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The Theory of Human Caring and Service Friendly Librarians. Dr. Susan E. Higgins University of Southern Mississippi School of Library and Information Science Hattiesburg, MS. USA. Premise.
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The Theory of Human Caring and Service Friendly Librarians Dr. Susan E. Higgins University of Southern Mississippi School of Library and Information Science Hattiesburg, MS. USA
Premise • By accepting human caring as a foundational concept of LIS, librarians will be more conscious practitioners. • They will contribute to the professionalism of the field.
Information in this Century • This foundational concept is the best way to influence the future of information in the 21st century.
The Premise is Based on Responsibility • Records of human achievement assist in greater understandings among people everywhere. • Librarians themselves are peacekeepers.
The Premise is Based on The Science of Human Caring • A caring disposition is the greatest asset a librarian can bring to the profession. • The librarian develops a caring disposition along with the knowledge of resources
The Premise is Based on Hospitality • The library is a channel of hospitality, idealism and reverence for culture. • These cannot be seen with the naked eye – only experienced.
The Premise is based on the user a multidimensional person Users are not just consumers of information, they are contributors themselves.
Why do we serve? • Librarians are drawn to the profession by their desire to interact or serve those who interact in libraries in a humanistic fashion.
How Can I Serve? • “The librarian’s role is to minimize the inquirer’s intellectual and emotional effort in seeking information.” Dr. Richard Crouch
Caring Science Questions • How can I intervene? • What questions can be asked? • How can I enter the user’s informing processes? • How can I deliver what will be informing to the unique individual asking the question?
The Information Caregiver • Jean Watson’s Theory of Human Caring for nurses is congruent with the traditional role of librarians, predominately women. • Caring science includes multiple and inclusive approaches to inquiry – not just the statistical evidence of hard science.
Carl Rogers – 1902-1987 A psychologist best known for his motivation theory, Self-actualization. Rogers wrote that this innate tendency for growth motivates all human behavior The concept is congruent with that of lifelong learning.
Positive Self Regard • Rogers believed that positive self regard is modeled by holding others in positive self regard. • Librarians can begin to minimize an inquirer’s intellectual and emotional effort in seeking information by holding them in a positive light.
Adele Fasick Librarians welcome and support people in their pursuit of knowledge.
Kay Vandergrift • Kay Vandergrift sees caring for library users as an ethical stance for librarianship. • Ways of knowing and ways of being are interrelated.
Service to children • Historically, public library service to children was to be intelligent and sympathetic • This was considered a philosophical stance • It was also ethical that only those who liked children actually served them.
The Service Mentality • By promoting library service as a caring science, theory and practice are brought together in lifelong learning.
Servant-leadership and librarianship • This management style advocates the ability to listen, be compassionate, encourage growth in people and focus on the community. (Heaphey, James) • Servant-leadership is the antithesis of quantitative, systems based approaches to management.
Managing the Manager • How we manage ourselves and how we are managed by library management itself is also a research context.
Effective Practice • Qualitative approaches to research and qualitative understandings of context are linked to more effective practice.
What will I be tomorrow? • Service friendly librarians will be the most powerful designers of the information and research landscape of tomorrow. • A qualitative research mileau can empower librarians.
References • Boeree, C. George. Carl Rogers 1902-1987. http://webspace.ship.edu/cgboer/rogers.html Accessed 5/6/2007 • Crouch, Richard Keith. Interpersonal Communication in the Reference Interview. Doctoral Dissertation. University of Toronto (Canada). DAI 42/10 A., p. 4189, 1981.
References • Fasick, Adele. Guildelines for Children’s Services, Section of Children’s Libraries. Supplement to Guidelines for Public Libraries (1986). IFLA Professional Report No. 25 IFLA, 1991. • Heaphey, James. Servant-leadership in public libraries. Indiana Libraries 25(3), 2006. 22-25
References • Vandergrift, Kay. Journey or Destination: Female Voices in Youth Literature. Htt://www.scils.rutgers.edu/~kvander/books/KAYMOS.pdf • Accessed 12/6/2007 • Watson, Jean. Dr. Jean Watson’s Theory of Human Caring. University of Colorado Health Science Center. www.2uchsc.edu/son/caring/content. Accessed 26/9/2007.