Michael Gorman (librarian)

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Michael Gorman (born 1941) is a British librarian. He grew up in London, England and gained an interest in libraries in part through his experiences at the Hendon library run by Eileen Colwell. He attended Ealing Technical College (now Thames Valley University) in London from 1964-1966.

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[edit] Career

From 1988 to 2007, Gorman was Dean of Library Services at the Henry Madden Library, California State University, Fresno. Gorman retired in 2008. From 1977 to 1988, he worked at the Library of the University of Illinois as, successively, Director of Technical Services, Director of General Services, and Acting University Librarian. From 1966 to 1977 he was, successively, Head of Cataloguing at the British National Bibliography, a member of the British Library Planning Secretariat, and Head of the Office of Bibliographic Standards in the British Library. He has taught at library schools in Britain and in the United States - most recently at the UCLA Graduate School of Education and Information Studies. Gorman was president of the American Library Association (ALA) for 2005-2006.

Michael Gorman is a traditionalist who sees the current state of library education as a crisis. His views on the Internet, digitization of books, Google, citizen journalism, and information science are passionately conservative. He has been called antidigital, elitist, a luddite, and even an idiot by his detractors. Two publications in particular have caused the most backlash, the 2004 article “Google and God’s Mind” [1], originally printed in the Los Angeles Times, and the 2005 response article “Revenge of the Blog People!”[2], originally printed in Library Journal.

Gorman’s ideas are not particularly controversial by themselves, but the way in which his views are presented has been seen at times as sarcastic, snobbish, and even aggressive. He has referred to the “seduction” of modern communication technology and the “assault” of information science. His opinions about values and the new generation of technolibrarians (sometimes he refers to them as pseudo-librarians) have been particularly alienating to some.

Michael Gorman is very connected to the ALA motto: "The best reading, for the largest number, at the least cost". Gorman believes in the power of the book as a format, and in the skill of traditional literacy as opposed to "visual literacy", etc. He sees library service as the most important part of a librarian's job, and has proposed changes in the curriculum of library schools to emphasize this. Gorman's opinion on the current state of things is often critical, but he has expressed continued optimism for the future survival of libraries. Although he is dismissive of certain trends in library science, he remains convinced that librarians will exist as long as traditional values are represented.

[edit] Gorman's ideas

[edit] The Eight Central Values of Librarians

  • Stewardship: the preservation and care of the human record
  • Service: professional and philanthropic, dedicated to human advancement
  • Intellectual Freedom: resist censorship, grant materials available
  • Privacy: ensure confidentiality, overcome technological invasions
  • Rationalism: organize materials in a logical manner, apply rationalism to procedures
  • Commitment to Literacy and Learning: encourage lifelong learning, provide literacy education
  • Equity of Access: ensure access, overcome barriers to use
  • Democracy: maintain democratic values, participate in educational process

[edit] Core curriculum for library schools

  • Collection Development
  • Cataloging
  • Reference and Library Instruction
  • Circulation
  • Maintenance
  • Preservation
  • Management

[edit] Problems facing libraries today

  • “Flight” from print sources
  • Diminishing funding
  • Librarians out of touch with Patron’s needs
  • Retirement of irreplaceable generation
  • “Assault” of Information Science

[edit] Publications

Gorman is the first editor of the Anglo-American Cataloging Rules, 2nd ed, as well as the 1988 revision, and is the author of The Concise AACR2, the fourth edition of which was published in 2005.

He is also the co-author (with Walt Crawford) of Future Libraries: Dreams, Madness, and Reality, which was honored with the 1997 Blackwell’s Scholarship Award. He has written two books about the profession of librarianship and the value of traditional librarianship: Our Enduring Values, published by ALA in 2000, and Our Own Selves: More Meditations for Librarians (2005). He has also written "The Enduring Library: Technology, Tradition, and the Quest for Balance" (2003), "Technical Services Today and Tomorrow" (1998), and "Our Singular Strengths: Meditations for Librarians" (1997). Our Enduring Values: Librarianship in the 21st Century (2000) won the ALA’s 2001 Highsmith award for the best book on librarianship.

Gorman is also the author of hundreds of articles about librarianship and issues in library science, published in various formats.

[edit] Awards

Gorman has been the recipient of numerous awards, including the Margaret Mann Citation in 1979, the 1992 Melvil Dewey Medal, Blackwell’s Scholarship Award in 1997, and the California Library Association/Access, Collections, and Technical Services Section Award of Achievement in 1999. He is a member of the ALA's council (1991-1995 and 2002-2006) and the ALA Executive Board through to 2007. He was made a fellow of the British Library Association in 1979 and an Honorary Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals (CILIP) in 2005.

[edit] References

  1. ^ Google and God's Mind The problem is, information isn't knowledge. by Michael Gorman, Los Angeles Times (December 17, 2004)
  2. ^ Revenge of the Blog People! by Michael Gorman -- Library Journal, 2/15/2005

[edit] External links

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