. What part of my
job would I be offended at?
I like the fact that the perception of library staff
has changed over the last few years.
What I love even more is that fact that many of us are proud about what
we do. Librarianship as a career is as
varied as the people who work in the industry.
To see the faces of our industry today –
internationally – take a look at This is what a librarian
looks like Each image has a story
behind it, and shows how diverse out industry workers are.
Kelly