I can't even list all of the different activities we saw going on at the archive. We visited the map room, the reading rooms, the microfiche room, and the children's section. Have a look at the following article taking us through the theme Reflections on the public Library San Diego.
We stepped over art students making sketches of the building interior; we breezed through one of the two brilliant exhibitions curated by the archive's staff, we tip-toed through the archive's rooms for research fellows. Each of these places was full of human beings, doing-I doesn't know what. Perhaps one of them was there to look online for a job, and maybe one was researching a story from their family history.
What does it mean to honor libraries? I don't need to reinvent the wheel here; there are quotes carved into the wall all over the archive. To honor libraries is to accept democracy. It is to honor the equality of citizens-to respect and indeed create a meritocracy. It is to acknowledge the role of knowledge in society. It is to accept human potential.
This archive is a demonstration that New York City honors these ideals, however imperfect we may be in fully realizing them. Although its architecture is very classic, when the New York Public Archive was built, it was a model of innovation. The system of book retrieval is an illustrative example. Being a research archive, many of the NYPL's books are not in continuous demand.
We've experimented with different models of garnering funds from the community, and nothing has taken hold quite yet. Maria had a lot of questions for our great tour guide about this aspect of things-especially about how the trustees work. Of course, people have their interests for being on a archive board, but overall, supporting libraries is firmly in the sphere of civic duty.
As you might expect, the NYPL is very different now than it was when it opened. It was one of the first libraries to digitize its catalog, maintaining a wall of books filled with the old cards, for preservation purposes. We saw books being moved off-site, as the archive relocates much of its collection to a warehouse in New Jersey. The books will still be available, but they will have to be transported from the store upon request.
Of course, the NYPL has not abandoned the book. But this story does give rise to an interesting problem that libraries face. Although the archive is a public institution, people's relationship with it is intensely personal. The archive is thus in a tricky place, it has to both continually innovate to be at the cutting edge, but it is also the vanguard of our shared culture, which can spill over into nostalgia.
In Busia, we get to be cutting edge now. We get to start from scratch and think about all the things that Busia needs, scope out all of the best ideas that are out there, and build based on that. We'll have a citizen science center, a co-working space, and an oral history lab. But, once established, the job of being innovative is not done-it's a continual process not to be a relic.
We stepped over art students making sketches of the building interior; we breezed through one of the two brilliant exhibitions curated by the archive's staff, we tip-toed through the archive's rooms for research fellows. Each of these places was full of human beings, doing-I doesn't know what. Perhaps one of them was there to look online for a job, and maybe one was researching a story from their family history.
What does it mean to honor libraries? I don't need to reinvent the wheel here; there are quotes carved into the wall all over the archive. To honor libraries is to accept democracy. It is to honor the equality of citizens-to respect and indeed create a meritocracy. It is to acknowledge the role of knowledge in society. It is to accept human potential.
This archive is a demonstration that New York City honors these ideals, however imperfect we may be in fully realizing them. Although its architecture is very classic, when the New York Public Archive was built, it was a model of innovation. The system of book retrieval is an illustrative example. Being a research archive, many of the NYPL's books are not in continuous demand.
We've experimented with different models of garnering funds from the community, and nothing has taken hold quite yet. Maria had a lot of questions for our great tour guide about this aspect of things-especially about how the trustees work. Of course, people have their interests for being on a archive board, but overall, supporting libraries is firmly in the sphere of civic duty.
As you might expect, the NYPL is very different now than it was when it opened. It was one of the first libraries to digitize its catalog, maintaining a wall of books filled with the old cards, for preservation purposes. We saw books being moved off-site, as the archive relocates much of its collection to a warehouse in New Jersey. The books will still be available, but they will have to be transported from the store upon request.
Of course, the NYPL has not abandoned the book. But this story does give rise to an interesting problem that libraries face. Although the archive is a public institution, people's relationship with it is intensely personal. The archive is thus in a tricky place, it has to both continually innovate to be at the cutting edge, but it is also the vanguard of our shared culture, which can spill over into nostalgia.
In Busia, we get to be cutting edge now. We get to start from scratch and think about all the things that Busia needs, scope out all of the best ideas that are out there, and build based on that. We'll have a citizen science center, a co-working space, and an oral history lab. But, once established, the job of being innovative is not done-it's a continual process not to be a relic.
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